The Joys of Moving

Well, now that we know that I have a job and we know where we're moving, Journey and I are having the fun of preparing to move. The best part? We're moving to New York in the middle of winter! Yea! So we've been weighing our options: Should we do this ourselves? Do we want to pay someone else to do it for us? If we do it ourselves, what size truck do we need and how (or are) we going to get the truck and both of our cars out there? If we pay someone else, who do we go with? Et cetera, et cetera, et cetera.

Since my new job doesn't have the money to pay for relocation costs, I'm thinking we'll end up just doing it ourselves. We know roughly what it will cost, and while I'm not trilled at the idea of driving a large moving truck with my truck on a trailer behind it, it's certainly a lot cheaper than paying someone else. So far, the only moving company whose estimate came even close to what it'll cost to do it ourselves is a company which gets absolutely horrible reviews online. As in, I found about 10 reviews and only one was positive. The rest were either 1 or no stars out of five. Yeah, we own some junk - but it's our junk and we like it. We don't want to trust it to a company who's unreliable.

There's also the matter of finding someplace to live. We've looked at home prices and we're pretty sure we could afford to go ahead and buy a home once we're out there - I'm talking 2-3 bedroom, 1.5-2 bath homes with unfinished basements and attics in the $50,000 to $70,000 range. And yeah a lot of these need some work; but a lot of that work is cosmetic: new paint, pulling up the old carpet and refinishing the hardwood floors, insulating the attic. That kind of thing we can go ourselves and can do it over time.

This does not, however, address the question of where we're going to live when we first get there. We certainly don't want to buy someplace sight unseen, or to live in a hotel for a month while we find someplace. No, we're thinking we'll find a rental we can stand and live there for 6 months. That gives us time to find a realtor, find the house we want, and go from there. So, I'm actually taking a trip out this weekend and the first part of next week to do some rental hunting and take care of some stuff for my new job (paper work, drug test, etc.). We have a few leads already, I just need to follow up with them and get a look at these places. The problem, really, is the cats. A vast majority of the places we've seen don't allow pets. That's kind of a problem. But, we'll see. I'm sure I'll be able to find someplace which will work!