Moving Frugally?

[mightymoo]

My DH and I have wanted to move back to the east coast for forever, but due to the economy we have put this off. However, we finally feel we've reached a point where we just have to do this and get it done with so we can start living without this hanging over our heads as 'sometime in the future', be closer to family and stop spending tons of money on flights, etc.

We are looking at moving in about 6 months so I'm thinking ahead, but I'm wondering how to do this frugally? This is a very long distance move - we have a lot of secondhand/used furniture that I'm happy to just sell and not look back at, but we have some nice pieces too - but I have no clue whether its worth the cost of moving them or not. We will probably live with family for at least a couple months, so we have to think about where to put everything. We have two cars and will probably plan to drive them out, so Uhauling is a possibility, but even renting a Uhaul truck to pull our sedan runs $3K, plus gas (which looks like it would be about $1K). Has anyone moved a long distance recently have any tips on how to do this without breaking the bank?

[Ruthla]

Definitely move with as little as possible- even the "nice pieces" of furniture might be worth selling where you are and replacing when you get to the East Coast.

My DB and SIL moved from CA to NJ about 2 years ago. They ended up selling one car and having the other one shipped- it worked out to be cheaper than driving it (including gas, depreciation on the car, hotel fare on route and, most significantly, lost wages during the cross-country drive.) When DB first moved to CA, he drove down and made a vacation/adventure out of it- but at the time he was single and freelancing.

When they first got to the East Coast, they lived with relatives for a few months while they saved up to buy a house.

[Lil'M]

If you manage to whittle down your stuff enough, you could check into renting a Uhaul trailer that you can pull from your car, instead of a uhaul truck pulling your car. They can hold a lot and are much cheaper.

[root*children]

You can buy a utility trailer for around $500-$900 and sell it when you get to your new destination.
We are doing the same type of cross-country move in 3 months, and we are going to buy a utility trailer, and sell almost all furniture, only keeping hard-to-find-quality-used things like one of our mattresses, one dresser, chest freezer & kitchen table/chairs.