You have until Jan. 1, 9 am to move house...go! (aka, what's the shortest time you've ever had to switch domiciles?)

Message Bookmarked

Bookmark Removed

Which is my situation. I was aware that the house I rent was quietly on the market but also knew that there weren't many offers, which had frustrated the landlord since he wanted to sell before the end of the year. However, it all went through over the weekend and I got the word yesterday, so, um, rah? The fact that my two housemates have a mutual self-regard that can be politely described as 'frosty' is going to make this all real fun! (Though presumably they can get back to being friends once we're all out...)

I'm going to try and move out on the weekend of the 21st/22nd so I can at least have everything shifted if not unpacked before I go home for Xmas -- which is all the more fun as these next three weeks at work are going to be busy busy busy! Pre-finals, finals week, cleaning out the old stuff and setting up the new, all with one less staff member than usual. Hrm.

I'm not as worried about all this as might be thought since I've already got a new place locked in, an apartment not far from the house, deposit placed yesterday, etc. Right now boxes and transport will be the big bugbear. But given the short turnaround time (it's still 30 days, admittedly, but we had been given assurances for sixty) -- what's the quickest you've had to be out lock, stock and barrel, either because the landlord said so or because you couldn't stand it a minute longer?

(If Gareth does hit LA on the weekend of the 14th, I will definitely be up for a meetup of some sort -- but Seattle midmonth is now VERY much out and I strongly doubt NYC for New Year's is any sort of option, I'll probably need to spend the rest of Xmas vacation unpacking...)

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Tuesday, 3 December 2002 16:03 (twenty-two years ago)

Two week's notice, by court order (neither case involved a problem with the landlord), TWICE IN A ROW, about four months apart. That was a bad year.

― Dave Fischer, Tuesday, 3 December 2002 16:06 (twenty-two years ago)

For xmas last year, we got a letter from our landlord that we had to move out ASAP for remodeling. We had a couple of months notice but were totally down as this was our first place together and we'd just invested in pretty paints on the walls.

― Sarah McLusky (coco), Tuesday, 3 December 2002 16:10 (twenty-two years ago)

well, seeing as how i spent the majority of the summer sleeping on peoples floors and staying in skanky hotels, you can see i totally failed at the moving quicly thing.

no LA on 14/12 for me, possibly around last weekend in january or first weekend in february though

― gareth (gareth), Tuesday, 3 December 2002 16:40 (twenty-two years ago)

dude, 30 days is TONS OF TIME!!! 30 days is LEISURELY compared to most of my house moves. the worst ever was the landlord in islington, who sold the house, said we could all move with him, then SEVEN DAYS before we were due to move, the new house was guzumped from under him. you try finding a flat in london in seven days. this is how i ended up in the kingdom of the dirt queen...

oh wait, no, sorry, i forgot the landlord in swiss cottage, who told me ON THE DAY THAT THE BUILDERS ARRIVED that i would have to find somewhere else to stay. "oh, we thought you'd be at your boyfriend's house anyway" was their excuse. i had FOUR HOURS to pack my valuables and get across town. so much stuff got destroyed in that move... i'm still angry about it.

then there was the hasbeen crisis, but we'll just let sleeping dogs lie on that one and not stir up any traumatic memories...

― kate, Tuesday, 3 December 2002 16:45 (twenty-two years ago)

dude, 30 days is TONS OF TIME!!!

Oh, I'm not complaining, really! It wasn't totally out of the blue, but still we were hoping for either a little more time or else not having to move so close to the holidays. I think I'm setting the artificial deadline of the 21st for myself so that way if there are unexpected delays I still have breathing space...

no LA on 14/12 for me, possibly around last weekend in january or first weekend in february though

Rock.

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Tuesday, 3 December 2002 16:51 (twenty-two years ago)

My last move in early 2000 was pretty spectacular. We exchanged contracts at 4pm on a Thursday and completed the next day. Me and Mrs Dr.C had spent all night packing the contents of our old house to be ready for the removal van (god knows how we managed to find one at zero notice) at 8 am on the Friday. We also had to deal with all the services - gas, phone, electrics etc in a real hurry. The rush was because we were buying a wreck and had to keep reducing the offer as we found out more things wrong with it (drains, wiring, heating, plumbing....) Eventually the seller got pissed off and called the whole thing off, only to resurrect it again with a stupidly short deadline. Two years of building and serious DIY and I now live in a fantastic house, but I could never do it again.

All the best for yr move Ned - and don't lose any records! (Not that you'd notice!)

― Dr. C (Dr. C), Tuesday, 3 December 2002 17:00 (twenty-two years ago)

I had four days when I found out I had a job in London. Luckily a lot of stuff was at my mum's house as I'd been sleeping on friends' sofas/ sharing a room with my mate Jordan in Sheffield. I had to go on an introductory thing in Liverpool which meant dragging all the stuff I had with me to the hotel and then straight down to London. Total nightmare.

― Anna (Anna), Tuesday, 3 December 2002 17:14 (twenty-two years ago)

3 weeks is the shortest time frame i have had, which seems a long time but as the years went by and we accumulated more junk i felt that we needed at least 3 months! the worst bit was having to do the whole move in one day, from old to new place, plus clean the old one and organise dogs, cat, fish and turtle in new place and it always rained.
im moving this weekend, but it is kind of spun out over 3 or 4 days afterward so isnt so bad.

― donna (donna), Tuesday, 3 December 2002 17:29 (twenty-two years ago)

I've had 30 days notice, but it was totally unexpected and there were four of us there that had each had to find places. Didn't help that we had a LOT of stuff either.

― Chris Barrus (xibalba), Tuesday, 3 December 2002 18:54 (twenty-two years ago)

When my father failed to pay child support and my mother couldn't make rent payments on the condo we had about a week. Needless to say I slept in my car for a while. My mother and sister went to a friends.

― Chris V. (Chris V), Tuesday, 3 December 2002 19:01 (twenty-two years ago)

Twice I've moved between three different apartments in the space of two weeks, but I've never had an unplanned move.

― Mr Noodles (Mr Noodles), Tuesday, 3 December 2002 19:06 (twenty-two years ago)

If you need a place to kip for a couple of nights, Ned, you're welcome here. And yes I would still say that if you lived less than 8,000 miles away.

― Martin Skidmore (Martin Skidmore), Tuesday, 3 December 2002 19:47 (twenty-two years ago)

Yer too kind, sentiments reciprocated, etc (and thanks Dr. C! What's an armload of CDs here and there? ;-)).

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Tuesday, 3 December 2002 19:49 (twenty-two years ago)

good luck with the moving Ned! (I can't offer any sage advice as I've moved house once).

― jel -- (jel), Tuesday, 3 December 2002 19:52 (twenty-two years ago)

I went through a very shitty situation in NYC. I had, I think, less than a week to move. and no money. I ended up staying in the bedroom of a friend of mine while he was at college in his parents house. luckily, that house was a loft in Chelsea with a view of the Empire State Building. Did I mention this was only 9 blocks from my office? But it was still shitty. I only stayed up there afew weeks to finish my classes, then it was off to my parents' house.

― Aaron Grossman (aajjgg), Tuesday, 3 December 2002 19:58 (twenty-two years ago)

oh, and good luck Ned!

― Aaron Grossman (aajjgg), Tuesday, 3 December 2002 19:58 (twenty-two years ago)

Ned!! at least you ALREADY HAVE A PLACE! I have to find housing RIGHT NOW in Los fucking Angeles as my lease expires December 31st and I have (because my dad is just counting on the return of my secuirty deposit for this current apartment to take care of "everything") 27 DAYS TO FIND A NEW APARTMENT, ASIDE FROM FINDING A JOB, TAKING FINALS, GRADUATING, AND GETTING AN MRI DUE TO SOME MYSTERIOUS ILLNESS.

Koreatown, here I come!

― Vic, Wednesday, 4 December 2002 02:31 (twenty-two years ago)

Just recently I had 2 days to pack and make a 22 hour drive cross-country. Also a year ago or so I lived out of my car for six months. I had an SUV then so it was quite comfortable.

― B, Wednesday, 4 December 2002 03:11 (twenty-two years ago)

Living out of your car: perpetual classic. Unless it's like, Jewel

― V, Wednesday, 4 December 2002 03:15 (twenty-two years ago)

Yeh she's just annoying. Who HASN'T had to live out of their car?

― B, Wednesday, 4 December 2002 03:16 (twenty-two years ago)

Britney?

ever notice how jewel's career is so over now, she isn't even considered a topic on the threads where people bitch about pop anymore. she is beyond passe. she is THE LAST DECADE'S PASSE

― V, Wednesday, 4 December 2002 03:29 (twenty-two years ago)

Ned, the other night I meant to say "good luck" with this. I'm terrified of moving problems, so I guess I'm both impressed and maybe a little reassured by the cavalier attitudes on this thread. Still, I'm pretty sure that as I have zero savings and a fairly small car, any problematic moving scenarios would likely end in total ruin.

Thankfully, Ned, I get the sense that you have the resources not to have to actually worry about this situation beyond the time and energy you'll have to cram into it during the coming weeks.

― nabisco (nabisco), Wednesday, 4 December 2002 06:24 (twenty-two years ago)

Yeah, that'll be the crunch...the work situation just got more tangled because one of the students had to quit today, and a stretched-thin rotation is about to tear messily. We're also interviewing about fifteen applicants for the next quarter, wrapping up this quarter's work, plotting for the next quarter and more besides. I predict my posts will shortly become hypersporadic, but we'll see.

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Wednesday, 4 December 2002 06:49 (twenty-two years ago)

Well I've got another one...Just went to the mail box and found out I have to move back across the country by the end of the year to keep my residency and therefore keep my one semester scholarship which i didn't know about, and which runs out after this school year. Time to pack the bags again..I love this. With any luck I'll still be able to move to the UK in the fall like I'd planned.

― B, Wednesday, 4 December 2002 06:52 (twenty-two years ago)

We found out that we had to move when the builders turned up to knock down the walls. I owned bugger-all stuff in those days so it didn't matter. I think we got it all out in a day or two and stored it at someone's parent's place.

I tend to move fairly regularly so I often don't bother to unpack all my stuff inbetween moves. Actually, that's got more to do with the fact that I own so much stuff that I never use that I don't need to unpack it. This year I still had a box that I hadn't opened since I'd moved one time 7 years ago.

One of my ex-flatmates could fit everything she owned into her car. The only furniture she had was a futon, a trestle table, a chair and a clothing rack. I would love to be as compact and mobile as her but at the moment I would require a 5 tonne truck to be able to do the same. My car wouldn't even fit all my clothes, let alone my books and furniture.

Hey Ned, how can we send you Christmas Cards if you're in the middle of a move?!

― toraneko (toraneko), Wednesday, 4 December 2002 07:00 (twenty-two years ago)

Hey B, why not just lie to them? Do they actually need to see you in person?

― toraneko (toraneko), Wednesday, 4 December 2002 07:01 (twenty-two years ago)

That was my first thought, but as I read the notice, apparently this scholarship is only valid for universities in my home state, which is a bunch of malarkey. I could lie to them for residency's sake, but I'd have to go back eventually anyway. It's all the better, I hate the weather here anyway. (thanks anyway)

― B, Wednesday, 4 December 2002 07:12 (twenty-two years ago)

I helped a friend move apartment in 10 hours two months ago, thought it was to the flat downstairs.

― Andrew Farrell (afarrell), Wednesday, 4 December 2002 11:06 (twenty-two years ago)

You must be logged in to post. Please either login here, or if you are not registered, you may register here.