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dennyk posted:You did something terribly wrong if you were quoted $3K for a 14' U-Haul one-way. This may be true if you are moving from one large city to another but is definitely not true if you are moving to smaller towns. I checked several rental truck options (as well as some of the you-pack-it options) for a 2000 mile (midwest to west coast) move this summer and the lowest I could get (WITHOUT insurance) was ~1.5k. I ultimately wound up selling all my stuff and shipping anything important to myself. I made ~2k selling my stuff and am saving ~1-1.5k on the move itself. That gives me ~3k to buy new stuff when I get there. It's actually not a bad option for your average fresh out of college student contemplating a big move, and it's one a lot of people tend to forget about. I'm shipping myself about 14 boxes and it's still only going to be about 1/3 the cost of getting rental truck. Not to mention what I will save on gas and insurance. quote:DO NOT BUY MOVING BOXES. Although this is usually true, there are some instances where buying boxes is worthwhile. I purchased boxes for my computer tower and framed photos. These boxes were of more difficult to come by sizes and were going to contain important items that I don't want to get damaged in transit. If you have items like this, I do recommend your U-haul store for buying odd-sized boxes. Almost every town will have one, they have a great selection, and the boxes are priced much lower than at most other stores. Just don't rent a truck from them. The last one I rented had a non-adjustable seat and could only be safely operated by someone at least 6 feet tall. I am 5'6". They could not get me another truck, despite my reservation. Which brings up another useful moving tip: Always plan for them to not have the truck you reserved ready at the time you reserved it for. Regardless of the truck vendor you use. It's like some kind of law. I have yet to ever receive the truck I reserved at the time I reserved it for.
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Jun 26, 2011 19:47
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Cheesus posted:Also, any opinions of U-Pack moving (http://www.upack.com)? I like the idea of packing my own trailer but not having to drive it. I looked into PODS but they don't deliver to my destination. I've used them myself once, and helped my sister move using them once. No issues either time. We did the version where we packed/unpacked it at their facility both times rather than the drop off/pick up service though, so I can't speak to that portion. The stuff all arrived on time and the staff were very nice and easy to deal with in all cases. Nothing was broken, although some of my stuff did fall over (but my fault for how it was packed, and all lightweight/unbreakable stuff). It was not only my cheapest option, but also meant I did not need to drive a giant truck 1500 miles, which was great.
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Nov 9, 2011 20:24
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An observer posted:I'm moving cross country in July-ish. I'm not taking any furniture with me- just books, clothes, other misc things. I'm thinking it would probably make more sense to ship the stuff with UPS or FedEx or something instead of getting movers, but what the hell do I know. Advice? I did this last year in July and shipped everything USPS because it was cheapest. I only had two boxes where items inside got damaged and they were pretty predictable (pictures with glass in the frames and my computer tower). In both cases my packaging was not as good as it could have been. Honestly, which how UPS treats packages here I'm not sure they would have done better, and I didn't having anything worth enough to me to both paying the FedEx price. One tip: Pack all the books/DVDs/CDs together and you can ship them media mail for a lot less. If you put other stuff in with them they don't qualify and you will have to pay normal shipping rates. Media mail can take longer, though for me it arrived at the same time as the other stuff. I saved at least $50 (and probably closer to $100) shipping my books and movies via media mail. If you have an address in advance of when you move (like a friend who will let you send the stuff to their place) it makes it a bit easier. I was able to send stuff over a 2 month period before the move. Are you driving or flying to get yourself there? I had to drive my car and dog with me so I sold or shipped everything that would not fit in the car with me. I spend less than half what I would have to get a uhaul and about a third what it would have cost to get movers, and was just able to drive my own car for the move, which was a lot more comfortable. It also let me hold on to fragile things and not risk them getting busted up in shipping. If I had it to do over again I'd have brought the computer tower with me this way.
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Nov 21, 2011 21:51
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Have you actually checked out the local furniture stores? One of the places near us was a total poo poo-show. Everyone was pushy and rude and the stuff was all way overpriced. But a store one town over (we seriously live in the middle of nowhere) was actually very nice, reasonably priced, good quality, and provided free delivery with the purchase. It can be well worth it to check out the local options fully before you switch to online.
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Jan 11, 2012 20:03
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xeria posted:Yeah, when I moved from Florida to Oregon, I sold all of my furniture to a co-worker and donated all my books to Goodwill. I still ended up with almost 40 boxes of stuff (mostly kitchen-related) and I packed all that really well and had it shipped via UPS for something around $800. Then I packed all my really expensive stuff (tv, computer, various electronics) and other things I didn't want to ship into my Jeep and drove cross-country with just that. Took about 4 solid days and all my boxes from UPS arrived the morning after I got to my new place. I probably mentioned it earlier in this thread, but I did this to move from Indiana to Idaho. It was cheaper/easier but mostly worked out for me because my fiance was already in Idaho with his stuff and we got married a few months after my move (so we got wedding presents to replace some of what I sold). Pretty happy with the choice though. It was so much nicer to drive a normal car cross-country than a big truck and I didn't have anything I was really attached to as far as furniture went.
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Feb 14, 2012 07:12
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AbsoluteLlama posted:Is it legal to be turned down for housing for 'not being a couple'? Even in the US where we are totally backwards with many housing laws I don't think that would fly. I mean, the landlord wouldn't tell you that's the reason anyway. This is actually quite common in the US, at least in the Orlando area. It's not at all uncommon for it to be a HOA rule that any house in a subdivision cannot be rented to adults who are not either 1) related or 2) married. At least in the area I was in it seemed to be primarily a way to avoid people renting their houses out to college students. One tip for any grad students in the thread who may not already know this: it can help tremendously to either be very clear with any potential landlords that you are a grad student (if they know what that is) or just stick to saying that you work for the school (as a research assistant/teaching assistant/whatever your stipend is coming from).
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Feb 21, 2012 05:46
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I've had landlords offer to include lawn maintenance if we wanted to pay $50 extra a month. We just bought a lawnmower for $75 on craigslist and sold it at the end of the year for $60. I think we put gas in it twice, and this was living in Florida where the grass had to be mowed ~10 months out of the year. When we did not have time to deal with it for the last 2-3 months we hired the neighbors kid across the street to cut it for $20 every two weeks. You would be stupid to rule out a place because of lawn maintenance IMO. Just hire someone to do it if the landlord doesn't want to and you don't want to deal with maintaining it yourself.
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Feb 28, 2012 17:07
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Yeah, I really think that's too large a portion of your income to be spending on rent. I'm spending 1/4 to 1/3 of my income on rent (depending on whether we have 2 or 3 roommates in any given month) and anything more would be pretty rough. Having roommates is pretty normal in my department though. I don't think you will manage 2/3 of your income going to rent without taking out student loans.
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Mar 21, 2012 03:00
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Comstar posted:What things should I look at for a bed when renting? A lot of beds I've looked at don't look very mobile or moveable. And as a related question, if you have the space, is bigger = better? I would disagree about a full being enough and would go for a queen if you've got two people sleeping in the bed. Don't get a king unless you are willing to deal with a lot of headaches. They are much harder to move and a lot of places won't have bedrooms large enough to house a king sized bed comfortably. Look for real wood (or metal), not particle board (this is true for all furniture, particle board does not break down and move well). Skip the box spring and get something that just has slats. Make sure there are enough slats. I got this bedframe with the headboard at the last place I lived and was quite happy with it. You can easily paint it any color you want, it goes together and breaks down easily, and doesn't get wobbly after it's been in use for a while. It was also cheaper than anything I could find locally. I was much happier with it than the Ikea bedframe I'd had before (though I'm sure some of the Ikea ones are perfectly fine).
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Apr 16, 2012 05:10
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The Lazer posted:Is it normal for an apartment complex to want you to be able to show twice the amount of rent a month in income for all three people renting a place. What I mean is I have myself and two other roommates, we want to rent a 3 bedroom apartment. The rent for the place is 1200 or so. The management staff wants all 3 of us individually to show 2400 a month in income. In the area I went to college in this was used as a way of keeping out students. It wasn't something every place did by any stretch but it wasn't super unusual either, especially at nicer places.
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May 9, 2012 00:55
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Aquatic Giraffe posted:Anyone have any experience with ABF shipping? They seem to be a blend between PODS and traditional movers, they drop off a moving pod thing to load up at your leisure, but also include movers to load/unload if you want. I got a coupon for $50 off my move from ABF through the post office when I filled out my change of address forms so I've been looking at using them. Used them and help my sister used them. They are great. No complaints at all from me.
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May 21, 2012 02:49
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