Question about moving vans

[Brad Tallis]

Hello All-

Due to a job transfer, I will be moving from Colorado back to Oregon in the next few months.

I have a lot of large tools and house-hold furnishings that will need to be moved. Unfortunately, my company can't help with the move, so I am going to have to move myself.

Hiring a moving company is pretty darn expensive... U-haul trucks are too small...

Have any of you moved recently and can recommend some ideas? Can you hire a moving company to just move the stuff (instead of packing it up, loading it, unloading it, etc)? Or, can you rent large moving-truck sized trucks? Is it worth the thousands of dollars to have someone else do all the work?

Also, if we end up using a moving company, are there companies you would recommend? Companies you would avoid?

Thanks for your help.

Brad

[Cliff Rohrabacher]

I have moved so many times I think I lost count.

Last two moves required two of the largest trucks U hall had

Yes you can move your big stuff you will need help some rigging skill a truck with a lift gate and serious tie down points som heavy rope a couple come-alongs and maybe even a lift of sorts to move things around.

If you have tools each weighing upwards of 600 to a 1000+ pounds you may need a freight company and some rigger's skills. You'll have to get a truck with a hydraulic tailgate - a lousy $100 more.

RPI breaks things so too Yellow
Always get extra insurance - get a rider just for the things being trucked and moved.

Talk to your mover. They may do heavy freight thereby saving the $$ of a separate contract.

[Don Baer]

Brad,
I am getting ready for a move from California to Arizona in June. We are having Mayflower do the move. LOML is packing up all of the valuable crystal etc and I will do the same for my shop. We are having them move the furniture only. I will move the Crystal and my shop. This is cutting the cost by several $$$$ and giving both LOML and I more piece of mind. Hope this helps.

[Dan Oelke]

If you use a "moving" company - they often have cheaper rates if you are not moving between Memorial Day and Labor Day. I think when I moved about 7 years ago by waiting until Oct (instead of Aug) we saved 50% on their rate. Or so they told me.

Best way to avoid theft/damage is to be on both ends for loading and unloading, and fill the entire trailer. If they unload it in their warehouse and then reload there are many more opportunities for things to be lost or smashed.

[Joe Pelonio]

Brad,

Be careful. Some of them (with me it was Mayflower) will estimate the cost based on your old house square footage, on the phone. If you have a lot of tools it will be way over. In my case the estimate was $2,100 and the actual was $3,600. Make them send someone out to see your stuff and give you a hard quote that can't be off by more than 10%. I'm not
saying all of them are that way but don't consider a Mayflower place that's located in Central Oregon. Wish I remembered the name.

At the time I was going to use a place that I found that drops off the trailer, you fill it, then they move it to the new place. That was $1,800
at the time and I thought for an additional $300 I'd let the movers do the work.

[Andy Hoyt]

When I moved from CA back to ME I had about six well known carriers come to the house and provide a written "quote" (as in - not an estimate) that had a 45 day shelf life. It ranged from $8K to $14K which included one car in with the household goods. We went with Bekins (quote was in the lower half value-wise) and their quote was based on weight which is then coverted to cubic footage for pricing.

We filled up about 1/2 of a 48 foot van. When it was all over with, I learned that the quote was spot on for cubic feet, but about 8% under the actual weight. They made attempt to get me to pony up some extra bucks, but when doing so they said I didn't have to pay the extra since I had been quoted a dollar amount based on their examination of our possessions.

It came down to tipping the long haul driver and his crews at each end for good effort or paying Bekins more. I went with the tipping.

I coordinated with my insurance agent and maintained full coverage on everything throughout the move.

[Carl Eyman]

Brad: Getting firm prices is good advice. They all try to give you a low-ball quote and a Hight-ball bill. iF you are going to do it yourself how about a u-haul truck pulling a u-haul trailer. Would that do the job?

[Frank Pellow]

When we moved from Toronto to the Seattle area about ten years ago, Microsoft paid the whole shot and we were not even aware of the cost. The moving company did all the packing and most of the unpacking.

About three years ago, I retired and decided to move back to Toronto. Different story this time –we had to pay ourselves. We got three firm quotes based upon weight and ended up going with the same folks who moved us out there –North American Van Lines. We had saved our packing boxes from the original move and we did all the packing this time. This saved us quite a lot. The actual weight was less than they estimated, so we paid less than the estimate. The cost of the move back to Toronto from Seattle was just under $8,000 (US) –that includes tips at both ends.

[Art Mulder]

The cost of the move back to Toronto from Seattle was just under $8,000 (US) –that includes tips at both ends.

Guys guys guys!! You're destroying my blissful ignorance here!! When I was moved from Edmonton to London(Ont) 7.5 years ago it never even occurred to me to tip the movers.

Our estimate was also quite a bit under, but we paid the estimate. I spoke to the driver about it. (as I recall, he owned his own rig, and was paid by the moving company). He told me he didn't care at all -- he got paid by the head office of the moving company, based on actual weight of the truck. The local office/franchise are the ones who prepared the estimate, and they are the ones who get "penalized" for under estimating.

But to get back to the original topic... One bit of advice I can give is that it is surprisingly inexpensive to ship a car. We had a young child when we moved, and a 4-day car drive was not something we were going to subject a 18-month old to. We flew, and had our car shipped by rail for CA$750, that was 1998, which I thought was quite reasonable considering all the work involved in them doing so.

[Karl Laustrup]

If you hire a moving company the best case scenario is to have the long haul driver pack your things at your house in the trailer that will take them to your new home. He may be picking up more along the way, but at least your HHG's will only be handled twice, once loading and once unloading. Chances are your HHG's will be packed by the local mover into one of their local vans and taken to their warehouse where it will be unloaded and then loaded into the long haul trailer. Same could happen at the other end. More handling means more chance for damage.

The other option is to have your WW'ing tools shipped via freight company and move your furniture yourself. I rented a Penske truck [24', they have up to 26'] to move my mom from SoCal to Wisconsin last summer. As I recall it was about $2200 plus the fuel. Of course you need help at both ends getting stuff on and off. And it's good to know about packing the truck correctly and tight. If done right you will need very little strapping in to secure the load.

My $1.398 cents worth. Good luck with the move.

Karl

[nic obie]

Brad By chance do you have a Pods dealer in your area?

My local HD has them.

http://www.pods.com/