Relocating - what to air freight, what to ship?

[flipdoodle]

We've been given an allowance of 300kg for air freight, and 40cuft to ship. I can't really imagine what those numbers mean, but it feels like we could fit the entire contents of our house about 5 times over!

Is the shipping for bulky furniture - beds, sofas, table and chairs, and air freight for everything else?

[flipdoodle]

Sorry, just found an almost identical thread from June last year. Sometimes I think I'm living CaramelGirl's life timeshifted by a year...

[WhereInTheWorldToNext]

300kg of airfreight is approximately 5 tea chests (or ten large suitcases). Although it does of course depend on what exactly you pack.

The main issue is that air freight will be with you in the week and a container depending on where you are going is more likely 6-8 weeks. So essentials go air freight, rest is shipped. What is an essential will depend on where you are going and into which type of accommodation (hotel/furnished let etc)

Air freight also unlikely to suffer from heat damage so anything that can be damaged by weeks worth of high temps should be air freighted. bitter experience of shipping three huge diptyque candies

[flipdoodle]

Oh no! Melty candles!

We'll either be in a serviced apartment or our own place with rented furniture until our stuff arrives. So I guess we'll take some bedding/towels with us on the plane and the rest in the air freight allowance?

I've been chucking so much stuff away in a decluttering attempt it feels like we hardly own anything anyway! Though I'm sure the reality will be different once we're trying to fit our life into a bunch of suitcases.

[GinaBambino]

Definitely try and declutter. I work in shipping and the amount of stuff I see people take that they could essentially buy in their new country is astounding! Use the container for anything big and heavy like beds/wardrobes whatever furniture you're taking and airfreight for anything small. Use hold luggage for your essentials including paperwork. Things can go missing/be delayed etc so depending on where you're moving to, make sure you're aware of transit times and that you can cope for weeks without certain items.

Good luck and I hope it all goes well for you!

[WhereInTheWorldToNext]

A word of caution about the advice to declutter: In my experience (and I've done several overseas moves) whilst it's important to get rid of the crap don't get tied up with trying to assess whether it's worth shipping stuff that might be available to purchase in your new county.

If you're shipping a container load there is little to be saved by deciding that it's not worth shipping the laundrey baskets or the coffee cups. The saving is minimal and it's a pain having to scrabble around in your first weeks trying to replace items that you presumably picked once because you liked them.

[MattDillonsPants]

Whatever you ship, wrap it four times as well as you think you need to. All of my pictures were smashed...well the glass was...and the cover on my sewing machine was badly cracked and DH's bike looked like it had been run over. Bits missing.

[brightandbeauiful]

What you choose to freight depends on where you're going - some countries have disproportionately expensive furniture/bedding/small kitchen electricals, so do your homework! We're in Ethiopia where furniture is ridiculously expensive, so we brought flat-pack furniture with us.

[BeaArthursUnderpants]

Ask your relo provider, but IME if you have rented furniture or a short-term apartment they will probably provide linens, basic kitchen goods, things like an iron, Hoover, and any other essentials you need. It will be basic, though, so if you like to cook you may want to put some decent knives, measuring cups, etc. in the air shipment. We really wished we had done that. Mostly, though, our air shipment was stuff the kids would want in order to feel comfortable and settle in. So we did air ship their bedding, a few bulk boxes of their favorite packaged snacks, books, plenty of toys, their bikes and scooters. The air shipment does fill up surprisingly quickl,, though. I think we had 1,000 lbs and it was plenty but we certainly had lots of stuff that went in the container as well.

If you are bringing children with you, and if they are flying you business class, you can also fit quite a bit of stuff in your luggage. We brought 8 large suitcases with over 500 lbs of stuff on the plane. Between that and the air shipment, we had everything we really needed.

Good luck!

[BeaArthursUnderpants]

Also, we were lucky and had the exact opposite experience from MattDillonsPants. The shipping company insisted on packing everything for us, for insurance reasons, and everything arrived without a scratch. The environmentalist in me was appalled at how much packing material they used but I guess they know what they're doing!

[ksb76]

I would agree with Bea - in your air shipment pack things that they either will provide but of a terrible quality (knives, pans, towels, etc) - all the things that annoy you in a self catering cottage (or is that just me!?) or extras that they won't provide (measuring cups, extra kitchen equipment that you are partial to). Also toys for the kids, and your computer. We generally have a laptop with us in hand luggage, our desktop in the air shipment, and our hard drive backup (time machine) in the sea container, so that we have everything in triplicate. When we moved with a baby we also managed to squeeze in a cot, and other baby supplies. Now with a 10/12 year old, we would pack in copious amounts of books, toys, bikes if possible etc of theirs, and any clothing that didn't' fit in regular luggage.

[InTheSandPit]

Check the time frames. Airfreight took a month (and was then delayed by Eid). Ship was 3-4 months.
We packed in suitcases seasonal clothes, toys, books. Hand luggage for all paperwork. Travel carseats for kids.
We air freighted bedding, kitchen, more toys, kids bikes, carseats, out of season clothes, desktop computer. Don't know how much it was. We knew rentals were usually furnished, so rented house furnished in UK. Took cash in leiu, and paided for airfreight ourselves.

[Hariasa]

This is a really useful thread - I'd also been wondering about this!

[Scone1nSixtySeconds]

If they provide packers use them! Ours were a bloody marvel.

Some of it depends where you are going of course, when we went to Australia it was a pain remembering that, for e.g. No pine cone type decorations were allowed at all. And anything air freighted via Dubai turns into a melty mess not glamorous enough for diptyque candles but lots of yummy chocolates

I would agree with the advice on this thread, with one special mention if you are moving with dc. Take their pillows on the plane. Nothing makes you feel more at home (or is skimped on more in rented accommodation) than your own pillow.

[InTheSandPit]

Our packers (both quotes) refused to let me pack. Purely on the basis that it needed to be checked we weren't trying to take stuff that would be refused (and hence result in the whole shipment being searched) and partly so it was labeled properly, again to reduce the amount of boxes searched by customs.

[Scotinoz]

We're in the late stages of moving, again, so I'm doing the whole air freight V container at the moment.

Firstly, 40cubic feet isn't much, but I'm guessing you maybe mean either a 40ft container or 40cubic metres? Either way, that's the contents of a 3 bedroom house...easily. We have a 3 bedroom house, outdoor furniture, bikes, golf clubs and kids outdoor toys which comes in around 35 cubic metres. Too much for a 20ft container but space in a 40ft container.

We tend to airfreight essentials - clothes, kids toys, kitchen bits and bobs etc.