Info on Our Move to STX

Dave · 2007-04-24T01:59:25Z

After reading this message board for over a year almost daily and even posting a few times, We are finally in STX for good! This board was a wonderful source of information and I thought I would give a recap of our journey. Maybe someone else will find something useful in this story. First of all, I believe that there are no absolutes. What worked for my wife and I may or may not make sense for you. Our first trip to St Croix was about 2 1/2 years ago, Labor day week. We fell in love with the Island instantly! within 48 hours we had bought a lot and before we went home we had bought a second lot. Once we got home we went to work on liquidating our rental houses in Lexington KY. 6 months later we bought a townhouse near Gallows Bay. One year after that, we bought another. Finally,on March 1 we closed on our last piece of Lexington real estate. We were on our way. We have three grown daughters (not making the trip) and two German Sheppards who did make the trip. Here is how we did it. First, we bought a used 20 ft container for $2,400. You can rent them but I will use mine for tool storage when I start building on our first lot. If you buy a used shipping container MAKE SURE that it has a current tag or else the Freight co will not load it on the boat. Next, I took the advice of a friend who had made the same move a year earlier and invested in silica desiccant. This is the stuff in the little packets that comes in new sneaker boxes,etc. U-Line is a packaging supply co with a website that sells silica in larger packets. We spent about $100-$120 on two sizes, one a little smaller than a pack of M&Ms and the other about three times that size. I think the smaller one was packed about 150 to the case and the large ones were packed about 80? My friend's container was randomly flagged by Customs in STX which caused a delay of over two weeks. Needless to say. he had pillows and linens with mildew problems ( he learned the hard way about silica). I think that the extra cost is cheap insurance. We put a small pack in almost every box and scattered the larger ones throughout the container. The company that I Bought the container from was able to recommend a trucking line that could haul the container down to Jacksonville for just over $1,000. I felt that this was reasonable (11 hr drive from Lex) and I did not shop this price. Lee at Flemming's came highly recommended from many people on this board and I can say that he did a great job for us. Some posts said that he was slow to respond but that was not our experience. Very good communication from Lee. On march 3,we left Lexington with me driving my truck with the dogs and my wife driving her car. We stayed at Red Roof Inns in Columbia SC, Jacksonville and Miami because They all take pets. We rarely travel with the dogs and have not stayed at a Red Roof in years. They are in the middle of a chain wide refurbishment and were all very nice. Once in Jacksonville, we took the car and truck to Sea Star at the Port of Jacksonville. Lee said that the cost on the water for the vehicles and container was the same from Jacksonville as it would be from Miami. With this in mind, we decided to use Jacksonville (less trucking fees for container) and that way my wife and I could be in one vehicle (rented mini-van) with dogs to Miami. We chose to fly out of Miami because It was the shortest non-stop flight and we were concerned about the dogs sitting on a tarmac somewhere (loose our luggage, no problem, loose our dogs, big problem!) We flew American Airlines and again, everyone was very helpful. Make sure that if you are flying large pets. that you get CONFIRMED reservations for the pets. I usually book airfare on line to save $10 -$15 per ticket, when I read about all the qualifiers concerning pet travel, I decided to book it all over the phone, again I felt like this was cheap insurance. In our case, BTW, it was over $100 per ticket less to book round trip than one way! March 6,4:30pm STX The dogs are off the plane and wagging their tails (so are we!) Our car and truck show up 5 days later, Lee takes care of all the paperwork and licensing EXCEPT insurance (he told us this upfront) and a couple of days later, our container has NOT been flagged by customs and is delivered to our home. Pillows and mattresses and linens do not smell funky, and life is good! So, what did we spend? $2,400 used container, $1,085 truck container to Jacksonville, $3,200 to ship container form Jacksonville to STX (including duty and customs fees and del to our home, $6,000 to ship car and truck From Jacksonville to STX, about $275 for 3 nights at Red Roofs, $520 for airline tickets, $200 for doggie tickets $90 for rental car from Jacksonville to Miami. Grand Total: just under $14,000. Some other info. Make sure that you have shot records from vet within 10 days of travel ( no one asked but why chance it?) Make sure that you have clear title and current reg for vehicles. If you have a car loan, talk to your l...

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palmetto

(@palmetto)

Posts: 17

Active Member

Dave -

Great post! Best of luck on St. Croix with everything. Glad to see that there are lots of dog lovers out there...we need to transfer three in the heat of July.

Posted : June 27, 2007 12:46 am

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