Never used PODs but I did use ABF a few years back and had a good experience. Didn't have them store my stuff for any length of time however. I think traditional moving companies will also usually store your stuff too if you don't want to do the DIY thing.

As for housing, if you google "corporate apartments" and the city you're moving to you should be able to find listings of furnished short-term lease apartments. Not sure if any rental company is better than another. Didn't end up needing one myself, but looked into them a few years back as well.

One caveat on pods - really configure your load so NOTHING can shift. The pod is dragged up a ramp with about a 20 degree tilt. Had friend with lots of breakage because it was loosely packed. Use lots of straps.
As to housing, if you have a Local university, check their short term housing for visiting professors. You won't get first pick, but if there are vacancies you can score a nice place for a few months.

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Jim
"In dog beers, I've only had one"
http://www.shakercolonial.com/
Creating custom made furnishing to your requirements

We used this service from U-Haul to move our daughter's stuff from Indiana University to NYC a couple of years ago. You can hire movers to load it for you if you don't want to do it yourself. Keep it stored at a U-Haul facility until you're ready for it. My daughter hired them to unload the box, too. Very cost-effective and convenient. Good luck. https://www.uhaul.com/UBox/

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Lifeguard: "Do you need help?" Me: "No, that's just my butterfly."

https://nypost.com/...eless-to-pay-for-it/


“We’re nomads,” Patch told The Post. “[We’re] moving to where resources are at any given time.”


Instead, the married couple moves into a different NYC apartment every week or so. As pet sitters, Liepin, 32, and Patch, 33, crash for free at various clientsÂ’ apartments and care for cats and dogs while their owners are out of town.
The pair allow themselves a combined weekly budget of just $100. Patch said they have saved “close to $50,000” apartment-hopping for the past two years.

Few things, first any reason not to sell most of your stuff and just get some good garage sale/craiglist stuff on the other end? I had a look at the pods when we moved and had a 5 month lag time between moves and it was going to be over $8k. So instead I bought a storage container 40 footer and put all my stuff that I did not sell in there. Of course I had a free place to put it, so no fees there for storage.

Did all the moving myself and when it was over I sold the container for $200 less than I bought it for, so more work but not $8k+ either.

You can lighten your load as much as possible and just get a cheap storage locker at some out of the way place too. Just get one big enough for what you got and it should not cost too much. I mean ditch refrigerators, sofas, chairs, beds, and any other IKEA like stuff. Take this time to thin out the clothes, pretend you have to live on a 35 ft boat for a year. Box up all the old yearbooks and photos and family china real good and just rent a trailer one way when the time comes to actually make the move.

At least that is my advice if you need to save money and would rather get yourself a super bike afterwards with the proceeds you saved. (-;

ABF trailer will be the cheapest, probably around $2300. ABF is pretty dependable but not perfect. They let my trailer sit for a few days because they forgot about it and at the destination the driver didn't want to make a separate trip to deliver the ramp. He took the liberty of stacking items that were not stacked for a reason to make room for the ramp.

The horror stories and pricing for other moving containers are much worse.

We are planning already to dump most of our non-essential furniture and will scrap a ton of other needless possessions like gifted trinkets, old clothes, old pots/pans. We will not dump our master bed, guest bed, and bedroom furniture, which is old family stuff. Beyond that we just have clothes and triathlon equipment, and wedding gifts (married earlier this year)

The issue for us is the potential two month period when we are living in "temporary" housing, which is why functionally and logistically a POD or some variation makes the most sense logistically, irrespective of cost, which is a factor, especially if $8K is in play, yikes.

Well ya the pod was the best thing I could do too, just not financially so I got a bit creative. Guess you just have to do a cost benefit analysis and either bite the bullet, or call some strong, smaller brained friends. You know the guys, the ones that will work for beer!!!! (-;