+1 to this. A central drop/gathering spot for things to go to the other house!
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So many people mentioning the collection spot for stuff. I have a big tote bag in my house where I dump anything I want to bring next time I visit my daughter. So, I guess I am already following this advice!
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@kiddie , itâs the 2 house equivalent of the laundry basket on the bottom step â my momâs way of minimizing unnecessary trips up and down the stairs. I can still hear the reprimand for bounding up the stairs empty-handed and having willfully ignored the basket!
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@gardenstategal, me too!
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Due to a combination of job & family, we have lived in two locations for about 8 years. Home is in the midwest, and we rent a tiny apartment on the west coast, too far apart to drive.
On the first move, we brought just enough to furnish the small apartment with extras from home, and made a vacation out of our initial trip. It was similar to moving a college student to their first apartment, with minimal supplies. Rather than tow the car, I drove behind DH who drove a small moving truck, which allowed us to park the truck, and more easily travel some of our wonderful national parks.
We could have bought more new, but it was step one in downsizing our house. Then we furnished more over time from Thrift stores. I actually enjoy re-using, and recycling. It is partially a challenge, and partially because I feel it helpful to buy less new âstuffâ.
I keep a master checklist of what to do and bring with me each time we switch residences. It is more the practical reminders of forwarding mail, turning off the water, setting timers, etc. I also keep a running list in my yearly planner, of items I want to transport. These are more items that change over time, as I think of them. Like mentioned bove, we also have a âdrop boxâ for many of these types of items. Southwest airlines became our friend. Each time I traveled between the two locations, I filled two large suitcases with whatever was on my lists.
We have enough at the small apartment, that I never have to bring clothes, and could leave either location without a suitcase in an emergency if necessary (except for needed toiletries and electronics). Iâve learned to treat our lives in each place differently.We did not duplicate everything. I like to sew, for instance, but the machine is only at our home, so thatâs the only place I sew. I have a woc only at the apartment. Our Espresso machine is only at home, so a lot more trips to the coffee shop on the West Coast, but hey, itâs in the Seattle area after all!
The biggest hassle was mail and paperwork. We finally adjusted our bills to be automatically paid via credit card, direct bank withdrawal, or online, but there is still occasional mail that gets caught in-between. We once received a local city zoning notice for changes we needed to respond to within the required 10 days. Of course it arrived 2 weeks later. Thankfully have not received any jury duty notices yet. USPS âinformed deliveryâ helps, but is not foolproof.
Unlike the younger generation, we still have a lot of paper stored in files. When tax season is in one place, and the receipts are in another, it can cause a problem. Last year I dragged all that with me on the plane. Eliminating paperwork, is a work in progress, and Iâm learning slowly to scan and ditch!
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We currently have a house in the Boston area and a condo in the LA area. Husband was recruited for a great job in LA a few years ago. Because of that, when we retire we will never spend another winter in New England. haha. But, we also also have a park model trailer (like a mobile home) in Maine. I can see us upgrading that home to a regular house for our use in the spring and summer. Anyway, my point is a park model trailer or a mobile home will come furnished. I suspect you will not be wintering in Boston and that may be sufficient for your needs.
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We have two homes about a 4 hr drive apart, our âworkâ home in town (only one of us is still working and that is 90% remote) and our retirement/vacation home. We duplicated most of the things and moved our excess furniture up. We bought some new and some used reasonably high quality furniture for other areas and are slowly duplicating the appliances as we change them out. We have an AppleTV and Sonos speakers in both places, and use the same SSID. Both places have cameras and recording equipment. We have full sets of clothes at both places. We mostly go back and forth for a week at a time.
We entertain a lot more at the vacation home, which is in a 4 season resort area, and we keep appropriate equipment there for recreation.
When we travel back and forth we just take a change of clothes for the way back and a cooler full of food and our phones & laptops. We buy most of it in the work location because there is a Costco nearby, and keep a freezer full of food for the times when we run out.
Itâs definitely extra work, but experiencing dark skies, no noise, and fresh air makes it worthwhile. I even get more work done there!
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I definitely get my best writing done in the retirement/vacation home.
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This is what I did for our second home. There are some pieces that will make the move to the new house when itâs finally completed, but the rest will be offered to family or donated. If the sale of our primary residence goes through, we wonât have nearly as much to move as we expected. The buyer wants most of our furniture, which Iâm delighted about.
I outfitted the kitchen at the second house minimally and inexpensively. I found a good deal on some Anchor Hocking glass food storage jars that enable me to stock the pantry without worrying about the possibility of bugs. H had enough tools to bring a basic set, but he misses his woodworking toys when heâs not at home.
Yes, thatâs been a pain. Too often the mail holds are ignored. We do as much as possible online, but that doesnât take care of everything. It doesnât help that some delivery drivers will put small packages in the mailbox at the curb rather than walk to the front porch. When a substitute mail carrier sees anything in the mailbox, we start getting mail delivery even though thereâs a hold in place.
I agreeeâmail can be an issue. When weâre at our vacation home, my Hâs administrative assistant (heâs partially retired) will get our first class mail once a week and send it to us. We donât have it forwarded to our vacation home because thereâs no mail delivery (have to get a PO Box). Weâve moved a fair amount of financial stuff online (automatic bill payment, online banking, etc.). We should have done it sooner.
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I have a different feeling about furnishing the second home. I donât want the second place to feel shabby, used, or in any way âless thanâ our primary home, so no castoff, second-hand, bargain/cheap versions of anything. It was very clear looking at listings of homes in vacation spots which ones were furnished for weekend or sporadic use, and most of these were sold turn-key with all furnishings included. Lake houses, especially, seemed to be furnished most casually I think with the idea that the lake is where the owners go to relax, forget about the demands of their jobs and primary homes, and not worry about the sand, water, snow, and equipment being hauled in and out. I get that, but thatâs not for me.
We are retired and will be using our second place almost half the year, and itâs across the country from our primary home, so no weekend use or quick runs between. All of the primary furnishings (sofa, beds, appliances) are new, and we will spend lots of fun time âantiquingâ for those occasional tables and other filler pieces, but even those will be refurbed to like-new condition if necessary. We flew in for the closing in May and spent eight days cleaning the place top to bottom, painting all the rooms that have drywall and all the doors, stripping and staining the porch, and replacing all the screens. Since we arrived in June, weâve installed new tub/shower fixtures, replaced the bathroom pedestal sink with a vanity (and removed that freaky bidet attachment I mentioned on another thread), and installed a water softener. Basically, weâve made the place like new.
Now I can relax and enjoy. 
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I hadnât even thought about the mail! This arrangement would not be long term - most likely just a year until we figure out our permanent next move (which could be living in the apartment and selling the house).
We have no idea yet how much time we would spend in either place or how oftern we would go back and forth (not too hard 4 hour ride). I want the place to be comfortable and a real âtrialâ of how we would like living there.
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I know people who were always saving old towel for the âcabinâ or the vacation house. I always said that if I could afford the second house, I wanted nice, new, fluffy towels.
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The USPS forwarding is very unreliable, we have a friend/neighbor in each are who checks our mail and texts me copies of anything. We no longer forward. I have online accounts for the utilities and knowing the bill has arrived allows me to login and pay. I have all the bills I pay on autopay and when we are away from home, I pay the home utilities on e-pay. Luddite husband normally handles those and wonât autopay.
We did outfit our second home almost entirely from hand me downs, my stuff from downsizing, my parents stuff from moving, and my university kids apartment leftovers as they had finished. Over the years, now that we rent it out when gone, we have upgraded to more timely things where needed.
We live in the Boston area and for several winters, rented a houseboat in Sausalito that was largely furnished. But we fully loaded an SUV with stuff (art supplies for my wife, monitor and VOIP phone system for me, âŠ), plus clothes and outdoor equipment and had the car transported. We then flew. At the end of our stays, we cleaned out most everything we had brought, loaded up the car, and had it transported.
We shared a deteriorating lake house with 3 of ShawWifeâs sibs. It had suffered neglect for years before it went sort of to four kids so no one invested. We sorted it out a couple of years ago and we and one sib own it now. We knocked it down and rebuilt it. It is gorgeous though we canât go there until they let vaccinated US residents into Canada. But, whenever replaced a set of dishes or glasses, we put them in the basement for the lake house. So the house is furnished with a bunch of our semi-sets of stuff. I shut down my office a year before COVID and moved my company to largely remote work and took the espresso machine/milk frother and put it in the basement for the lake house. What we wont do is put in old furniture because the ShawWife and sib are allergic to mold. So no old furniture in the basement. I would gladly part with this house but it is of deep sentimental value to my wife and sib.
I would like to buy/rent a house in Florida (or someplace warm) so as to avoid Massachusetts winters. I would plan to furnish that from scratch. I donât have the sense it is cost effective to ship furniture anyway. In general, I want to take clothes and go back and forth. Except, this winter, we drove to Florida due to COVID and took our bikes. It was so nice to have our own wonderful bikes and not ride some not quite fitting clunker. But, it would be very expensive to have high quality bikes in both places. Not sure Iâd want to leave an expensive bike around in the Florida summer.
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One thing weâve done with both places is purchase cameras to go along with existing security systems. Two neighbors at our main home have had items stolen or break-ins, while at our 2nd home we had our old trailer broken into and neighbors have had garages burgled and expensive tools stolen. We can monitor the ramp from the water, the deck, front of the house, and up at the top where our 5th wheel and sibâs trailer are kept. As a plus, we get notified (and video!) when otters come up from the cove and across the deck or front porch.
In 2020 we bought a 2nd wine fridge so we wouldnât have to deal with transporting wine etc every time. Along with Nespresso machines at both places, itâs prob my favorite purchase.
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One thing that made my husband happier is when we discovered that our Medicare Supplement will pay for gym fees both in CA and in NY. I didnât ask how many gym fees they would pay but we could now go to a very nice gym within an 8 minute walk from our NYC condo.
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Two homes for many years about 500 miles apart. Recently added a third in my college town just because it was modern, new construction and kind of a fun destination close enough to The City to be convenient but far enough to feel âawayâ.
In both âvacationâ places, wicker furniture was my best friend. Very versatile and easy to move around. Biggest basket item? A sack of dirty laundry that eventually makes its way to the one place with its own washer/dryer.
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