Final tally:

• “Medium” boxes (18x14x12, $44 for 20): 38
• “Large” boxes (20x20x15, $46 for 15): 15
• “Extra-large” boxes (23x23x16, $44 for 10): 10
• Packing tape (4 x 110-yard rolls for $14): 4
• Packing tape (Scotch packing tape, 40 yards for $6): 3
• Total bill: approximately $220

Tonnage: 3490 lbs., does not include:

• Sofa
• Love seat
• Queen mattress and box spring
• Two end tables
• Coffee table
• Folding table
• Two bookshelves

I estimate the total weight at 3890 lbs. The car is in Youngstown, OH, and still scheduled for September 1st delivery.

Packing for moving day is a real pain; the movers come Friday morning and we will just barely make it. Materials were mostly purchased online at DirectMovingBoxes. It seems that a company Smart Pack Solutions makes/sells/distributes the actual boxes and packing materials, and a bunch of different websites all sell the exact same things at the exact same prices in some kind of affiliate network.

• “Medium” boxes (18x14x12, $44 for 20): 34
• “Large” boxes (20x20x15, $46 for 15): 13
• “Extra-large” boxes (23x23x16, $44 for 10): 5
• Packing tape (4 x 110-yard rolls for $14): 4
• Packing tape (Scotch packing tape, 40 yards for $6): 1
• Total bill: approximately $200

Current tonnage: 2262 lbs., does not include things like TV, sofa, couch, or other furniture.

Still to go:

• Long desk
• Corner workstation desk
• HumanScale keyboard tray
• Desktop computer, monitor, and speakers
• Server computer
• Laser printer
• Mattress and box springs
• Miscellaneous desk items (about 2 boxes’ worth).
• Framed pictures

My car is currently in Providence, RI, and is scheduled to arrive in California on September 1st. Sweet!

I am slowly (temporarily) letting go of all my worldly possessions, hopefully to be reunited with them in California. I drop off my car on Monday. That shouldn’t hurt too much; I walk to work, and we otherwise hardly drive. In fact, I will save money by not having to pay to park the darn thing ($300/month).

In two weeks, the movers come to take everything else away, leaving us to “rough it” for a week (I make no pretense at asceticism). In particular, the following things will be gone:

• No Bed. We’ll be keeping a “Coleman Quickbed” airbed with us; it is quite serviceable in place of our real bed. The packaging for the airbed is quite ridiculously laughable. It is predominantly green-colored, with pictures of a tent and a sleeping bag, all to evoke images of roughing it in the great outdoors. Even better, these airbeds are sold in the “outdoor sporting goods” section at Target and other retailers. I bet none of these things have ever tasted the great outdoors, except maybe on its way from the store to the car. Many of them eventually leak (many web reviews complain about this). Our first one did leak, but our next two have both survived several guests’ stays. At $20-30 a piece, one can’t complain too much.
• No Kitchen Appliances. I’m already tired of the food court in the mall across the street. Even if we splurge and eat out every night, we have no way to re-heat our leftovers.
• No TV. I have some books and a huge pile of unread magazines saved up for that week. I would normally look forward to going without TV for a week, except that the new fall season seems to be starting early this year, so I will probably be missing a week or two of all my favorite shows.
• No Computers. This will hurt. No computer = no DVR (see “No TV”, above), no e-mail or web-surfing, no Quicken, and finally, no Tsaiberspace (yes, this hurts you, too, I’m sure).
• No Internet. (See “No Computers”, above.)

I planned my vehicle drop-off and movers pick-up so that everything would arrive in California a day or two after we get there (according to the best estimates the auto-shipper and movers could give me); hopefully things will work out. It will be much more difficult/expensive to go without a car on the West Coast than it is to do so here in Boston.

No posts last week; I was busy looking for an apartment for the upcoming move.

Finding a place to live in the San Francisco Bay Area can be very easy. All one needs to do is browse some number of online directories for managed apartment properties, and pick one based on price, location, amenities, etc. However, this approach usually leaves one paying about $200/mo. more for the convenient shopping.

If one is willing to do a little legwork, one can save a lot of money for a much nicer place by finding properties that are rented out directly by the owner or a broker (e.g., a private property in a condo building, or a townhouse complex, or even a whole house). These used to be very hard to find because they were generally only findable via newspaper classifieds and brokers, but thanks to mediums like Craigslist, they are now almost just as easy to find as managed properties (sometimes easier).

Besides the legwork, the other problem is that there are other savvy apartment-hunters with the same idea, so it can be quite competitive. Also, since private property is at stake, landlords want to know everything about the prospective tenant. To be prepared, one needs to bring the following items to the appointment or to the open house:

• Credit report: some people will accept your copy; others will want to do the lookup themselves and charge you $25-30 for it.
• Checkbook: to pay for the credit reports, and if you’re lucky, the security deposit and first month’s rent.
• Recent paystubs: so the landlord can verify your income.
• A cover letter, photograph, and cheery disposition: this is effectively an interview.

That last item leads to a very competitive atmosphere, especially in an open-house environment where all prospective tenants can size each other up.

We saw one property that was very nice: a top-floor 2BR condo in a nice complex in a nice location with air-conditioning, full-size in-unit washer/dryer, new kitchen appliances, garaged parking, etc. Furthermore, it was very reasonably priced, at below market value: the landlord was asking $1750/mo.; similar properties in similar neighborhoods were going for $2000-2400/mo.

Everyone was instantly on their best behavior, vying to keep the landlord’s attention as the landlord took notes on everyone they spoke to. Also, everyone was delivering their carefully-rehearsed story as to why they were the perfect tenant(s). Even more absurdly (IMHO), everyone’s strategy usually had some sob-story quality to it. As I filled out the rental application paperwork, I eavesdropped on some of the competition’s tactics:

• “We currently live in Hayward, but my kids are starting school next year, and I really want them to go to the Foster City school district. But everyone looks at my kids and says they don’t want us living there …”
• “We’ve been living and working in Foster City for the past <n> years and love the community. We currently live down the street, but with our first baby on the way, we think we need a bigger place …”

We had the disadvantage of moving in from out of state: we couldn’t say we were long-time pillars of the community, and it would be harder for the landlord to check our references from three time zones away. As I filled out the paperwork, my better half was left with no choice but to casually mention to the landlord’s husband that we were moving from Boston (“honey, don’t forget to drop the [H]-bombs …”) and that we were a just-starting-out professional married non-smoking couple with no children and no pets.

I was optimistic about our chances, almost thinking that we were a lock. The competition was busy trying to shush children (the ones that would be drawing on the walls), or were single (the ones that would be unstable and likely to move back out very soon), or were executives of some sort (too rich and therefore too likely to buy a home very soon and move out), or were not social enough to engage the landlord in conversation (out of sight and out of mind).

I was wrong. We didn’t get it. The legwork was not a total failure; we did end up taking over some other person’s below-market-rate lease on their apartment (he was moving out early). But I’m still trying to figure out what makes the perfect tenant.