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Moving Stress and How to Deal With It

Moving. The word, the thought, the work – can take us to a place of despair. It’s like the biggest weekend homework assignment of your life. Depending on how much you need to move, of course. If you’re not a tiny house dweller or true minimalist, chances are you have a house full of stuff that needs to be organized, packaged, moved, unpacked, reorganized and put in place in your new home. Big and small. 

And moving your lifelong collection of stuff  isn’t the only stress moving can bring to the surface. What if you’re moving to a completely different city or state? Will you adapt and like the new surroundings, will you make new friends, will your children make new friends? There’s a lot that can go through our minds when we think about change. Some people enjoy and look forward to change, while for others it may bring on stress and anxiety thinking about leaving their comfort zones. Here are some ways you can help yourself and your family to take away and alleviate some of the stress from moving:

Simply put, change your mindset. This doesn’t mean not to acknowledge all the responsibilities or tasks that go along with a move, but try to look at these things differently, in a positive and productive way. If you think about going through all of your belongings and only taking with you what you truly need and want, and getting rid of stuff you didn’t even remember you had, this is a good thing! An opportunity to let go of the old and lighten your load. Declutter, donate, re-purpose. Changing our view on the benefits of moving can greatly improve the process.

Organize and prioritize. Don’t wait until the last minute to do everything. Make a list of all of the tasks you need to take care of like changing your address, changing utility company information, canceling subscriptions. Prepare for packing by making a categorized list of your items, what kind of boxes and containers you need, labels, tape, markers, etc. Having all of your tools at the ready will avoid the stress of not having them when you need them. 

Research your new city. If you’re moving to a completely new location and don’t know much about it, do some digging online! Check out the popular local restaurants, look for nature trails and parks, find the closest coffee shop to your new address. Community meet-up groups are a great way for new people in town to meet and make connections. 

Hire a professional moving company. If you are able, hiring professionals to help with you packing, loading, trekking and unloading is a huge weight off your shoulders. No stress of asking friends and family to use their weekend in the most dreadful and strenuous way possible, and you’re able to focus on all the logistics and personal planning you need to tend to. Whether you hire for the full gamut of the moving process, which can include movers coming into your home and actually packing for you, or just the day-of work of transporting your furniture and boxes, the professional help is one we’d recommend if it’s in your budget.

Don’t take too long settling in. We get it, moving is exhausting, and the thought of now going through the stress of unpacking and putting away all that stuff is one we want to put off and avoid. You should give yourself a little time to rest and decompress, however, getting your new home in order will allow you to sit back, relax and get comfy in your new place. You know you’d feel much better sitting on the couch and having a view of a finished and decorated room, rather than 3 boxes in the corner and your framed art standing against the wall. Wouldn’t it be nice to open a cupboard and grab a glass, instead of pilfering through which (hopefully labeled) box it’s in? Getting settled will help you feel grounded and ready to take on this new chapter of your life.

We hope some of these suggestions help you if you’re finding yourself stressed out about moving. It’s obviously not the most fun thing in the world, but it doesn’t have to be the absolute worst, either!

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Move It Or Lose It

Planning a move is quite the headache. A headache which only intensifies the farther away your move happens to be. When your move is across town, that’s one thing. Across state lines is another thing entirely. The cost to move increases with the distance. At a certain point, you may find yourself wondering if it’s really worth the money to move all your things or just upgrade with the new home. To make this decision, consider these factors.

Estimates

The first step you inevitably take during a move is gathering estimates from potential movers. There are several things that affect this estimate. Time, types of service, floors in a house, weight, bulky/irregular shaped items, and distance are all going to affect your final cost. 

Let’s start with time. Your moving company may price by the hour, or a flat rate. Your decision to choose between these rates will depend on how far you have to travel and how much packing you plan on doing. If you leave all the packing up to the movers, it’s going to take longer. The amount of stairs they have to go up and down will affect how quickly they can move. 

As we just mentioned, you can hire movers to simply move your items, or perform a full service of packing, moving, and unpacking/assembling your items. For things like beds and sectional couches, if you were to buy new items it’s likely that delivery and installation would come included. You’ll still have to get your old items out of the house, but this is where you could potentially save some money by purchasing new bedroom furniture.

The number of floors in your house and how many stairs you have doesn’t just translate into time, it also adds to the effort of the movers. Tight corners and the unbalanced weight makes the job harder and therefore cost more. It isn’t just the house you’re moving out of, it’s the one you’re moving into, as well, that will be added in.

Bulky and irregular shaped items are the other area where it may behoove you to forego moving certain furniture pieces and invest in something new. Weight and shape comes into play when it starts to exceed a certain amount. The heavier and harder to move an item, the more it’s going to cost you. 

What’s The Work-Around?

Ultimately, it doesn’t matter if you choose to get a new couch instead of moving yours. It’s still going to need to be removed from the house or apartment. If you leave it behind a in a rental property, you could be charged a removal fee. However, if you can get it out to the curb (for the price of some pizza to feed your strong friends) you can request that the city pick it up for free. You can also look into other avenues such as Habitat for Humanity. Often, when you donate to this and similar organizations, if you don’t have a means to drop off the item, they will come to you and pick it up at little or no charge. As for new furniture, delivery and installation options are always available from the seller. Simple research and price comparison will be your best bet to determine which option is right for you. 

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Helpful Tips For Your Cross Country Move

Moving is an exhausting, albeit exciting, process. Even more so when it’s compacted by the distance. It’s one thing to move across town. All you really need is a big enough truck and an entire day of back breaking manual labor and the bulk of the work is done. You can either go big to go home with a massive truck, fitting all your worldly possessions in a single trip transport, or save some cash in rental fees and make several trips throughout the day. Even if you’re only moving one town away, the stress isn’t that much worse. But going out of state, possibly crossing multiple state lines in the process is daunting to say the least. To keep you from being completely overwhelmed in this process, follow these tips and tricks to make your cross country move as painless as possible.

Pre-planning

If at all possible, take a trip to your new destination and spend a weekend getting to know the city. Before your trip, try and schedule a few appointments with realtors to view potential new homes. Buying a new home – or even renting a new apartment – sight unseen is risky. You could be stuck there for a year – minimum, more if you’ve signed a mortgage. It isn’t just the condition of the house, but its relation to everything else in the area, including your work commute. This is an added cost, but worth it to help ease your mind and create a smooth transition.

Packing

Yes, you can hire movers that will also pack for you. But honestly, they’ll be responsible for fitting an entire house into one truck and getting on the road at a decent time. There are two things to bear in mind throughout this process: stuff and time. The amount of stuff you take with you can make a huge difference. If the movers have to pack fewer boxes and pieces of furniture in the truck the whole process goes much faster. Everything from mattresses and furniture to knick-knacks and clothing should be subject to dismissal. Donate your items to a shelter or Habitat for Humanity to make an impact on someone else’s life and yours at the same time. Secondly, don’t wait until the last minute. Begin this preparation as soon as you close on your new house or sign the lease. 

Insurance

When shopping for movers, check their insurance policy. The drivers should be insured and there should be a quality guarantee with your contract. Additional insurance you purchase yourself never hurts either. There’s a lot that can happen on the road. Protect your valuables and yourself.

Contact/Communication

Set up proper lines of communication and contact for your movers. Car chargers for your phones – maybe even provide one for your drivers – will save you. Appoint designated meet-up spots for meals, overnight stays, and rest stops. It’s okay if you lose each other on the road throughout the day. But always be able to reconnect and stay in touch.

Paperwork, Essentials, And Tip

Be sure to keep your precious valuables and important paperwork with you. Birth certificates, marriage license, and family heirloom china or jewelry items are better left where you can keep an eye on them. Have a bag packed with a change of clothes, hygiene products, and any other snacks or reading materials you might need for the trip. And, as always, don’t forget to tip your movers for their work. Withdraw cash from the bank the day before you set off so that it’s with you and ready to disperse when they do. 

It’s a huge transition and one that offers a lot of promise and possibility. Don’t let yourself get bogged down in all there is to do. Get a firm handle on these essential points and it’ll be smooth sailing from start to finish. 

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Big City Livin’ or Small Town Life

Where you live plays a huge part in who you are as a person in the world. There’s an undeniable difference in the rhythm of a big city versus a small town. That rhythm alone – the pace at which people plug along day after day – affects so much about a person. In movies the Big Shot Big City Lawyer is always in a rush, and the Small Town Simple Farmer can’t be hurried along for anything. And it’s true; people in larger cities move faster. You can always tell a tourist from a dweller on the streets of NYC or Hollywood.

Granted, these assumptions are very general and not everyone fits “the mold” of where they live. These are the people most likely to migrate to a coast or inland, to find a place more suited to them. But why is this the way it is? What creates this rhythm? Let’s ponder…

Distance and Space Between

The most notable difference between big and small cities isn’t their size, necessarily, but how much is crammed into the area. Seriously, just think about the irony that in a large city like Los Angeles where every centimeter of space is being taken up by someone or something, there’s less space to own, let alone exist, than in a small town like Kingfisher, OK where the nearest shopping mall is over an hour away in Oklahoma City. And Los Angeles is in the midst of massive development everywhere; tearing down old, flailing buildings and making way for high-rise, high-occupancy buildings with fine dining and shops on their first floor.

This isn’t to say smaller towns of 50,000 people or so are deprived of all civilization. It’s still the 21st century. They have shopping centers and more densely populated areas. But they also have space between things, yet nothing is more than 10 minutes away. It makes tasks like going to the grocery store less daunting.

Volume of People and Things

Further down this difference line we get the number of people and things sharing these small or large seeming spaces. Add this one factor to the example we just used of grocery shopping and this mundane, necessary task changes instantly. Unless you’re there the moment the doors open to Trader Joe’s on a Tuesday, there will never be a time when it’s “not that busy”. As the day goes on, it only gets worse. And it’s not just the crowds of people you have to muddle through, it’s the cars and traffic. Grocery shopping in a smaller town might take an hour if you’re buying a lot and taking your time browsing the aisles. Step out for a total of 10 things and you’ll spend half an hour sitting in traffic just getting there and back in a larger city.

More people in a smaller amount of space lends itself to an array of habits and feelings like you never have enough time for anything and so your life is a constant grind of go, go, go! There’s a heightened sense of urgency among big city dwellers that doesn’t exist in smaller towns.

As far as things and things to do, it’s not that there “isn’t anything to do” in a small town, there’s just only so much to do. Listening to Cory Booker speak about his time as Mayor of Newark, NJ, he spent a lot of time trying to attract businesses to his smaller town. Newark’s a town of close to 300,000 people and it was a tough sell because the investor’s didn’t believe that the smaller town could sustain a business of their size. Booker was able to get businesses there and the city got a nice little boom, but think of towns that are smaller than that. They aren’t likely to have luxury movie theatres like the Arclight or a Starbucks on every corner. Theatres with spoken word, original plays, or open mic comedy nights don’t exist. There’s one local, community run theatre – if you’re lucky. Orchestras and museums aren’t in every small town. The Arts are the last to flourish in smaller towns.

Again, though, it isn’t that they don’t exist, they just aren’t a huge portion of what there is to do in a small town. It’s encouraging to see more small boutiques and coffee shops pop up that have locally sourced goods and ingredients to sell their customers. Even things like Wine and Paint nights are becoming more trendy in smaller areas. But it’s not like NYC where you could go out every single night forever and still have something new to do.

Proportional and Relative

There are many more differences on a substantially nuanced level between the densely and sparsely populated areas of the country. But these two main points are the biggest factors in what we first noted was the main difference – a city’s rhythm. Less people and more room gives the sense of having more time and less need to rush. Flip the script and it’s no wonder there’s more stress and demand for instant results, and less feeling like you have room to breathe and relax. It affects people differently. Some people were born ready to run, and so they feel at ease in a faster paced environment. Others are content to take their time and enjoy the view, so the slow beat of a small town’s drum appeals to their senses. Whatever type of person you are, if you feel you were born in the wrong environment, you can always change it with a move.