It’s not every day that you see a truck rolling down the main drag of town with a house on the back. Mobile homes are one thing. But a single-family with a porch going from point A to point B? That’ll get your attention.

You might be curious why anyone would physically move a house — like, dig it out of the ground and take it to another location — rather than just find a new one like most people do. Typically, historic homes are the best candidates to justify the enormous expense and effort this process requires.

Take the 3,000-square-foot Mackenzie House in Detroit. After nearly 125 years on Cass Avenue, Wayne State University’s historic David Mackenzie House relocated in 2019. Built in 1895, this Queen Anne-style home belonged to David Mackenzie, the university’s founder. It cost $750,000 just to move the house around the block. According to the National Register of Historic Places, more than 95,000 properties have been listed in the National Register as “worthy of preservation.”

But there are other reasons to move a house, too. Hard to wrap your head around how such a colossal feat gets accomplished? It’s interesting stuff… we found out all the details from a pro who’s crew does 200 to 250 house lifts annually.