Learn me: Moving

[D_Eclipse9916]

Jess and I are 99% moving down to Lake Norman in Mooresville, NC. We have lived in the Reston/Vienna area our entire lives so this is a big move for both of us. A couple guys on this forum have made the moves so looking for advice on getting rid of extra junk/moving logistics/staying in contact with friends.

I have already been approved to work remote but Jess will most likely need to find a part time job. Her job with the DOI is flexible but unsure yet if they will let her be part time and remote so any suggestions for searching for telecommute jobs would be hugely helpful.

Our house will most likely be built in the next 3-8 months and we are in no rush (helpful suggestions on dealing with his is helpful as well).

[Senor_Taylor]

Wow, big news! I wish I had some helpful advice for you. Congratulations! You started your migration south a little early. If you need help getting rid of cars or tools, I'll gladly take them off your hands!

[WRXtranceformed]

Congrats! I think you all will really like it down here. LKN is its own world up there, are you moving right on the lake or a community nearby? You definitely picked the right lake to live nearby, LKN is much better than Lake Wylie.

We're about an hour south from you on the other end of CLT but glad to be here for y'all if you need anything at all, for real. It can be tough moving to a new city I know what it's like! So let us know if we can help out!

As far as the move and logistics, I didn't have a house or a house full of stuff when I moved down here from NoVA...I just borrowed a buddy's SUV and rented a UHAUL. But after doing a few moves and helping a lot of friends, it's honestly worth the money to pay for movers. It will be a decent bill moving from state to state but it's the best money you'll spend vs. dealing with all of the other stressful stuff of closing on new house and moving your own things at the same time. It always helps to purge stuff you don't need before you move (ie garage sale), especially big furniture that probably won't fit / work in the new home. No sense in paying to move it if you're not going to use it again.

If they are building your house, was your plan to put your house in NoVA on the market after the new one is ready? There's a lot of balance to that as I learned (ie if someone buys your current house faster than expected and the new one isn't ready, what do you do). We took a calculated risk and put our house on the market pretty much right as we closed on the new one. It helped me avoid having to pay to store all of our things in a storage unit and figure out a short term rental situation. Obviously you want to make sure the finances work out to be able to carry two mortgages because that is less than ideal, but we sold our other house about a month and a half after we moved into a new one. The market is always good in DC so you probably won't have a problem selling that house up there.

As far as part time jobs here, this is obviously a banking capital so Jess could look into some kind of contract work with the banks (BoA, Wells) if her skills transfer. Doesn't Justin or his wife work at Wells? They might have a good contact. The Lowe's Home Improvement corporate campus is up in Mooresville too, they may have some roles of interest. I've been there a number of times and it would be a pretty cool place to work.

Stoked for you guys to break out of that bubble!

[ScottyB]

hey congrats! i've moved a lot in the last 10 years - 4 times. i hope i don't sound too much like an ass, but have you guys spent much time in lake norman driving around? i drive through there all the time on 77 going up to roanoke from GA. be careful choosing employment near the interstate...i've literally never gotten through there without hitting a jam.

extra junk - craigslist/forum sale the stuff worth anything, donate the rest. don't be afraid to trash stuff, if its not immediately useful, valuable, or sentimental just dump it. moving furniture sucks, now is the time to sell as much as possible and start fresh once you move in.

moving - obviously check the mover's ratings across different review platforms to ensure they're decent quality but also make absolutely sure you have movers lined up and scheduled (confirmed) on both ends, packing and unpacking. do NOT put anything leather in one of those PODS portable crates/lockers....with any humidity it will steam up inside and turn your leather into a fungus farm. request as much additional wool packing blankets as possible or buy some more of your own, and wrap all your nice furniture extremely well with them. you'll need to watch the movers and supervise them, they're going to want to stack stuff and put furniture at terrible angles which is a great way to break off couch legs or gouge chair arms. anything truly fragile needs to travel with you like framed pictures, glassware, china etc. prepare for at least one trip up and back in your truck/trailer taking the fragile things ahead of time...you're super lucky you have such a big rig to take stuff in.

friends - social media is pretty much it, enjoy your new local motorsports groups, there are a ton in that part of NC. if you're working from home you'll need to seek out some chances to make friends locally, but you'll do fine. be sure you get away from your computer during the day or you're going to start hating your time at home.

[ispoonwithmugen]

Nice man!

extra junk - Ditto what Scott said. Craigslist/Facebook for sale sites and letgo will be your friend. eBay for other stuff if it's valuable enough to lose a percentage to eBay and still make a profit.

moving - I did this the hard way and spontaneous so my first suggestion would be don't be spontaneous LOL. It sounds like you have that in check. Second pay someone to do all the moving. Check ratings etc and go with them. You'll hate yourself if you don't (trust me here). I know my Dad's work paid for his move to ATL when he was on contract. Not sure if you can wiggle that into the negotiation (seems like you're already asking for remote work).

friends - social media and the occasional text/email/phone call.

[Apoc]

Moving:
- Pay a proper interstate moving company and get three quotes to triangulate
- Consider paying them or someone from the gig economy (e.g. Task Rabbit) to actually pack your shit
- They will likely not move any fluids or flammable materials

Getting rid of stuff:
- If you haven't used it in a year, it's gone
- List high value items individually on CL
- Yard sale the moderately valuable items
- Find a charity that will pick up items to take things that wouldn't sell (there are several in Nova)
- Put the rest on the curb and post pictures in the free section of CL

Staying in Touch With Friends:
- no idea... I don't have any

[JustinG]

-Clean your closets out and take it to goodwill. We went ahead and packed all of our out of season clothes into Tubs and labeled them during this process as well
-Go through each room, one by one, as said before if you haven't used it in a year or it has no purpose get rid of it.
-Dishes/kitchen gadgets, bye bye if you haven't used it in 6 months
-Go ahead and pack stuff in rooms you aren't in very often.
-Check Craigslist for people selling/giving away packing boxes. Hit up the ABC store for boxes, as they were awesome for dishes/glasses.
-LABEL EVERYTHING, with duct tape and a sharpie or write directly on the box if it is cardboard


We got rid of a lot using the FB Classifieds sections for your neighborhood/surrounding area. If it wasn't gone in 1 week or 2, it was donated or trashed.
We did the Pod thing for a good amount of stuff, but most of our furniture came with us when we moved into my parents while the house was being built so no experience there.

Costco has some Black tubs with Yellow tops that are cheaper by like 5 bucks vs the Home Depot version. I think they pop up on sale for $7.50 per every now and then. These came in handy when packing stuff from the garage, as they are very durable, stack well, and once emptied can be used for seasonal storage.

We slowly started decluttering and selling stuff off in November. Hit it hard core the week after Christmas and had our house removed of all personal items and staged. Listed 2nd week of January, and house was sold the first week of February after snowmageddon 2016 and another 3 days of snow.

Pod was there end of Feb, and we slowly started packing stuff into the Pod until we had to be out the first part of April.

TLDR: Start packing now, use CL and FB Classifieds, get rid of everything unless you absolutely know you will use it in the new house.

[.RJ]

I dont have anything to add other than I'm jealous of your escape from Nova :lol:

Charlotte is on my short list when I escape the wall

[WRXtranceformed]

I dont have anything to add other than I'm jealous of your escape from Nova :lol:

Charlotte is on my short list when I escape the wall

Come on down and visit anytime! Got a guest room here waitin for you

[ScottyB]

Check Craigslist for people selling/giving away packing boxes. Hit up the ABC store for boxes, as they were awesome for dishes/glasses.

this is awesome, yes do that also. boxes are $$ and most people toss em anyway.

keep any decent boxes from Amazon purchases. check out Costco as well, they have boxes/crates by the checkout that are free to take. also worth asking at big appliance stores like bestbuy, bedbath&beyond or hhgregg if they have empty boxes in the back that you can have from big stuff.

[Sully]

When I was using hello fresh, I saved all my boxes because they're are super heavy duty. (Getting ready for my dad to sell his house where all my stuff is) Kinda small depending on which package you get. Maybe Justin will give you some of his?

Sent from my SM-G930V using Tapatalk

[Apoc]

You could do all that... or you could just pay $1 per box and have them delivered to your house.

Your time is worth more than saving $50.

[Sully]

My way hasn't cost me any time. I would break the box down to recycle it but instead I just put it in another box.

But yes, if you don't have them already, I guess getting them from someone could be not worth your time

Sent from my VK810 4G using Tapatalk

[davej]

Moving:
- Pay a proper interstate moving company and get three quotes to triangulate
- Consider paying them or someone from the gig economy (e.g. Task Rabbit) to actually pack your shit
- They will likely not move any fluids or flammable materials

Getting rid of stuff:
- If you haven't used it in a year, it's gone
- List high value items individually on CL
- Yard sale the moderately valuable items
- Find a charity that will pick up items to take things that wouldn't sell (there are several in Nova)
- Put the rest on the curb and post pictures in the free section of CL

Staying in Touch With Friends:
- no idea... I don't have any

ding ding ding!
We've been up and down the east coast more times than I'd care to admit. The one time we used a moving company was with a relocation package, I think it was Atlas and they came to pack everything up and unloaded all the boxes into the rooms at the new place as well. 11/10 I would recommend this if you can swing it. The amount of stress it can relieve for your family is unbelievable. They inventory what they pack and tag it, I would highly recommend photographing more valuable/fragile items yourself before hand. We had a few items broken, one being a tv, and all of my power tools were missing (weird right?), but they cut me a check for more than enough to replace (and upgrade). It might be worth it to throw a few boxes in your truck and bring them down yourself it you have things you don't want to risk.

The other times were budget moves and done with small children. I'm not at a place yet where I can speak of those times.
That being said, if you do it yourself and need help running loads or vehicles down, we can help out.

[WRXtranceformed]

It might be worth it to throw a few boxes in your truck and bring them down yourself it you have things you don't want to risk.

This is a given for sure. Check with the moving company you hire too because there is usually a list of things that they won't move (and you shouldn't want them to move) anyway. Anything liquid usually, firearms, ammunition. Basically if it's small, dangerous or valuable and fairly small just throw it in your truck. For liquids you want to move but don't want to end up a mess everywhere (ie auto detailing supplies, oil, etc.) those plastic bins like Justin mentioned are great or go budget like me and take a construction trash bag (the black ones) and tape it to the inside of a moving box.

After you move in, you will still find boxes to unpack in your new home a year later.

Another thing we found helpful during moving day: Tape signs on the door of each room with the name of the room. It really helps when directing the movers where to take stuff (ie Man Cave, Master Bedroom, Kids Room, etc.)

[JustinG]

Another thing, get a large roll of thick brown paper and some painters tape.

I assume you are doing hardwood floors downstairs, use this paper to cover the floor in the higher traffic areas (ie entrance to stairs, entrance to living space) so while moving and appliance delivery your brand new floors don't get jacked up.

If you have carpet you could do the same thing wherever carpet is.

Oh and be careful with your tools after you are moved in and mounting stuff, dropping a ratchet on the floor is incredibly depressing after only being in the house for 48 hours. They were nice enough to replace the boards I damaged.

[JustinG]

Another thing, get a large roll of thick brown paper and some painters tape.

I assume you are doing hardwood floors downstairs, use this paper to cover the floor in the higher traffic areas (ie entrance to stairs, entrance to living space) so while moving and appliance delivery your brand new floors don't get jacked up.

If you have carpet you could do the same thing wherever carpet is.

Oh and be careful with your tools after you are moved in and mounting stuff, dropping a ratchet on the floor is incredibly depressing after only being in the house for 48 hours. They were nice enough to replace the boards I damaged.

[.RJ]

Another thing, get a large roll of thick brown paper and some painters tape.

Home depot sells floor protector stuff. Dont use paper.

[JPolen01]

Another thing, get a large roll of thick brown paper and some painters tape.

Home depot sells floor protector stuff. Dont use paper.

Yeah, don't use paper. Get the plastic stuff with adhesive on it.It won't move and rip like paper and is waterproof incase it is a rainy day. So glad I bought a giant roll of that when we moved.

[JustinG]

Had no idea that existed, yea do that.