Almost ready to make the move to FL...

[TeaForTulips]

Thanks for your great posting... I am planning our move now, even though it won't be for 2 years... I would really appreciate the insight on your comment that your move was "insanely expensive". I'm budgeting everything out, including a scouting trip, and landed around $5000 (moving everything myself in a UHaul, and NOT including the expenses of utility deposits, etc.. JUST the cross country move).

Any info on your status now would be sooo appreciated!

Thanks!

K

Thanks!

I think if you are able to move yourself that is awesome! I spent what felt like forever talking to what felt like hundreds of moving companies getting quotes, information, etc. I priced uhauls and everything, but we have some really heavy furtniture (to me anyways! ). Between me and g/f who has fibromyalgia it was just a bad idea. I also thought about hiring someone to just do the lifting into and out of the truck, but had a hard time finding a trustworthy company/person in FL to do so. I finally decided on a company out of Dallas (we were moving from Shreveport, LA) who gave me a great impression, great price, and were all local. I could have sworn I did research for reviews on every company I spoke with, but apparently they slipped by somehow. They were HORRIBLE. They didn't show the day they were scheduled to due to trouble on their first pick up in Baton Rouge, so they were supposed to arrive they next morning first thing. Then they had truck problems so they were going to try to send someone new but they wouldn't be there til the next day. Then finally the first truck got going and was to be there around 3pm. After no show I called the truck driver who did not even know they were coming again. They were on their way and were supposed to get there that evening... needless to say they showed up AFTER 11pm. By this point I was livid. I had spoken to so many people at the company including the owner, never getting called back when I was supposed to. I could go on forever about the trouble I had. The actual workers who showed up though were very profressional and kind. Once they saw all our stuff and I explained we also had a storage unit which they did not know about they informed me a cost estimate. Of course before all this I gave a detailed inventory sheet to the company for my original price quote. They were now telling me not only was it more than double what I was told, but they weren't going to have enough room in the truck since they also had the Baton Rouge pick up. I could not afford the new price... I was moving in 3 days. There are no words for how mad I was at the situation and the owner of the company. Of course he was never able to talk to me after that and upon reporting them to BBB. I found a ton of horrible reviews on the company and could not believe they were still an A company through BBB.

They ended up recommending another company out of Baton Rouge who was owned by this amazing guy and they believed he would do it for the price I wanted. I called ABBA moving company out of Baton Rouge close to midnight and made a deal with this guy. They were driving up the next day, loading our stuff in the uhaul, driving it to Florida, unloading it, and flying back to Florida all for 4K.

It was the owner and one other guy who did it all at lightning speed. Even my dad was impressed. They were so kind and great at what they did. It felt weird just watching these two guys move all our stuff. I felt like I needed to be doing something. He required no deposit!! We drove to Florida and they had everything unpacked by the time we arrived. They came back over after dinner where I offered either cash or check and he took a personal check.

Now because we were moving into a 1 bedroom apartment, a lot of my stuff in being stored at my mother's in LA. So we only moved a 1 bedroom apartment to FL. We also didn't move our dining room set because it was too big. I can only imagine what it would cost for someone moving more than we had let alone a whole house.

I think a lot of my stress and expense came because we had a little over a month to find a place and move. Because I am a control freak I pretty much did everything on my own. Bad idea.

I think it is great you are planning so far in advance. You sound like me. I have vacations planned over a year in advance. I am now planning our commitment ceremony for May 2013. The early bird gets the worm!

We decided to put our house hunt on hold for now. Life has gotten in the way, in good ways and bad, so we never put in the full effort to looking. Now its time to renew our lease, so we are going to go ahead and renew for now. We aren't in a rush because we have such an amazing location and cheap rent that we are ok.

Sorry for such a long story. Let me know if I can help you at all! Good luck!

 

[palmtreegirl]

We moved from PA to Florida 6 years ago and love it here! We both grew up in NJ and only lived in PA 18 months before we decided to finally move down here. You couldn't pay me to move back up North.

We live in Lake County, near Clermont and love it here. We're about 40 minutes from Disney, far enough away from the attractions and city but not too far either. We also lived in Ocala(liked it) and Kissimmee(hated it) before settling here.

I love this part of Florida, friendly people with a southern feel, lots of lakes and we even have hills. I really wouldn't want to live anywhere else in Florida.