Timeline for our move - we're both employed F/T

[dksid]

Hello! My husband and I are relocating to SG in 2-4 months. We are both employed and will both be expatriated for our jobs. We may or may not move at the same time. I may go first with him following a month or two later. I have gotten beyond the excitement stage and am now coming to the reality of logistics and packing and renting our house, etc. We don't have the luxury of having one of us not work and take care of a lot of the move. Can anyone provide advice for how much time we should expect to be off work to take care of everything? What is realistic to tell our employers? When should we start arranging things like Movers and medical visits and showing our house and renting a storage unit and banking and address changes and oh so many things? I will be speaking with my US and Asia HR departments in the next week to get a bit more guidance on the re-lo assistance. Any and all advice is welcome. Thanks in advance.

[curiousgeorge]

I'll let other speak to the timeframe of time you will need, but I will give you one piece of advice.

Don't store it.

Whatever you are considering storing, don't bother unless its a family heirloom. There are a couple of reasons for this, depending on your length of stay in Singapore:
1) The cost of storing will eventually exceed the cost of replacing.
2) Whatever you are storing now will remain as part of your life "before Singapore". When/if you return home in five years you'll open up the storage locker and look at your old life and want nothing to do with it. Taste changes. What looks homely in your living room now will look old and tattered in a lock-up five years from now. You'll end up throwing it all away so might as well free yourself from the burden now.

"But my mattress cost $2000 and its only three years old!" But in five years it will be a mouldy eight year old mattress that smells musty from storage that you won't want to lie on anymore.

I promise you will find the selling and disposal cathartic, and you'll move to Singapore with a streamlined life. A couple of suitcases of clothes and a box of photos/momentos is all you need.

[zzm9980]

What George said. Plus, until you find out the extent of your relo your questions are really pointless. Your relo team may be handling everything. Find out what they're doing or not doing. Determine what you need to do to close out your life where you are now, and come on over.

If they're NOT handling local accomodations and assistance finding housing in Singapore, put your effort into researching that now. Figure out if you need an agent or not. Figure out where you will live for the 3-6 weeks (or maybe more) it'll take you to find a place, close on it, and get the keys.

[JR8]

Removers will give you a template timetable listing all the things to consider. Post redirection. Disconnect phone, cancel utilities etc etc. You can probably find an example pre-move calendar just by Googling.

Agreed, be ruthless chucking stuff before you move. Do at least two whole sweeps of your home a month apart, well before packing up. Well before the quotes or you'll pay for shipping the junk anyway. We've been away about 6 years this time now (not really planned, as always seems to happen), most of the stuff we stored back home we're going to have to pay to have re-delivered back to our home-home, only for us to then immediately bin it. And we'll likely have to pay to bin it too, madness. Only thing I actually want back is my big old tool-chest and the antiques.

Indecision is expensive, you have to be absolutely RUTHLESS in decluttering.

[JR8]

Great what?
p.s./pssst I expect you're being watched pretty closely right now for the value and purpose of your posting on this forum.

[bgd]

Great what?
p.s./pssst I expect you're being watched pretty closely right now for the value and purpose of your posting on this forum.

She didn't last long

[JR8]

Hehehe... spotted that one a mile off