Storing Furniture During a Dhaka Move — Real Costs and Pitfalls
Dhaka does not yet have a mature consumer self-storage market of the kind that exists in Bangkok, Singapore, or the Middle Eastern cities where the Bangladeshi diaspora most often compares against. What Dhaka has is a mixed patchwork — mover-operated warehouses, informal storage with relatives, dedicated village-return shipments, and a small number of new-generation self-storage operators appearing in Bashundhara and Uttara. This post is a working guide to what each option actually costs in 2026, what the failure modes look like, and how to decide between them.
The five options
1. Mover-operated warehouse storage. Companies like Rakhi, Bproperty Movers, Dhaka Movers, and Real Movers offer combined pack-move-store services. You pay per square foot per month, plus one-time pack-in and pack-out charges.
2. Standalone self-storage units. A newer offering in 2024–2026, concentrated in Bashundhara and Uttara. Units of 25 to 200 sq ft rented monthly. You pack yourself, drop off, retrieve when needed.
3. Sending furniture to the village. A common Bangladeshi solution: pack the flat’s contents onto a hired truck and send them to a family home outside the city, where a relative stores them free or for a token contribution.
4. Relative or friend’s garage or spare room. Zero or low cost, high social capital debt, and unpredictable retrieval.
5. Selling / gifting and re-buying later. For lower-value items, often cheaper than storage over 6+ months.
What each actually costs
Mover-operated warehouse
Typical 2026 pricing:
- Warehouse storage: ৳8–15 per square foot per month.
- Pack-in labour and materials (cartons, bubble wrap, plywood crating for glass): ৳6,000–15,000 for a 2 BR flat’s contents.
- Transport to warehouse: ৳4,500–9,500 for a 2 BR load within Dhaka.
- Transport out at retrieval: same range.
- Pack-out unloading and placement at new address: ৳3,000–6,000.
A typical 2 BR flat’s furniture occupies roughly 100–150 sq ft of warehouse footprint (once stacked). Six-month cost: ৳10,000–18,000 storage + ~৳18,000–35,000 one-time. Total: ~৳28,000–53,000 for six months.
Standalone self-storage
Typical 2026 pricing:
- Unit rental: ৳2,500–4,500 per month for a 25 sq ft unit; ৳6,000–11,000 for a 50 sq ft unit; larger units in proportion.
- You handle transport yourself — hired pickup truck ৳3,500–6,000 each way.
- No packing service at most locations; you bring boxes.
Six-month cost for a 50 sq ft unit: ~৳45,000 + ৳9,000 transport = **৳54,000.**
Standalone self-storage tends to be pricier per square foot than mover warehouses, but you get 24/7 access, individual lock-and-key security, and no dependency on the mover’s schedule for retrieval.
Sending to the village
Truck rental one way (mid-size, 1-ton to 3-ton depending on load): ৳12,000–35,000 depending on distance. Labour to load and unload: ৳3,000–6,000 each end. Storage cost: usually free or ৳2,000–5,000/month for a token contribution.
Six-month cost: ~৳25,000–50,000 all-in for a 2 BR load going 200 km, mostly in the round-trip transport.
Relative’s garage or spare room
The financial cost is near zero but there are three hidden costs: (a) the item’s condition when you retrieve it, (b) the social debt if the item causes any inconvenience during storage, (c) unpredictable retrieval logistics if you need something back before the storage ends.
The monsoon risk
Dhaka’s July–September monsoon is the single biggest threat to stored furniture. Failure modes we have seen:
- Warehouse roof leaks during heavy rain onto un-tarped items on upper shelves. Wooden furniture warps, mattresses mould, cardboard cartons collapse.
- Flooded ground floors in warehouses located in low-lying industrial areas outside the city.
- Humidity damage even in dry warehouses — leather sofas mildew, unfinished wood swells, upholstered items smell permanently damp after 3+ months in high humidity without ventilation.
- Village-house storage on a mud-floor room or in a shed without proper flooring — insect damage, rodent damage, and monsoon flooding all compound.
Ask before signing:
- What is the warehouse elevation relative to street? (Should be above street level.)
- Is the warehouse roof sheet-metal or reinforced concrete? (RCC significantly better.)
- Is any part of the ground floor used for storage? (Avoid ground-floor units in monsoon months.)
- Is climate control offered? (Almost none in Dhaka do, but the question surfaces the answer honestly.)
The insurance gap
Movers in Dhaka rarely include real insurance in the base quote. What you typically get:
- “Damage waiver” — a token liability of ৳500–2,000 per item, well below replacement value for most furniture.
- Optional “full-value” cover — an additional 4–8% of the declared value of goods. Rare that anyone opts for it.
- No insurance at all — the default at most smaller operators. If something is damaged, you argue over what percentage the mover pays, usually settling around 20–40% of the actual loss.
For anything genuinely valuable — antique furniture, imported appliances, art — get separate insurance from a general insurer or ask the mover to quote full-value cover explicitly. For everyday furniture, accept that a 5–10% loss rate over a six-month storage is realistic and price accordingly.
The four decisions that determine outcome
1. What actually needs storing? Almost every household over-estimates what is worth storing. A rough test: for each item, ask “if this were destroyed in storage, would I re-buy an identical replacement?” If no, sell or gift it before the move. This alone typically cuts storage cost by 30–40%.
2. Storage duration. Under 3 months: mover warehouse is easiest. 3–9 months: self-storage becomes competitive. Over 9 months: village-send or sell/rebuy usually wins on total cost.
3. Season. Avoid monsoon storage if you have any flexibility. If unavoidable, pay for the higher-quality warehouse, add tarps to your items, and check on them monthly.
4. Retrieval predictability. If you know your retrieval date within a week, mover warehouse is efficient. If retrieval could be anywhere in a 3-month window (common when waiting for a new lease to start), self-storage’s flexibility justifies the cost premium.
Two habits that save money and grief
- Photograph every item before it goes into storage. High-resolution photos with visible timestamps. This is your only leverage on damage claims.
- Do not seal cartons opaque. Use clear plastic bins or label cartons on all four sides. Retrieving the one box you need out of forty at the warehouse is meaningfully harder than it sounds when nothing is labelled.
The realistic six-month budget
For a 2 BR household using mover warehouse with basic labour and a single retrieval:
- Pack + move in: ~৳20,000
- 6 months storage of 120 sq ft: ~৳9,000
- Move out and place at new address: ~৳9,000
- Loss / damage buffer at 5% of declared value: ~৳15,000 (highly variable)
Realistic total: ৳50,000–70,000 for the full round trip. Higher if you are storing anything genuinely valuable and want to insure it properly.
For most Dhaka households moving between apartments, this is enough of a number that the “sell now, rebuy later” option is worth pricing against — for items where identical replacements are widely available, it often wins.