To move across the country from Utah to Florida, we spent ⅓ of typical moving costs!
Taz and I decided to move across the country back to our home state of Florida! We wanted to move closer to family and live nearby since all of our siblings are still at home. However, moving costs an arm and a leg, especially going out of state. Everyone tells us how they can’t follow their dreams outside of where they live because everything is “too expensive.” Surprisingly, we cut out almost all the large expenses and we are spending almost nothing! I’ll walk through our processes and how we are able to move across the country for almost no cost at all.
Do Your Research
Since we are moving 2500 miles away, most moving companies are astronomical. (I know some companies will assist with moving costs if you get a job across the country. If you can, do that!) We don’t have many things and knew we could get away with a small moving van, but most moving companies only allow their largest vehicles to travel across the country which just adds more money (not to mention gas!) Taz and I ruled that out fairly quickly and began looking into pods where you can load furniture into a shipping container and then it’s dropped off at your destination. Orrrr you can ship everything you own to your new home and pray that it gets there.
Pick the Best Option
Taz and I decided to go with the latter option. This works for us since we know where we are moving to and we won’t need much furniture starting out. My job got a corporate discount for shipping and before I left, we sent out all our boxes beforehand. If you are working at a big company and have access to shipping, definitely ask for a quote! The second cheapest option was to go for a pod. To move across the country, we found that a moving truck is the most expensive. Over the next year, we will be living with family so we don’t need a ton of furniture so our situation may be different than most. Find out what works the best for your family. We downsized A LOT and got rid of a ton of stuff but it was better for us to get rid of things and sell most of our things versus filling up a truck and trekking across the country. From everything we’ve sold, we made back almost all the money we spent buying gas from Utah to Arizona and plane flights from Arizona to Florida. This made our costs less than $100 total.
Save, Save, Save!
Taz and I saved a TON of money! We’ve been living on one paycheck for months.. Thankfully, we won’t be having to pay rent once we get to Florida for a little while. We planned out a budget for the next year of our life and we went through a process to figure out how much we could live off of. First, we looked at our expenses each month (excluding rent for us, but include it if you are renting.) We saw what we could cut down on and formed a realistic budget. Then, save away and pull the plug when the time comes!
That’s how we will move across the country for almost no cost! It isn’t glamorous, but it cuts our cost down. Let me know if there’s something I missed or if you have any other tips for moving across the country.
XOXO Kayla
