Money and Life Lessons Learned from Moving
I STRONGLY dislike moving. I moved every year in college and was happy when I moved into a real apartment. However, I inevitably needed to move again. I’d been at the last place for several years and you know how that goes…I accumulated way more stuff than I realized. Now I had to contend with moving furniture, piles of books and papers, and so much other stuff. I didn’t care for the process, but I took away some great money lessons from moving. I learned some ways to save money when moving (some the hard way) and some lessons to apply to life and business. So money saving moving tips first.
Saving Money Tips
1) You can get free boxes. If you work in an office building, ask the mail room and maintenance staff if you can have boxes. They just recycle the cardboard boxes any way so if you explain you’re moving and ask nicely to take some boxes. They’ll say yes. You’ll get some nice sturdy boxes at no cost to you. If you don’t work in an office building, ask maintenance or a nice worker at a store and they’ll likely let you take boxes as well. They’re taking them out to be recycled also or sadly some trash them.
2) Prep meals ahead of time to avoid eating out. Cook enough for several meals and freeze them before you move. Make sure to pack the frozen meals in a clearly marked separate box. This way when you’re tired and irritable from carrying and moving boxes you can simply pull out a pre-made meal, heat it up and chow down. It will be healthier and you’ll save money. I learned this the hard way. I thought I would just have a pot out where I could cook a simple meal. Yeah, that did not happen. I ended up spending $40 in order to eat until I finished unpacking the kitchen.
3) Be ready to upcycle items. You’ll need to rearrange where items are kept when you move to a new place, as spacing and storage areas in each room will be different. I had six nice baskets of storage in my old bathroom. The new place doesn’t accommodate them as easily. So I had to get a little creative with where to place the baskets and how to change some other items to make everything display nicely. Instead of going shopping for new crates etc see what you can do to get what you currently have to fit and look nice. This will save you a bundle. Go on sites like Pinterest for cool ideas.
Life and Business Lessons
1) Ask. Yep, that simple, you have to ask before you can get a yes. Whether dealing with business or general life goals, ask for what you need. The answer may be yes. Above I asked for boxes, but imagine if it was something I needed to better your business or career?
2) Hire out. Friends and I moved most of my things, except the really large items. However, there were a lot of hours of packing and then moving. If I had hired movers to move all the items, I would have reclaimed hours on which to work on more productive tasks for my business etc. Spend more time working in your passion and hire others that are working in theirs.
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Photo credit: Mpopp
