How to move you, your partner and all your belongings across the country for $1000 - part 1

By far the most tedious aspect of taking up a new job on the other side of the country has been the ordeal of moving ourselves and our household across a 4,000km distance. Upon learning that the opportunity in Victoria had solidified into bona fide reality, and after the expected procrastination/denial phase had passed, we somewhat reluctantly set down to exploring our options. Romance of heading west aside, it was not a pretty picture, particularly in terms of financial cost. Shocker.

My new employer did offer a moving stipend, which in the end amounted to enough money to pay for my own transportation costs, but not those of my partner. That said, as the career benefits of the move mostly sided in my court, I felt it only fair that I should undertake the majority of the resulting expense for both of us.

The least costly quote we received for shipping our furniture and belongings from Ontario to BC (for a two bedroom house) was $3,500 US + gasoline 'tax', which we were told to expect would probably amount to another $1,000. This was for the mostly-do-it-yourself option, where the moving company would drop off a container at our house that we would then pack ourselves. The company would then pick up the container, transport it across the county and deliver it in Victoria where we would then be expected to unpack it. In addition to this expense, we also needed to consider our own transportation costs, which we expected would amount to somewhere between $700 and $1000 one-way for the two of us. In case you're curious, the most expensive quote we received was about $8,000 US for a full service option where the moving company would pack, load and then unload all our belongings.

Being the cheapies that we are, we immediately viewed this level of expense as being out of the question. Having had only a brief, four year experience with home ownership, we remained of the mindset that anything demanding an immediate cash-in-hand payment greater than $2000 is outrageously extravagant. Re-evaluating our options it occurred to us that it might be more practical to consider selling the majority of our furniture and belongings and using the resulting funds to purchase the necessities upon reaching our destination. Realizing the multiple benefits associated with this option - drastically reducing our moving costs, earning a few bucks, and being afforded the opportunity to purchase items to best suit whatever new living arrangement awaited us - we quickly decided that this was the route to go.

We set down to tackling the task at hand, which we jointly decided was to pare our belongings down to the bare minimum. What followed was an interesting exercise in negotiation and determination as we struggled to find common ground between our somewhat disparate interpretations of 'bare minimum'.