Flat pack that arrived while you were not there, a bedroom that has to be ready before guests, or a wardrobe that was built once and has never closed properly since. Send the make and model or a photo of the boxes, and you get a free quote that includes fixing it safely and taking the packaging away.
Free and without obligation.
Furniture assembly in the Algarve covers flat pack and delivered furniture built in the room it belongs in: wardrobes, beds, storage, desks and office furniture, garden furniture and kitchen units. The build includes levelling on a floor that is rarely flat, fixing tall pieces to the wall with the right fixing for that wall, adjusting doors and drawers, and removing the packaging. Handyman Algarve quotes furniture assembly in the Algarve for free, in English or Portuguese.
The leaflet in the box assumes a level floor, a solid wall and a room with space to lay everything out. A Portuguese house often has none of the three. Floors in older properties fall away towards a drain or a doorway, so a wardrobe built square on the floor rocks when it is stood up, and its doors then refuse to stay closed. Walls are the bigger issue: the strap supplied for anti tip fixing is made for a generic wall, and hollow brick, thermal block and plasterboard each need a different fixing to hold. And apartments here often have narrow stairwells and tight landings, which decides whether a piece can be built in the room or has to be built where it stands. None of that is difficult. It is simply the difference between a piece that lasts and one that is loose within a year.
Every tall piece of furniture supplied today comes with a strap or bracket, because a wardrobe or a chest of drawers can tip when a drawer is pulled out or when a child uses it as a ladder. Fitting it takes minutes and is the single most important part of the assembly. What matters is matching the fixing to the wall: a plug and screw in solid masonry, a longer plug that reaches the web in hollow brick, a cavity fixing or a screw into a stud in plasterboard. In a rented property it is worth asking the landlord before drilling, and worth saying so when you request the quote, because there are non drilling options for some situations and they need to be planned rather than improvised.
As of 2026, assembly is quoted by the piece and by the time it takes, and the model number tells a fitter almost everything: a chest of drawers is an hour, a large sliding door wardrobe is most of a day, and a garden set can be either. What moves it beyond that is access, whether the boxes are already in the room or still in the entrance hall, how many pieces there are in one visit, which is where a whole bedroom becomes cheaper per item than a single unit, and whether packaging removal is included. A rescue job on a piece someone else built is quoted after seeing photos, because it can be an adjustment or a partial rebuild.
Send the make and model, or a photo of the box labels, plus the floor the room is on. See how it works for the process from request to finished job.
Free and without obligation.
We reply within one business day, usually much faster.
It is building flat pack and delivered furniture in the room where it will be used, and securing it properly once built. In practice it also covers what the instructions leave out: getting the boxes upstairs, checking the parts against the list before starting, fixing tall units to the wall, levelling on an uneven floor, adjusting doors and drawers so they line up, and taking the packaging away.
Unpack and count every part and fitting against the list first, because a missing dowel found halfway through costs a day. Lay the panels out in build order on cardboard so nothing is scratched. Build the carcass on the floor, checking it is square before anything is fixed permanently. Fit the back, since that is what holds the square. Stand the piece up, level it with packers on the real floor, and fix it to the wall if it is tall. Doors, drawers and handles come last, and adjusting them is what makes it look bought rather than built.
Most flat pack is designed around a hex key that comes in the box, and the rest of the work needs a cordless drill or driver with a clutch, a set of bits including pozidriv, a rubber mallet, a spirit level, a tape measure and a set of packers. The clutch is the part that matters: a drill driven at full torque strips chipboard fittings, and a stripped cam fitting cannot be re tightened. The wall fixings are chosen by what the wall is, which is where most self assembly goes wrong here.
Yes, and it is the part most often skipped. Wardrobes, bookcases and chests of drawers can tip when a drawer is opened or a child climbs, and every manufacturer supplies a strap or bracket for that reason. In an Algarve house the fixing has to suit the wall: solid masonry takes a plug and screw, hollow brick needs a longer plug reaching the web, and a plasterboard partition needs a cavity fixing or a screw into a stud. The strap in the box is designed for none of those in particular.
Some of it, once, and with realistic expectations. Cam and dowel joints lose grip when they are undone, chipboard edges crumble around a fitting that has been removed, and a wardrobe that comes apart cleanly does not always go back together tight. It is usually worth dismantling a large item for a move rather than risking a doorway, and worth budgeting for a few replacement fittings. Solid wood furniture takes it far better than chipboard.
Older Algarve floors rarely are, and a wardrobe built square on the floor can rock or bind once it is stood up on tiles that fall away towards a drain or a doorway. The fix is packers under the base, set with a level before the doors are hung, not afterwards. This is the single most common reason a self assembled wardrobe has doors that will not stay closed: the piece is fine and the floor is not.