Moving from the midwest Wisconsin to puna

[MBB]

Finally making the big move home, can't wait to be back home in Hawaii. Want advice from anyone who moved from Midwest to Puna. What is the best way to move, we want to bring our furniture. We plan on possibly shipping a container straight from Midwest to puna, driving the car to a port and shipping car from there. Any good advice on shipping companies, best, and cheapest way to do this.

Mahalo to my future neighbors

[kalakoa]

If you ship a container, it might be worth doing your own logistics: buying the container outright means not having to give it back, you can park it on the property and use it as a storage shed, sell it if/when you're "done".

[birdmove]

If you buy a place in some of the developments (Hawaiin Paradise Park for instance) you get an acre of land. Plenty of room to park even a 40" container. Have you spent time here before??

Jon

Jon in Keaau/HPP

[dayna]

Maybe my husband can chime in here since he knows more about the cost, but if your container gets here to Hawaii and you've not found a place to live yet it's MUCH cheaper to leave the container in Honolulu for storage then here on the Big Island. I think the costs is a difference of 100's of dollars for a short stay. Our container was at Aloha Cargo Transport in Honolulu (and they were the shipper).

Also for container delivery I can't say enough good things about Conans, they've delivered two containers for us now and both in tight winding type driveways with lots of tough spots!

And I totally agree with purchasing the container. We have two, 1 40 foot up in volcano and 1 20 foot down here in OrchidLand. Best storage sheds money can buy! (and with a container lock the most secure).

Dayna

www.E-Z-Caps.com

[Carey]

We moved from N. IL to Puna 7 years ago, having never been to Hawaii (instigation was for me to go to the University here). We did not buy land first, but rented first to get a feel of the island.

We had always lived on acreage, & thought that was what we would do here... We decided on a smaller lot here after maintaining the rental land.... things do not have winter here... plants are on over-drive & hyper-drive... If you want to spend a good portion of your time on yard/garden work, go for land... but even a small lot can keep you busy for hours a week, just maintaining it & can feed a bunch!

We decided not to bring furniture (had 5 rooms of wood antiques & some very over stuffed living room furniture - sold or gave away most of it)
Have decided that here lighter tropical works better.... (I should add, that unless tropical is on your palette, there are few choices her & then it might be better to bring) and most entertaining involves a lot of folding tables & lots of chairs... we rented first & the rental had mainly "patio" (lanai here) furniture... easy to keep clean & there are some really comfy options... the money we made from the furniture sale of the stuff we had more than paid for the stuff we have gotten, so there was no real cost, and just a change of design. We shipped our household stuff USPS, parcel, 81 boxes (far cheaper than any other option, unless you are tied to your furniture)

We did drive to the west coast, as our car was then only 3 years old....used Pasha for the transport from CA to Hilo, dropped off the car & used a rental to get around there & here for one week (got a 4WD here & beat the snot out of it exploring roads we didn't wanna use OUR car on)

[nana valley]

I moved pretty much the same way Carey did, only I did not rent first. Shipped about 80 boxes USPS and I used UHaul's UBox for the larger, heavier items and that worked very well for me. Because I was moving to BI, UHaul required me to buy the plywood 4'WX8'DX7'H box which was inexpensive and worked out great for me. I use the Ubox for storage (similar to the use of a container). I installed vents, painted the structure and it is stored in my carport.
I sold, donated or gave away all of my furniture on the mainland and bought furniture here that was proven more compatible to this climate. I had learned that leather furniture does not do well here because of mold. Certain woods are loved by the termites over other wood material.

My shipping costs were cut by $15,000 when I decided not to use containers! The most difficult thing was giving up such nice property that was quality-made and then watch strangers take it away for a fraction of what it was worth. Once I got past the initial shock of that, the move was easy.

UHaul was very helpful for me through the Boise office but there are some bad reviews coming from Texas area, deep South and the MidWest. I credited the quality of hired help (hope I don't offend anyone!)as being a factor.

Your car will ship faster and arrive sooner if you deliver it to California (Longbeach or Oakland)as I have since learned all the cars come to Hawaii from CA. I delivered my car to Seattle, it sat on their dock for 4 days, put in a container on a Matson ship, shipped to Longbeach, sat there for a few days then shipped to Honolulu. Then it was removed from the container and sat on the Honolulu dock for a few days before coming to Hilo. I had to rent a car for three weeks, not one week like Carey did!! So look into the company she used for sure. My car's clearcoat was damaged because of the salt air exposure from sitting on these docks and my failure to immediately wash it when I picked it up! So wash your car when you get it. Maybe put a hard wax just before you move it, too.

Best of luck in your move. I promise you will never freeze to death here!

[MBB]

Thanks for all the imput. We already own a home on 1 acre in HPP. I will look into all the good options suggested here by my future neighbors.

Mahalo

[SandyS]

We moved over from MI about two years ago. We also sold most of our mainland things and moved the rest USPS. After weighing many options, we used konacarguy.com to ship two cars directly from MI. The cars arrived ahead of schedule and in perfect condition. I have not missed anything thing we left behind except family and friends

[PaulW]

Bring as little as possible!

[Guest]

Come with the shirt on your back. Perhaps maybe ship a car if you have a fairly new one.

The money you will save on shipping, hauling, moving, storage and of course the most important item that will get broken is just not worth buying what you need and want here.