Several months ago Peter and I brainstormed options on how to get our belongings from Saint Louis to Portland:

  1. Hire a movers.
  2. Use a storage container.
  3. Haul things behind us in a rented truck.

Once we made the decision that when we get to Portland we’ll stay somewhere temporary and look for our permanent home, that also made this decision for us. So we chose option 2, the storage container, because this way the storage container company can store our container in a warehouse in Portland until we are ready for them to deliver it to the address we tell them.

During my research I found there are a lot of storage container companies, but only a handful of reputable ones that do national moves. If you are looking to do an in-town move with a storage container, I would recommend pricing the local options as I found they were cheaper than using a company that can handle cross-country moves. Of course a lot of this is because the bulk of the price is for distance.

Here are the most reputable options I found for a cross-country move with storage containers:

These companies have various options for container sizes and storage. The first thing I did was solicit quotes. For first impressions of these businesses, this really set the tone. PODS was awesome because they give you a quote online, instantly. The others you have to e-mail or call and wait for a response. Smart Move was by far the worst. They took several DAYS to get me a quote, and after that they continued to send me unsolicited ads via e-mail. All the pricing was pretty comparable but I was surprised to see PODS was actually the cheapest too. After I read about their patented lift system that keeps the POD level when being moved, that sealed the deal in my mind. The competitors don’t have that.

I called and made a reservation. They consider today’s gas prices when quoting, and I was really happy later on when I realized I had locked in my price for a relatively low gas price.. it still hasn’t been that low since. So how much does it cost to use PODS? Like I said, a LOT depends on distance. But our move from Saint Louis to Portland will be about $3,600. That includes the first month of storage in a PODS storage center in Portland. It’s not cheap, but it is cheaper than hiring movers for a move like this, and we won’t be rushed.

I will of course update if any issues arise, but the POD is set to be dropped off on May 1st and picked up on June 1st which gives us a whole month to pack. And make jokes about being POD PEOPLE.

PODS offers a lot of affiliation/organization discounts, but I’m also fan of the ol’ Google-around-for-it discount and I found this code: PODSavings2 which gives you 10% off initial delivery, 5% off between markets. It ended up knocking about $200 off our price.

© sscornelius

PODS Storage Container Photo © sscornelius