Can You Move an Appliance to the Basement?

Can You Move an Appliance to the Basement?

Last updated: October 2026

Yes. Basement and second-floor placements with stair dollies are everyday work for us.

In a lot of Chicago homes, the basement is where the appliances end up. The laundry room is down there. The second fridge or the chest freezer lives down there. And when you buy a new washer or move into a house with an unfinished basement, the heavy machine has to make it down those stairs somehow.

How it goes down the stairs

We move appliances on stair dollies. The appliance gets strapped to the dolly, and the crew controls it one step at a time on the way down. It's slow on purpose. Very slow. A washer or a fridge that gets away on a staircase can damage the machine, the stairs, and the walls.

Floors, door frames, and stairs get protected before anything moves. Read how we protect floors and homes.

What the stairs tell us

Chicago basement stairs come in every shape. Some are wide and straight. Plenty are narrow and steep, and in a lot of older bungalows and two-flats they turn at the bottom right next to a doorway that was built long before anyone imagined a side-by-side fridge. When you call, tell us about yours.

How wide they are. Measure at the narrowest point.

Whether they turn. And how tight the turn is.

What's at the bottom. A doorway, a hallway, or a low ceiling.

How big the appliance is. Height, width, and depth.

Getting the appliance ready

Before we arrive, the appliance needs to be disconnected. We don't do plumbing work, so gas and water lines need to be disconnected and reconnected by a licensed plumber. Read do you disconnect gas and water lines on appliances.

For refrigerators, the only prep is draining them. Empty the fridge, then drain it so there's no water left inside when it's tipped onto a dolly.

Going up instead of down

The same goes for the second floor. If the laundry is upstairs, the washer and dryer go up on stair dollies the same way. Second-floor placements are everyday work too.

Moving it inside the same house

Sometimes the appliance isn't coming from another home at all. A fridge is moving from the kitchen to the basement. A washer is moving from the garage to a new laundry room. We move appliances within the same building or to another location, wherever you need them. Read do you move appliances within the same building.

Out with the old one

If a new appliance is replacing an old one, we can take the old one away. Working appliances go to local donation centers when they can be reused, and the rest go to the junk yard. Our appliance removal service covers how that works.

For a full look at moving fridges, washers, and ranges, read our guide on moving large appliances in Chicago.

Pricing

Appliance moves are hourly like our other moves, with a 2-hour minimum. Moving companies in the Chicago area charge at least one hour for travel.

Basement placements are part of our large appliance moving service, one of our moving services.

Call (773) 275-4100 or email info@wcmoving.com, and tell us about the stairs.