In previous Animal Crossing games, you could spend hours and hours on your town's appearance, meticulously creating orchards, gardens, and other features, only for a new villager to appear and destroy everything. The latest entry, which just hit Nintendo Switch, might change that. It has tons of quality of life improvements throughout, so many players are asking the questions: can you move houses, shops, and other buildings in Animal Crossing: New Horizons?
Can you move houses, shops and other buildings
Fortunately, the answer is a firm yes for the most part! The caveats are the Resident Services, Wharf, and Airport that cannot be moved. But you can choose well when the villagers or shops arrive where they go, setting up their tent before the full building is in place. That's already a huge improvement, but what about after that? Once you've made your choice, can you change it later? Again the answer is yes! And fans will surely rejoice.
However, there is a catch. First, the ability unlocks very late in the game, several weeks in fact for most players. You will need the full Resident Services to build and run with Isabelle inside. Speak with her and you can apply for a permit to move any building on the island. It is, however, extremely expensive. Since the game just arrived, we don't have the exact numbers, but think tens of thousands of bells to move any building. We do have help there though, if you need more bells.
Once you have the ability, you are ready. Just head to Resident Services whenever you want to move or anything else that gets in your way. Combine that with terraforming and you can remake your island all the time however you want. Hope this answers the question of whether you can move houses, shops, and other buildings in Animal Crossing: New Horizons.
– This article was last updated on: March 19, 2022
