Estimated reading time: 15 minutes
We’ve moved. Over the past several months Winnie and I have made the complex transition from living in Northern Virginia to living in Charlotte, North Carolina. This transition involved buying a house, selling our house, moving our extensive collection of household goods, and reorganizing my ongoing professional life. Not to mention shifting all our necessary professional support services we developed during the eighteen years we lived in Virginia.
But we now live in Charlotte. In the great scheme of life adventures that’s happened to Winnie and me, this was just another speed bump.
Once Upon A Time in Virginia
Our move from the Mississippi Gulf Coast to Northern Virginia back in 2006 was mostly an act of desperation. We had just spent a year cleaning up and rebuilding after being flooded by Hurricane Katrina, with future hurricanes expected. Not to mention my job was looking increasingly tenuous with annual ten-percent layoffs scheduled until morale – and corporate profits – improved. It was time to leave.
In contrast, this latest move was treating ourselves after eighteen years of hard work. Winnie had effectively retired at the beginning of the Covid pandemic, and I was ready to retire. Winnie had strong, but nebulous, ideas about the home she wanted. I simply wanted to be someplace close to navigable water with lots of woodland areas for boating, kayaking, and outdoor sports. Not to mention, I was tired of fighting Northern Virginia traffic every time I rolled out of my driveway.
In early March, 2024, in anticipation of a near-future move, I announced my planned retirement to my colleagues and supervisors. I set my final day of work for June 28.
Buying
Winnie had already started serious house-hunting in June 2023. By October, we were pretty convinced we would not find the right house for quiet retirement around Northern Virginia. So, we gradually expanded our search area.
We kept expanding our search until we arrived in Charlotte, North Carolina. Winnie had some friends living there who previously lived in Northern Virginia, which made it easier for us to learn about the area and do house hunting. There, Winnie found her house. We placed our offer in mid-March, with closing set for April 11. From that point we had to face how/when to move, coinciding with selling our New Old House and retiring from my job.
Moving Foreplay
Relocating involved extensive logistical planning. My previously announced June 28 retirement date defined when we could leave Virginia. Listing our house for sale in June seemed reasonable. I didn’t like the idea of potential buyers tromping around our house while we were still living there. Not only for reason than I was working at home three days each week. But our realtor pushed us to list sooner, as March/April/May are peak home selling months.
We came up with a plan to get the house listed by the end of April. While simultaneously moving out. As with house-hunting, Winnie took the lead in packing and getting our house ready.
Incremental Moving
First, we had to decide how to move the bulk of household goods down to our new home. After lots of discussion, we decided on a semi-do-it-ourselves move using a PODS container service. It seemed to offer the right mix of leisurely packing but letting someone else do the driving, while still being economical.
So, we started by packing up all small stuff we didn’t need every day. This was made easier by the fact we never completely unpacked from our December 2021 move. Then we planned out some pre-moving trips.
The First Pre-Moving Trip
The weeks prior to buying our new house were a whirlwind of cleaning, packing, and organizing. We needed to be in Charlotte for closing, which focused our planning on what to haul down for that trip. It made sense that our boat and hardshell kayaks would be part of this first trip. We also made an advance three-day scouting trip to locate a marina suitable for storing our boat.
Our recently purchased RV quickly proved very useful in moving. Winnie’s Nissan Versa isn’t capable of pulling any trailer loads, so our first trip was made using our Jeep Cherokee and RV as towing vehicles. Not to mention, we could load serious amounts of stuff in the RV. Closing day came soon enough, and we made our first uneventful four-day moving run south. I drove the RV pulling the boat, and Winnie drove the Jeep pulling the utility trailer. She mostly followed me all the way down, creating a two-vehicle convoy.
Moving our boat on this first trip had two fringe benefits:
- Cleared space in our driveway for yard sales and future PODS container delivery.
- Alleviated my ability to spend weekends out on the water boating so more time devoted to moving.
Our closing happened right on schedule, and we became the proud new owners of a house in Charlotte, North Carolina. We unpacked the RV, Jeep, utility trailer, and moved our boat to a marina. Then back north for the next round.
The Next pre-Moving Trip
We continued to pack as soon as we returned to Virginia. Surprisingly (to us) we were able to haul most of our smaller items down on the first trip. Now, in preparation for listing and showing, we started pushing everything we absolutely did not need from the house into the garage. We also started planning the PODS container delivery.
Our schedule for moving completely out of our house was bookended by when we would sell it and my planned retirement date. My retirement date was fixed, but date for selling the house was a wild card. We set our listing date for April 29, with an open house planned for that following weekend. We planned our second moving trip for the weekend of our open house as a good reason for staying the hell away.
The big part of our second move was all my tools and shop equipment. We had brought our utility trailer back from the first trip so now started loading it up again. We also decided that on this trip, we’d bring Winnie’s Versa down and leave it parked in the garage. It would be one less item sitting in our driveway.
Highway Leapfrogging
As planned our house was listed, and we made another four-day trip down to Charlotte. I drove slow on this trip as the trailer was seriously loaded down, and I didn’t want the excitement of changing a trailer tire along the freeway. Winnie decided she wasn’t going to drive that slow, so we played highway leapfrog all the way down. She’d drive ahead of me, pull into a highway rest stop, park and take a nap until I caught up with her. Then, drive down to the next rest stop and repeat.
I may have been over-cautious, but we made it all the way down with no “excitement.” Plus, Winnie was well-rested once we finally arrived in Charlotte.
