How Much Money Has Moving Fraud Cost Consumers? We Estimated It.

There is no official estimate of how much money moving fraud costs American consumers each year. FMCSA tracks complaints but does not aggregate dollar losses. The DOT Office of Inspector General investigates individual cases but does not publish cumulative financial data. State attorneys general prosecute moving companies but do not report combined consumer losses in a standardized way.

Trunk built an estimate from the bottom up, using real complaint data from FMCSA's National Consumer Complaint Database, documented financial losses from federal and state cases, and published research on complaint underreporting rates.

Trunk's database contains complaint records for 2,231 interstate household goods carriers and brokers. Of these, 250 companies have at least one NCCDB complaint on file. Across all years and categories, those 250 companies have accumulated a combined 3,057 complaints.

This number represents only complaints filed with FMCSA. It does not include complaints filed with the BBB, state attorneys general, local police, or consumer protection agencies. It does not include consumers who were harmed but filed no complaint at all.

FMCSA complaint records do not include dollar amounts. To estimate per-incident losses, Trunk compiled documented financial figures from federal court filings, state attorney general cases, and verified consumer reports.

Documented cases with known financial losses:

- Value Added Moving (DOT 2915791): $4,131 average overcharge per consumer, based on 135 complaints and documented case filings. - Safe Ship / Ver Vanlines network: Eschbach family charged $22,000 above the binding estimate for a move from Florida to Michigan. Consumer report confirmed with photographic evidence. - Tattoli / Lucrative Van Lines network (DOT 3999967): $20,000 overcharge documented in a single consumer case, with goods held at a Clifton, NJ warehouse until payment. - Safe Ship / Ver Vanlines: $4,000 overcharge on a PCS military move (Wang v. Safe Ship, Palm Beach County Case 502025CA012956). - Coastal Moving Services (DOT 4090919): $2,500 or more in documented overcharges across multiple consumer reports, with 229 NCCDB complaints and 316 BBB complaints.

The median documented overcharge across these cases is approximately $4,100. However, this figure does not capture all costs. Additional losses include:

- Non-refundable wire deposits (typically $1,000 to $3,000), which are lost when consumers cancel after discovering the company is fraudulent. - Damaged or missing property. The average interstate move involves $25,000 to $50,000 in household goods. Even partial damage or loss at 5% to 10% of value adds $1,250 to $5,000 per incident. - Storage fees charged while goods are held in transit warehouses, often $150 to $500 per month. - Legal costs for consumers who pursue small claims court or hire attorneys.

Conservative estimate of total financial harm per complaint: $4,100 in direct overcharges plus $1,500 in ancillary costs (deposits, damage, storage, legal). Total: approximately $5,600 per complaint.

FMCSA's own publications acknowledge that most harmed consumers do not file federal complaints. The agency's 2019 consumer advisory states that complaints help FMCSA identify problem carriers, but the agency has never published a formal underreporting ratio for household goods complaints.

Research from other consumer protection domains provides guidance. The Federal Trade Commission's 2017 study of consumer fraud found that only 4.8% of fraud victims reported the incident to any government agency. The Bureau of Justice Statistics reports similar underreporting rates for property crime.

For moving fraud specifically, underreporting is likely higher than average because:

1. Many consumers do not know FMCSA exists or that they can file a complaint. 2. The complaint process requires identifying the correct DOT number, which many victims cannot locate. 3. Consumers who paid cash (a common demand from fraudulent movers) may fear drawing attention to the transaction. 4. Military PCS movers often absorb losses rather than disrupt their relocation timeline.

Conservative multiplier: 7x. This assumes roughly 1 in 7 harmed consumers files an FMCSA complaint. This is more conservative than the FTC's 1-in-20 ratio but accounts for the fact that moving fraud involves large dollar amounts, which correlates with higher reporting rates.

Documented NCCDB complaints (all years, 250 companies): 3,057

Annualized complaints (based on 2025 and 2026 data showing acceleration): approximately 1,200 per year across tracked companies.

Unreported incidents (1,200 x 7 multiplier): approximately 8,400 total incidents per year.

Average financial harm per incident: $5,600.

Estimated annual consumer losses: 8,400 x $5,600 = $47,040,000.

Rounded: approximately $47 million per year.

This estimate covers only interstate household goods moves regulated by FMCSA. It does not include intrastate moves (regulated by individual states), which represent a larger volume of total moves and likely a comparable or greater volume of fraud.

This estimate is conservative. It excludes several categories of loss:

- Intrastate moving fraud, which involves a much larger number of companies and moves. - Emotional and psychological costs, including stress, lost time, and disruption to employment or housing. - Insurance claim payouts that are denied or reduced by carriers invoking released-value protection ($0.60 per pound). - Costs borne by taxpayers through law enforcement investigations, court proceedings, and regulatory operations. - Lost wages from consumers who must take time off work to deal with hostage loads, missing belongings, or legal disputes.

If intrastate moves are included and the FTC's 1-in-20 reporting ratio is applied instead of 1-in-7, the total estimate would exceed $200 million per year.

FMCSA's total annual budget for all programs (not just household goods) is approximately $900 million. The agency has closed zero broker enforcement cases since September 2024. Whether any HHG-related safety enforcement cases were closed in the same period is unclear.

The estimated $47 million in annual consumer losses from interstate moving fraud alone exceeds the total annual revenue of most individual moving companies in the country. It is roughly equivalent to the combined annual revenue of the 10 most-complained companies in our database.

For comparison, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau recovers approximately $600 million per year for harmed consumers across all financial products. FMCSA recovered $0 for moving fraud consumers in the same period.

This estimate was built using Trunk's database of 2,231 interstate HHG carriers and brokers, with complaint data scraped from FMCSA's NCCDB as of September 2026. Dollar figures come from documented court filings, state attorney general cases, and verified consumer reports with supporting evidence. The underreporting multiplier of 7x is a conservative assumption; sensitivity analysis at 5x yields $33.6 million annually and at 10x yields $67.2 million annually. All figures are presented as estimates, not precise measurements. The true number is unknowable because FMCSA does not track financial losses in its complaint system.