Moving companies: Van to Toronto? Experience? Tips?
 

Planning to move from Van to Toronto, 1 bedroom apartment to 1 bedroom.

Going to sell all the crappy eq3 furniture and get it over in Toronto.

Moving companies are easily $3500 to move 1000lbs AND one needs a place / permit to be able to park a 18 wheeler to help load and unload at both destination.

Any tips on moving / cross country etc.. would be good. thanks in advance!

I've done the Vancouver to Toronto move, and then Toronto to Calgary move
both time fully paid for by work so expense wasnt really an issue.

as for the parking of the 18-wheeler, no worries about that, the moving companies will move your load into smaller cube trucks for in-town delivery where they cannot drive the big moving trucks into location.

If you are moving into a condo in toronto, book the move-in elevator far far in advance, sometimes they are fully booked for like 2 weeks, which mean you may end up moving mid month and be stuck with having to find temp housing.
Most condo also charge a move-in fee, my last condo was $150 + $500 damage deposit for elevator and I only had a 4 hour window.

all my moves the movers packed/unpacked and also disassembled and reassembled all furniture. request TVs to be packed with "shock" sensors, and to ensure the movers test all LCD monitors and TV in front of you before packing, and then unpack and plug in to test at arrival.....moving companies will charge you extra for any TV/LCD monitors that you move but will reimburse you for any damages. The shock sensors change colour if the TV was dropped or stored incorrectly during move.

moving company will not pack/ship any liquids including condiments, soy sauce etc, and no alcohol. so plan to give those away, or drive those yourself to Toronto if you are making a cross country road trip with your car.

I did the move from Vancouver to Toronto (and sadly still here.)

I didn't have a lot of belongings so I only shipped my car. If you can sell anything you can, sell it now because the cost to move is tough to bear, unless paid for by employer.

skiipi is correct on pretty much everything. Book your elevator and any movers you need in as far in advance as possible because the real estate market is hot right now, so people often move during the last day of the of the month or the first. July 1 - good luck. Everybody moves.

We honestly have 1 tv + 1 computer monitor but good note.

I'm trying to see how I can ship a pallet of stuff so I can pack all the 20+ boxes and get it done with.
Maybe I get it delivered to in law's place (pallet) and I unpack into apartment in Toronto.

If you want to ship a pallet, you can try Air Canada Cargo as well, but it COULD get just as expensive. Get a quote to be safe. You can e-mail them or call them; The staff are pretty friendly and helpful. Depending on what you are shipping, you can contact Scott Freight Services or find a freight forwarder from YVR's cargo page. If you want to pick it up from YYZ, you can rent a van or something and haul it to your apartment/condo in Toronto without having to piss off your in-laws or deal with booking the elevators etc.

Are you shipping your car as well? Livingstone International can double up on both.

Or try Manic's suggestion of using uShip. I haven't had good luck on it for Canadian hauls, only the US.

if you're travelling really light...

back when i was in university moving moving back home (VERRRY long time ago), i literally taped the hell out of about 1 or 2 boxes i got from super store (apple boxes) :lol and greyhounded them back to vancouver. back then it wasn't too expensive compared to other delivery/moving companies... i was mostly shipping back old text books and stuff i couldn't give away to other students so it fit well in boxes and was sort of heavy.
you could probably check what their prices are too.

I was told and my gf said Greyhound is done. But I'll call them to double check.

Car wise, I won't bring back my car or my motorcycle. Will just buy new there.

I was told pallet delivery is not available because they won't allow you to load by yourself.

I gotta do more research! Thanks for these tips. Will start calling MOnday asap.

If you have someone else move it, go through all your stuff immediately upon delivery and don't sign anything til you're sure it's all there. My parents moved cross country with a pretty expensive company (paid for by their company) and all kinds of stuff went missing.