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Our new home came furnished and we really like the furnishings so we will only be bringing my art supplies, artwork, a few books and our clothes. (minus of course the down coats and boots etc). I have decided to ship boxes via UPS rather than hire a mover just for the few boxes. Ups will be much less expensive for such a long distance.
I have been selling off my large book collection and giving away most of the furniture dishes etc.
Can UPS or Fedex arrange to ship boxes to a location that isn't your address and hold your stuff there until you're ready to collect it? I was considering using a freight company for a while.
I am moving from MN to FL. It's not a company-paid move so I'm trying to manage cost.
I am only moving the things I love. I'll buy new replacement items for those things I need in my new place. I am moving a 2 yr old couch, 3 end tables, my bedroom set which I really like, and one of my daughter's bedroom sets since she's 17 and moving out next year. No reason to buy new at this point.
I'm ditching the kitchen table, 3 couches, a piano, bar stools, dining room table and my twins' bedroom set.
It gets difficult. As that this move was a temporary one, I'm now sorting again what to get rid of to reduce the load.
One one side right now, there are the things I have to buy again because the "originals" are packed somewhere in some box and are unavailable. So Sunday, I bought now weight gloves, new bike gloves, new bike light, and a new water bottle because all that stuff is buried somewhere. Perhaps there is a note in there somewhere to someone like me with a backpack mentality: get, make a backpack with all your exercise accessories to move in the car.
On the other side, I opened three boxes tonight. One was of $1 paperbacks. It was packed poorly, could have been better space organized but consider the circumstances of Operation WHIRLWIND, oh well! But I repacked that more efficiently and put it off to the side as a box (no doubt one of many) that has to be read as much as it can be in the next 9.5 months. Some of the books in that box I put aside to keep such as Robin Davidson's "Tracks" and play books like Antigone.
Then there was a box of Mom's art books, a Time Life library type of arrangement. SIGH.....too "valuable" to let go, so boxed them properly, took index pictures of the contents, designated it an art box book, and when to the next box. That one was slightly easier, being hard backs with some that can be read "easily" (brought one into work with me, on Khrushchev, which I will lightning read (pages in under 30 seconds) tonight), some that should be read slightly slower, and some things that now the main collection suffered the demise in the move two weeks ago, are much "easier" to discard after another lightning read. Ie, a Nat'l Geographic from 1988, an Army magazine from 1987.
There are at least two limitations with lightning read. First of all, I've used it for an occasional book here and there, not trying to consume a whole library in weeks. I don't know its limits, when the subconscious will be overloaded trying to process the stuff I read so fast. The other thing is that I won't know for weeks whether or not it has sunk in and by then, the book may be gone. Oh, well!
Then, some things won't be as easy to discard. Came across an encyclopedia type book on American's treasures and where they are located. Elsewhere, I know I have another on world shipwrecks. And so on and so forth. Long story short, when one is a Renaissance Lady, well, you can't get rid of anything. If I should be so fortunate to be able to get rid of 70-90%, with a library my size, that's still a lot of books.
The only thing I keep are items that are not replaceable. If I can find a new one of the same kind in the new digs, then I sell what I have. It doesn't matter if you don't get what you paid for it, you rarely ever will. Many moving companies will not give one care in the world if your stuff gets damaged along the way, and the price to move with any kind of insurance costs you more money than if you had sold your stuff and bought new when you got to the new place.
Save yourself the headache and bring only what you can't replace.
The things I plan on taking are the things that will cost me more to replace than move. I'm on a tight budget and because I have no interest in driving a U-Haul across the country, I'm going to go the box route (either Relo-Cubes or U-Haul - haven't decided yet). So, I can only take what can fit into the number of boxes I can afford.
My couches, which i love, will cost $2000 to replace. I doubt I'd be able to sell them for even half that, because used furniture doesn't get what it's worth on CL. The total cost of the moving everything that would fit in those boxes is what I would have to pay to replace the couches, therefore it's more economical to move them.
If you're using a mover, when I got a quote from one, he told me it was $0.50 per pound after a certain weight. So, my dresser, for example, assume it weighs 40 lbs, can I replace it for $20? Nope. Do I love it? Yes. So keep it.
Best advice I can give - if you love it, keep it. If you are just used to it, get rid of it. A new place is a new opportunity to pair down and only keep the things you truly love.
Find out the cost per pound to move the distance you are going. Then ask yourself: Is this worth $x to keep. We have used this method several times. We moved 2000 miles last fall and a lot of things went by way of craigslist and garage sales to new owners.
AAAAGH! One of the disadvantages of being a Renaissance Lady is that you have so many backgrounds in so many different subjects that, well, as my real estate agent said, "Someone with 4 degrees I would expect to need many rooms for her library.".
It is unpacking box after box of books to sort, repack those that are needed, and dump those I can....but it seems the last is a very small amount.
Somethings, yes, like out of my stack on home gyms, dance, pilates, yoga, and massage, I can drop the books on running races since those days are behind me.
But others, books on flying, books on medicine, books on diving environments & locations, books on animals, books, books, books!
On the good side of things, right now my machines are reducing the VHS collection to the tune of 8-12 tapes a day.
SIGH, grab another box, pack it to the subject, tape it up, label it, grab another box.
EDIT: To the topic of how do you decide? One way is you do a reprogramming of your self, of the image you see yourself in. One thing the VHS > DVD project is showing me, reminding me of is that for all the time my VCRs were recording, I was elsewhere, doing something else, and I never got around to watching what they taped (now there is a different reason for the conversion).
Same thing here as I come across this or that Nat'l Geo that escaped the purge. Am I ever going to have the time to read that issue from 1988? And the honest answer is No. So realizing that, it is easier (but not easy) to slide it into the recycling bin.
The reprogramming of me from apartment dweller to house person is still ongoing but at the very least, there are insights of something of that newer me that can erase the panic of what to toss and give me calm.
As it is, my yoga books probably fit even more into the new, reprogrammed me (especially when I have a doom&gloom boss who can end my positive outlook at end of shift with a new gripe about the world), so they stay.
Back to dinner making, which gave me the insight calm, back to sorting.
Last edited by TamaraSavannah; 05-20-2015 at 05:58 PM..
We are donating all small items that I have been sorting through, other items are going into the garage sale my neighbor is having soon the rest will be packed and moved. Most of our furniture is at least 5 years old and the rest is at least 15 years old but still in very good conditiod and we will not be able to replace these items with new stuff that is of much less quality. Some of our things are more than 50 years old and will be kept as they have been handed down from one generation to the next.
Lots of furniture has already been sold. Do not move appliances. It isn't worth it. Do not move books if you can par it down. You might be able to ship them media mail for less. Only keep the furniture you need immediately or can't replace. For us it's a bunch of boxes, our beds, a couple dressers, couch, a couple chairs, TV stand, TVs, and some lamps. It would have cost an additional 800 to move all the other stuff. I can replace that on the other side easily. I'm a bargain and second hand shopper though. I have kids that tear stuff up and I'm not ready to buy stuff I love or is irreplaceable yet.
I think so much of life that makes it home comes out of the boxes and the furniture is easily swapped.
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