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That (vacation rental) does make sense, assuming it's for 2-3 weeks, and not 2-3 months. It still sucks to waste the extra money, but unless you have another place to stay, it's probably better than ending up stuck in a dump longterm. I've had that experience in other cities -- things can look much better online than in person.
I'm thinking, after all, I will leave my cat behind in my family's care and just have him come later when we have an apartment. Life will be easier. I was just concerned with the last minute things that need to be taken care of right before a pet leaves for Hawaii. I'll just have to entrust that with a VERY reliable person.
I've been lurking on these boards for a while, trying to do research but I had to register to comment. I'm in San Antonio right now too, and my husband and I are moving to Oahu this fall as well. I'll be leaving in two weeks and staying in temporary lodging (that I haven't found yet) and he'll follow at the end of October. Are you moving household goods? If so, how? That is our biggest hurdle right now. And as far as temporary lodging, I've found a lot of options listed on craigslist, although I have no idea how legitimate they are.
Em - Hi there! I've been looking at VRBO.com and using bookingbuddy to look at several other vacation rental sites at once to find a suitable place. There are plenty out there, it's just a matter of finding one that's available. I've made a few inquiries, and if they turn out to be available, I plan on asking if they'll give us a discount to help us out with our relocation. Also, some places come with a full kitchen (stocked down to the last fork), while others only have a microwave and fridge. I'm only looking at places that have a stocked kitchen (with at least hot plate burners).
As for your question about sending household goods... Since it's still a little while till we move, I haven't started packing yet, but my rough plan is to use flat-rate boxes from the USPS if possible. I'll be packing & shipping pots/pans, plastic cups, utencils and a few small kitchen appliances: toaster oven, blender, and a small george foreman grill. The plates and bowls I have are ceramic; not fancy or anything but if they broke during shipping then it'd be a waste of the shipping cost. At least, that's how I see it. Of course, that's not all but I'm sure you get the gist of it ^_^
Now, I'm no expert so if you figured out a better way of doing things, please let me know! I want to make this move run as smoothly as possible.
Last edited by jenocide22; 08-24-2011 at 08:55 PM..
Em, how much are you going to be shipping? Are you going to need a full container, or perhaps you have less stuff and you may be able to use a ReloCube? Some people have shipped their belongings via USPS.
If you've been searching these forums, then you hopefully will have found some old discussions about this. I suggest that you start a new thread with more specific information about what you are shipping, rather than try to tag onto jenocide's thread.
I moved here the beginning of Feb, with 3 cats. I came first, then my wife and our 3 cats.
The advantage of not having the cats enabled me to stay in an inexpensive hotel while I looked for an apartment. I too read about the VRBO stuff on here, but seriously??? That stuff is priced for vacations, not for me, a person looking to move here and just needing a place to stay. I paid $69 a night for the hotel, I didn't see a VRBO that could even come close to that. Yes...a $69/night VRBO would probably not be very nice anyway. No offense intended towards VRBO owners, I just don't think people moving here are really the market for VRBO.
I found out REAL quick that having pets limits your selection dramatically. It's a tight market because most buildings have Association Rules that do not allow pets. And because it's a tight market, it's priced as such. To find the RIGHT place we had to spend about 3 solid weeks of watching craigslist after we were in the first place.
Our first place was NOT the right choice. A 260 sq ft studio with no a/c is no place for 5 living creatures to live harmoniously (sp?).
Searching craigslist with the pets ok filter and a price in our range showed that there are many units that are constantly available. Of the 4 places we had scoped out before I came here, only one of them was 'ok'. I really was glad I stayed in a hotel and gave myself time to look at each place. But even then, that first place didn't work out. What it did do was to teach us what our standards were and to accept the fact that we had to raise our budget for rent. (Standards like parking, washer and dryer in the unit, A/C, some sort of view, relatively quiet, carpet not tile floor, elevators.)
Once the rent budget was more realistic, it wasn't as hard to find a few more places that would work. It's just a shame that you get more for the money without pets. I get the owners point of view on that though.
As far as shipping things...We sold everything but 5 USPS Flat Rate boxes of tools, silverware and other items. We brought 4 bins and 2 suitcases with us. That worked but it is not a quick process to re-buy everything from noodle strainers to furniture. Prices are higher here on those things which slows the re-build process more.
That being said, we LOVE it here. Takes some adjustments from mainland life, but the perks are huge. We love the town and the weather...throw in the warm water beaches and mountains and there is really no comparison.
Disclaimer: Everything in this post is all my opinion, so if anybody gets upset about it just know that the world is flat.
Without fail, look at the prices of Don Quijote supermarket. It's just a couple of blocks east of Walmart and near the convention center. DQ's has a great deal of Asian, and in particular Japanese foods, however they often have great prices on a lot of items. Shop their ads and in store specials. I think they are one of the better places in town in terms of value.
Dhraco - I'll definitely look into a hotel too. I've actually found a few different vacation rentals that are $80/night or less. My issue was that I wanted to have a kitchenette at least. The plan is to have a list of apts that e can go see the moment we get settled. I use craigslist and star advertiser looking for apts, but I don't narrow it down to pets ok places because I have seen advertisements that don't specify. It could be pet friendly, but the owner/renter omitted the information on purpose or by accident. Oh and then there's specifc realtors that rent (as well as buy/sell) and the hawaii humane society website.
Plates, cups, flatware, pots, pans, linens, drapery, furniture, etc., can all be had at extremely reasonable prices from yard and garage sales. The islands have a HUGE transient population and most folks who move here from other places bring way too much stuff and can't afford to ship it back with them when they leave. There are lots of yard sales and they are every Saturday.
We bought another house last April and we've furnished half of it with yard sale stuff since it has a different style than our other house. Plus sometimes it was easier to just get a new chair or table than to move the old one down the front stairs of the old house. Our renter doesn't mind since he doesn't have that much stuff so it works for us. I'm typing from a new desk & chair from a yard sale two months ago - $10. It's a nice glass topped pale green wicker set. Three new living room chairs, the Laz-e-boy (brandname) was $10, the Danish Modern solid wood side chair was $5 and the old carved wood Hawaiiana chair was free but needed a bit of glue. The grandfather clock (Westminster chimes, moving moon dial, huge "lyre" pendulum) was an appalling $10. A relative had given it to them and they'd never unpacked it or tried to set it up since they figured it required a clock person to do it. I bought it without really looking at it for parts since clock repair is something I do occasionally but it didn't need fixing, just setting up. Two new rugs on the floor, one was $5 and the larger one was $40. New drapes for the bedroom, $3. New drapes for the living room, $4. These are drapes, too, not curtains. New washing machine, free, although it needed a part replaced with was taken off a different broken washing machine. So we left the old washing machine at the other house and the fellow renting it now is quite happy.
If I were moving from the mainland, I'd bring at least my hard drive if not the whole computer, various small keepsakes, sentimental things and oddball things which would be hard to replace such as the insulated metal French press. A few clothes, although only natural fabric ones, you'll swell up and die in polyesters. Medical records, school records, licenses, etc. A sense of adventure, joy, respect and a willingness to be kind to others. Fortunately, those pack well.
Dthraco - thank you for your informative post. I had to convince my hubster to hold off on moving this October until about May of next year. Still stuff we need to do to get our home here ready to sell, still purging stuff, paying off the car we want to ship, son being awarded a scholarship for college here, etc. etc. Waiting until May of 2012, my dad has offered up his studio while he is not living in it (where we stay while vacationing), rent free. Why not jump on that while looking? It took a lot of convincing (why he wasn't looking at the whole picture is beyond me) for him to wait, as he wanted to get a jump on job hunting since he is not needed here to sell the house that is in my name. I copied and pasted your post and emailed it to him - with info from other people who have done what we want to do, maybe he will "get it". Thank you.
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fellow San Antonian
