Moving ourselves: Are we crazy?
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Anonymous
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We'll be moving the first week of July, and I'm thinking we should save our money and move ourselves. We are only moving about two miles from our current home, and will have about a week of overlap between closing on our new place and having to be out of the old place. We don't have a ton of furniture, but there will be lots and lots of boxes. The big furniture (what DH couldn't carry by himself and I would't be strong enough to help with) only consists of a couch, one big dresser, a sideboard, and a queen-sized mattress. The rest is all smaller (4 end tables, a broken-down full-size bed, a small bookshelf, dining table and chairs, two small lightweight dressers, two TVs). I'm thinking that if DH asked a friend or two for a couple hours of help with the big stuff, we could manage the rest. We are no strangers to hard work, having just spend several years renovating our home by ourselves. This home purchase and move are going to really strap us for cash, and the $1500-2000 we've been quoted for the move seems like a ton of money!
Thoughts? |
Anonymous
| First, "only moving about two miles" should not be part of the equation. Doesn't matter if you're going two or 200 miles, it's a PITA. But two grand is two grand and with a week's overlap and a couple of friends willing to help with the big stuff, no reason not to move yourselves. |
Anonymous
Well actually it is relevant, because you can make lots of trips in not much time. It will be hellacious, OP, and you will swear you will never do it again, but you can do it and it wil be fine and over and you will still have the $$ in your pocket. |
Anonymous
| I will never again move without movers. |
Anonymous
| Depends on your friends. We have some family/friends who always do their own moves, but they aren't as well off financially as us. We do not help with moves. We make enough money to hire people to move us (and have done so in the past). Since we don't ask others to help us, we don't want to help others. I'll assist in other ways (putting away dishes, cleaning, watching the kids, etc) but we aren't going to do any lifting. Call on friends who've asked for your help with moving in the past and you're more likely to have willing participants. But be willing to hire day labors if need be. |
Anonymous
| We've done it. Sucks, but it's definitely cheap. For our last move, I paid a burly and recently laid off friend $100 to come help us with the heavy stuff for an hour. |
Anonymous
| Please check back with us once you are done. I suspect this will be your last self-move. |
Anonymous
| Unless we win the lottery, we will never pay movers. That is one thing a family can easily handle on its own. |
Anonymous
| All these people think they should move by moving companies gotta be spoiled. We have moved to another state by ourselves, unless you are old and handicap or you make tons of money. |
Anonymous
| That sounds like it will work. Moving is never fun, but it sounds like you don't have much heavy stuff. Good luck! |
Anonymous
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We actually rented a pod and took our time moving crap out. DH and I moved stuff at night when it was cooler and the babies were sleeping and just puddled away at it til we were done, then took our time unpacking at the new place the same way. That was only a few hundred. I'm way too private a person (too much porn/weird stuff/whatever) to hire movers.
Actually our move was only a couple minutes away as well and it really helped us move the breakables and bags of clothes a lot faster in the car. |
Anonymous
| We've done it. It was not a big deal when we were in our 20s and 30s. It gets much harder as you get older. We are 46 and wouldn't do it now. We're both in great shape with no health problems. We would like to stay that way. |
Anonymous
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I think the big question is, how old are your kids and what will they be doing in the midst of the moving? We are moving a block, will also have some overlap, and are planning to hire movers for the bulk of it. We'll move a lot of our own clothing, artwork, and various odds and ends during the overlap but plan to have movers come for the heavy lifting, mostly because our kids are 2 and 4 and I feel like wrangling them during the move would be a huge issue, esp since most of our friends have similarly aged kids.
In terms of the cost, we were given an hourly rate of $140 and figure that, given the short distance and relatively small amount of stuff we have, it will only take a few hours. We are generally DIYers, so it sort of goes against the grain to pay people, but by the time we pay for a U-Haul and a sitter I think we'd have spent nearly as much. |
Anonymous
OP, we were in pretty much exactly your situation. Lots of boxes, a couch, side boards, mattresses. We moved a mile down the road, and we had moved a lot of things ourselves already. We paid $1,100 for movers to take care of this -- took 3 tough guys from 9.00 am through 2.00 pm. Personally I would never try to move myself but if you are in great physical shape and have strong friends, it's worth a try. |
Anonymous
| I think what's really going to make it tough is the first line in your post - moving the first week in July. It will really limit the time of day you will want to move boxes in and out. You will wear out a lot more quickly in th eheat. Sure it can be done, but it will be hard. |