Moving is a royal pain in the backside!

Hi there Hmmm, lets see. I have moved 3 times in the last 2 1/2 years and am about to do it again at the end of Jan 09. In fact, I am getting quite good at packing up the house. First time was a nightmare! I had 3 young children, 1 who was just 3 years and 1 year old twins and a whole house with all the baby paraphernalia to pack in between sorting the kids out - not about to happen. We paid the movers to pack for us - definitely worth it! Move 2 and Move 3 were a lot easier to co-ordinate once the kids got a bit older and I got the hang of it BUT ... move 2 was a debacle! The move went off well and we duly arrived at the new (rented) house, got settled in Ok. Water, heating, electricity, etc ... all working OK. The telephone was supposed to have been connected.. it wasn't! Then the man arrived to connect our Sky for the TV and couldn't do it because the phone wasn't connected yet! Also, obviously the broadband connection hadn't been connected. I won't go into details, but in the end it took the telephone company about 4 weeks to connect our phone and it was 9 weeks before we finally got broadband connected. You can imagine what our mobile/cell phone bills were like since we had to use them to set up all the change of address details, access our email, etc... NIGHTMARE!!

It is good to see you and Shelly back, and Happy New Year to the both of you. I know you said you had a hard time getting moved and settled in the new house, it is over now and that is good. I haven't moved in a long time now and hope I don't have to, if I do it will probably be to an old folks home. . I had a sister to move right before Christmas and she had a problem with her landlord and the windows. She had a lot of wind coming thru her windows and the landlord did not want her to put any caulking around the windows he told her to use some plastic and cover them up. I thought that was a sorry excuse of a landlord to suggest that.

We move every three months, its not into a house every time but its a new apartment or condo or once it was a house. Moving for us is very liberating, we get rid of stuff we don't use and give it to people who do. Yes, finding out all the things that need to be fixed is a pain but it makes for a better person to know you overcame it.

Yeah, I hate moving. Me and my husband have moved 7 times in 8 years. There was Louisiana to Indiana, Indiana to Kentucky, Kentucky to Louisiana, moving to 2 other apartments in Louisiana, then from Louisiana to South Dakota, and finally South Dakota to Iowa. Some moves were for jobs, some were because of financial problems, and the apartments in Louisiana were just trying to find a better place to live. We left Louisiana to move to South Dakota after the hurricanes and we decided we had had enough of our home state. Then we ended up here in Iowa when my husband got a job here. That last move here to Iowa was a pain. I had a 3-year-old on my hands and had to single-handedly pack and unpack our entire house by myself. I got shingles for the second time during that period from the stress and exhaustion (I get shingles when I am under severe stress). When we moved into the house, we did have some problems. We lived in the house for a couple of days without heat (in chilly November) until the gas could be turned on. For the first couple of days, we couldn't flush the toilets or use the water because we didn't realize that the main water in the house had been shut off. Oops. For the first week, we lived with no furniture except for a tv and vcr, an inflatable bed, and a playpen for my son. We also had no hot water for the first 2 weeks that we lived here. That was no fun, let me tell you. We couldn't take showers or bathe because the water was freezing cold. The water being turned on had nothing to do with it, either. Somebody who had worked on the house to get it ready to sell had done some shoddy plumbing and had run a hot water pipe to the downstairs toilet so that it would prevent the toilet from sweating. That apparently prevented hot water from going to all the other pipes in the house. The plumbers I got to come in replaced my water heater because that's what they thought was wrong. That's okay cause I probably needed it anyway, but luckily this one nice guy from the group came back to the house and figured out why the hot water wasn't working. (By the way, they do make water heaters with electric pilot lights because that's the kind that the plumbers installed.) I can't tell you how awesome that first shower was. Unfortunately, when we went to use the shower in our master bathroom, there was another problem. My husband came downstairs after his shower, while I was showering and he soon shouted up for me to turn the water off. Water was leaking from the upstairs shower into my kitchen. Great... We just recently got that fixed, more than a year after we moved into the house. The real misery of the move was when we all got a stomach virus shortly after we moved in. For some reason, which I can't remember now, we couldn't wash laundry and my son wouldn't throw up in a trash can or toilet, so I had to lay towels down. (It was the first time he had ever thrown up before, so it kind of freaked him out.) So then I had all this dirty laundry on my hands. I also had to get a plug for a stove in order to be able to use my dryer because some genius put a stove outlet in the laundry room for the dryer, so I couldn't dry clothes after the washer was working until I pulled the old dryer cord out and put the new one on. The whole thing was kind of a nightmare, but I made it through somehow. I learned a lot about moving, that's for sure!

Hi fwidman, HAPPY NEW YEAR to you, no I did have any horr story moving into a new home because I moved into to my home 28 years ago and it was a brand new house that had just been built, but my nightmare was living in our flat where we got burgled and then the bed room ceiling collasped, the land wouldn't anythin about it and then moved to my in-laws and that was another nightmare, so it was just heaven when we bought this house, we had everthing fitted so no problems. Tamara

Yes, moving can be a pain. The last time I moved was 2 years ago. You never know how much stuff you got until you move.

oh you wouldn't believe it we were moving from florida to south carolina a normal 8 hour trip an my car blew up on the wat an our 8 hour trip turned into 21 hours our 3dogs 4 cats an 2 kids were not happy an thn to top it off the people that were going to help us unload the uhual had waited as long as they could then had to go to work so we had to empty the uhaul alone alone with n o sleep in over 24 hours now cause the uhaul had to go back so after all the driving then unloading you can guess we just crash on the matress on the floor before we started empying boxes ,I told my hubby next time I move it will in a pine box never again

It's been a while (like 23 years or so), but when I moved from my nice cozy apartment where everything was taken care of by management while I was at work...to my own house, where nobody takes care of anything for me (lol), we ran into all sorts of problems. The first thing we ran into was that the plumbers that were hired to fix some pipes that had frozen over the winter (the house was empty for almost a year) fixed the pipes and turned the water on. The people that had lived here before had an icemaker and just took unhooked it, without closing it off. My entire kitchen and part of the living room were flooded! I came in about the time the 3 Stooges plumbing company were looking for a way to turn the water off. It's an electric well pump and the cut off was right behind the door. I was a little mad about that. The flooring had to be replaced, as well as the wood under the kitchen sink. Within a week of being here, the septic tank overflowed. That was fun, too. I don't think it had ever, and I mean ever, been pumped out. So we had that done. I had a heat pump put in within the first month. It was working great, and then all of a sudden the power started going off. My house is all-electric. Thinking it was something to do with the heat pump, I called the company that installed it. Turns out, I had aluminum wiring into the electric box. I thought that was illegal, but evidently it's only illegal to put it throughout the house. Into the box is ok. The wires had melted through the vinyl sheathing and was just about ready to blow. The electrician I had to hire said it would have blown the whole wall out. I kept that melted box for a while, just in case. lol Those are the biggest things I remember. I still miss that old apartment sometimes. It's so nice to be able to call someone else and they are responsible for fixing it. When you own it, you really own it! lol

I really dont have any horror stories but I do know that moving can be a pain and very tiring so you need that hot water to be able to take a nice long relaxing Hot bath after everything is put away.You have a great night and Happy New Year to you and Shelly.

Wow, what a coincidence! I had the same instance with not being able to fire up the boiler so we had no heating or hot water for the first night when we moved in just before christmas and had to ring out for the heating company to come have a look at it.. Hate moving, first the packing then been unpacking bits and pieces since then and almost done but I am so tired and achy from all the lifting! Only good thing is that it's a much better place than our last so makes it kinda worthwhile...

I've moved so many times it would take me years to tell you about the horrors. I would have to say the worst is the last place we lived. We were desperate to move when we moved in there so we didn't get all the details of everything like we should have. I don't know if it was our fault or the landlords significant other. He showed us the place without her even knowing about it, then rented the place to us without telling her. The reason behind that was that we had to be out of our old place like 2 days ago and we had 3 or 4 months rent money saved up. He was supposed to do a credit check before renting it, but because we offered the money for the first couple months in advance, he waved the check. When the landlord came over to have us sign the lease we were already moved in, that same day. She had no idea that we had kids or our cat. Her boyfriend didn't give her details. Needless to say she wasn't happy but let it go and let us stay. She actually os a very nice lady but wasn't sure if we had lied to him or if he just didn't mentionit to her. Later that week, the next door neighbor came knocking on our door at like 11pm saying that we needed to turn up the heat because he was freezing. What???? that made no sense to us. It turns out that the 2 downstairs apartments share the heat and the thermostat was in our apartment. We controlled the heat to both apartments. Later we found out that the bill was supposed to be put in our names and we would have to work it out wit the neighbor as to who paid what when the bill comes. NO WAY, NO HOW, UH UH, NOT HAPPENING!!! We fought with the landlord about it until they agreed to get the bill sent to them and they would decide who pays what. But we still had the problem about the heat not being hot enough for the neighbors and too hot for us. We just refused to deal with it. Turns out the neighbors had all kinds of issues qith the landlord and her boyfriend so they ended up moving out. Shortly after we moved into another area, to a different house from the same landlord. Problems solved.

I have been moving every 2-3 years all my life. I have stayed in 27 cities so far in 54 years. it is a royal pain alright when you have to move, but I have got quite used to it by now. We have our boxes and fixed palces for putting everything. problem arises if you do not get a house straight away and have to wait for a few months to get a house and stay inteh mean while in some tmeporary accommodation. you can not open up every thing and have to live out of the box. It can be really painful.

The only good thing about moving is finding things you forgot you have while you're packing things away! I moved before I went into 9th grade and it sucked so much! My dad was away in the Navy so it was just my mom my 2 younger sisters and my grandma who couldn't really help because she was old. We got everything ready and everything, but it was such a hassle because I was just sitting around not being able to do anything because everything had to be mostly carried out and they were heavy things. Luckily we had a lot of people from our church helping us out, but they ended up breaking the over door thing... Oh well.

I really hope you are a bit more settled now.what a nightmare moving is ,that is one of the reasons for staying where we are,we sometimes talk about a bigger house and smaller garden,but that is as far as it gets we have been in the house for 30years and It has grown on us and all the stuff in the loft to be honest we are too lazy to pack it all away.Hope you will be happy in your new home.

It is, but if you are organized about it, then it does not have to be so bad. My family has moved quite a few times, and we just get thing straightened out before we move to the place that we are moving to. It does not have to be that hard.

New boots, wished I could wear sexy shoes like that, but that would make for one big lip stand. Moving is absolutely not my thing either. I moved accross provinces one time and I stress One Time. Never again. My husband at that time thought we needed to jump ship because the grass would be greener somewhere else. WELL we got going and traveling on gravel roads which I had never done having always been a city girl. I was never rich but I had pavement to drive on. No clue. I was driving my old car and my husband was driving his old truck with all our belongings on it. I very much doubt the car, truck and all our junk was worth more than about 1,000.00, but it was all we owned and it was all paid for. I told Mr. hillbilly hubby to slow down, he had to travel ahead of me because I had no idea of where we were going and he was driving like a true farmer leaving me in a cloud of dust, I couldn't see anything. When I said slow down all he said was yeah yeah. We were going along when all of a sudden my car jumped in the air like I hit a deer or something and I stopped right now. I just sat there for a minute till the dust settled and hubby was long gone of course and no one in sight, dust settled and there was nothing ahead or behind me so I stepped on the gas to go and I went no where the motor of my car just roared, so I tried to back up and same thing so I thought Oh Great I lost the transmission. I went to get out of the car and to my horrified surprize I was sitting on top of the mattress from our bed, YES with all four tires. I sat back in the car half crying and half wanting to choke my husband. I sat there for a long time before he clued in and came looking for me and not even one person came along. I thought he was moving me to hell. Then when he did get there he worked his guts out getting me off the mattress. I don't think I ever thought it was funny but others did. Then when we got to where we were going I knew for sure we were in hell. I have never seen cold winter like that and we didn't have running water. I had to haul water from the store in five gallon pails for about 1/4 of a mile each way. I did that for one winter than said that's it and we moved back to where we were in the first place.

I haven't moved in 14yrs now and don't intend too but when things go wrong like my washing machine did just after boxing day, and I had to get it fixed that is a royal pain in the b**t too, I hope all goes well apartfrom that with your move...littleowl

Welcome Back from the Move and see you got a new pair of shoes for me to steal for Christmas..yes! I don't have any horror stories on moving except,... wait how about moving into a house across from a mother in Law after buying the house, and the people wouldn't move out when we moved all the way from Calif. to texas..so we had to move in with her for a month..yes that was loads of fun... Huggs and did you get my card?

My story is the same as yours. I might add that I am trying my best to not think of my old landlady.

Hey fwidman! Welcome back! Been missing you! Absolutely gorgous shoes to start the New Year off! And Happy New Year to you and Shelly! Sorry about all the trauma moving to the new house! But, once you get it all together it will have been worth it, I think? I do hope that will be last of the problems. I know that there are always lots of those that come with moving, especially with brand new places! You just have to wait until they get all of those little never been used before kinks out of all the appliances and then hopefully you can settle in and enjoy the new house! I hope you were at least able to enjoy some of the holidays! Well lots of luck in your new home!