Moving across the country is getting noticeably more expensive, with recent surveys putting the average long-distance move at $4,401, according to Angi’s 2026 moving trends report, and $4,566 for a typical cross-country relocation per HomeAdvisor’s cost data, with most households spending between $2,389 and $6,866 depending on distance and home size.
Fuel is the cost driver homeowners hear about most often, but movers say it’s a relatively small piece of what’s actually pushing prices up this year.
Fuel Surcharges Are the Easy Explanation
“Moving costs aren’t static, and neither is our data. Fuel prices and carrier capacity shift constantly,” said Ryan Carrigan, co-founder of moveBuddha, whose moving-cost data has been cited by the New York Times and Bloomberg. Fuel and carrier capacity are the factors movers cite most readily, and they’re real: moveBuddha’s calculator, which pulls more than 10,000 fresh pricing data points a month, shows customers who compare multiple quotes still save an average of 30% off their first offer, a sign of just how much prices swing carrier to carrier.
Cargo Theft Is the Bigger Story
The less obvious driver is insurance, and specifically a surge in cargo theft that’s rippling through the entire long-haul trucking industry that moving companies rely on. Losses from cargo theft across the U.S. and Canada jumped 60% in 2025, reaching an estimated $725 million, up from about $453 million in 2024, according to Verisk CargoNet’s 2025 annual analysis. The average value stolen per incident climbed to $273,990, a 36% increase, even as the total number of theft events held roughly flat.
“Criminal enterprises are becoming more selective and sophisticated,” said Keith Lewis, vice president of operations at Verisk CargoNet, in the company’s release announcing the findings, noting that thieves are increasingly targeting high-value shipments rather than opportunistic loads.
When theft losses spike industry-wide, insurance carriers raise rates across the board to account for the elevated risk, even for moving companies with clean safety records. That cost gets passed on to customers through higher base rates rather than a line-item fuel surcharge, which is part of why it doesn’t show up in the sticker-shock conversations most homeowners have with their movers.
A Driver Shortage Adds to the Squeeze
Layered on top of that is a persistent shortage of qualified truck drivers. The American Trucking Associations has reported a national shortage of roughly 50,000 drivers, a gap that pushes up wages for the drivers moving companies do employ and tightens capacity during peak moving season, when demand for trucks and crews is already highest.
Put together, the picture for anyone planning a long-distance move is less about pump prices and more about a trucking industry absorbing higher insurance costs, thinner driver rosters and a tighter capacity market, all of which show up in the quote long before the truck ever leaves the driveway.
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