<p>So, please explain to me fellow parents how you work out the logistics of move in when your child goes to college across country. Do you ship everything and if so do you plan for it all to arrive a day or two before you do? Do you fly in a bit early? Do you fly in, ship a few things but arrive stay a day or two and shop for some things? Do you drive in and make it a cross country vacation along the way, with the dorm frig in the back of the car??</p>
<p>And in the summers does your child pack and ship back things, store things somewhere or await for the family car to arrive yet again to load and haul?</p>
<p>How crucial was it to have an airport close? Is an airport to/from which the school provides shuttles on breaks enough?</p>
<p>I am having trouble processing this...clearly! </p>
<p>This may well not be an issue for us, but some reach schools that are FAR have come through, so now the cost and logistics of this need to be factored in a bit more. We are not opposed to the distance, just interested in how families do this logistically.</p>
<p>All 3 of our kids went to college 1000+ miles from home. (I went to college 5000 miles from home back in the day, so it seemed like the normal thing to me.) Ship some things, purchase most things on site. Fly in the day before move-in, rent a car, go to BB&B, Target, etc. (You can pre-order what you want and pick it up at the nearest store.) Student stores stuff over the summer. Don’t drive across the country unless you have plenty of free time and love to drive. Plus, if you have all your student’s stuff in the SUV/minivan, do you want to leave it in the vehicle overnight while you stay in the roadside Motel 6?</p>
<p>My son is only a short plane ride away, but I can answer some of your questions. We drive twice a year. He stores his big things on campus somewhere for the summer. He is close to an airport so we pay for a cab. Another. Son may be going farther away, and he will be farther from an airport, so he will need to shuttle back and forth at breaks. When we were picking schools, I wanted them fairly close to an airport, and it worked out that they will both be within an hour of an airport. I would suggest getting there a little early, at least for the first move on. If you post on the forum for the particular schools, you will likely get your questions answered. Good luck. </p>
<p>What dadx3 says. My D insisted on bringing most of her clothing only to wear maybe a third of it. She donated what she didn’t use. DH and I had flown with her in freshman year so she had 4 suitcases to fill. We also had her car trucked over there (cross country) and filled it with items for her room. She realized it was too much when the summer came and she had to store everything.</p>
<p>I second dadx3’s response. We flew in a couple of days early. Picked up our pre-order from Bed Bath and Beyond and then shopped locally for other needed items. My D had 2 suitcases and a duffle with her - we took advantage of the 2 free bags on Southwest and since 3 of us were traveling, we could have 6 free bags. It worked great. She stores everything locally over the summer and will store it this summer and next fall while she is on her study abroad trip. We are going to use the same strategy for our son this fall even though he is going to a closer college. I can’t say enough about how smooth the Bed Bath and Beyond system worked.</p>
<p>My daughter attended college 700 miles from home, a distance that we drove more than once in a single day (11-12 hours). </p>
<p>On her first trip to the college she shipped some boxes (UPS), but we carried the bulk of her stuff with us in a rental van. Helped her set up her room, stayed for the convocation, and after being not-so-gently dismissed by the college, we departed shortly after noon and drove straight home. </p>
<p>Some things to plan on with stuff you’re carrying with you: put clear labels of student’s name and dorm room number, taped onto every box and bag. (We had a lot of large garbage bags, with name, dorm and room number in masking tape on the bags.) This helps on “move in day” where the college will usually provide curbside unloading and will have stuff brought to the student’s room within a few minutes. Similarly, the college will advise on where and how to label your shipped materials. Dorm name and room numbers are good to put on boxes. Chances are the boxes will be in the room when you arrive; at worst in an accessible storeroom.</p>
<p>Whether or not you plan to help on the move-in, you can/should plan to attend the first parents’ day. For some colleges, you really need to book rooms well in advance. But also plan to spend some time going shopping, because by then your daughter or son will have some clearly missing items and may not have ready transportation. For our daughter, a good trip to Target did the trick.</p>
<p>Most of our trips after the first time were by plane, but we also always got a rental car so we could do some shopping…</p>
<p>Both of my kids went to school more than 1,000 miles away – the first in a small Midwest town, the second in a major East Coast city. </p>
<p>For the first kid, his dad and I flew in with him a couple of days early to the nearby major city via SW, which allowed all of us to live from a small carry-on each and then to check two “bags” full of ds1’s stuff free. For dh and I, our “bags” were large Rubbermaid containers, which ds has since used every year for storage. He keeps them under his bed during the year and then moves them into summer storage when the time coms . We rented an SUV, picked up our previously shopped-for package at the local BB&B, plus shopped at Best Buy for dorm speakers, Target for school supplies and toiletries – that kind of thing. We went a couple of days early, because we spent one day taking in an MLB game (that home team happened to be playing our home team, and we LOVE baseball!). So, yeah, mostly business, plus a little fun. We needed to rent a car because the school is 45 minutes from major shopping and the airport.</p>
<p>With ds2, dh couldn’t go for the move-in, but ds1 could. Ds2 was selected for a special program so flew up a week early. Again via SW, so he carried on his guitar and checked two large rolling duffles. Ds1 and I came up a week later with a lot of stuff in tow. We wanted to avoid renting a car, so we didn’t do the BB&B thing. Instead, we ordered through Target. Delivery is free with the Red Card. Uh, I wouldn’t recommend the Red Card thing. I had a horrible experience top to bottom with Target, which up to that point had been my favorite store. But it is an option. We made do with public transit and one taxi ride, and it was plenty. I did the parent orientation stuff while ds1 explored the city, which he’d never visited, and met up with college friends.</p>
<p>My daughter is in her second year of college halfway across the country. </p>
<p>Since we decided to let her take her car, I drove out with her and then flew back home. We took an extra day or two and made it a nice ‘going off to college’ mother-daughter road trip. </p>
<p>Because we were driving, we were able to bring more with us but we still made several trips to Target and Bed, Bath & Beyond over move-in weekend. Some things we ordered online from Amazon and had them shipped to her dorm address. </p>
<p>Last summer, we rented a storage unit and stored her stuff near her school. This summer she’ll be staying at school and only coming home for a week or so. :(</p>
<p>One of our D’s went to school on the opposite coast. We only took her when she first left for school-she went by herself in subsequent years. We each checked a free bag, so she had use of 3 suitcases plus her carry-on. We ordered bed linens, towels, etc. and then picked them up at the store near her school. We shopped for other supplies once we arrived. He school was in a college town, and apartments were rented for the year, not for a 9-month period. As a result, she was able to leave most of her stuff at her apartment and then shuffle stuff around if she moved. I never really got involved so don’t know the details, but she figured it all out. If in dorms, most areas seem to have summer storage available where they will come to the school and pick it all up, then deliver it back the following fall. I think the first year I shipped a small box of stuff that she needed, about a month after school started. For the most part, I told her that if it didn’t fit in the suitcases, it didn’t go. When she graduated, she had accumulated extra things, much of which was sold or given away. We did ship a couple of extra boxes home. Her last apartment was unfurnished. We ordered a bed, mattress, dresser, desk, from Walmart. She had to assemble it, but then sold it all at the end of the year for not much less than we paid. </p>
<p>Her large school was in an isolated area with a small airport. The first year, we flew into a major airport several hours away and rented a car because we wanted to see the area. We did the same when she graduated, because my husband had not been there. In between, she used the local airport a couple of times, but it was very expensive to fly from there. Mostly she took the Megabus to a larger airport, or got a ride, and then flew from there. It usually saved several hundred dollars, and also cut out the commuter flight section that tended to be very unreliable. I would definitely say to arrive at least the day before so you can be ready to move in as early as possible. How long you stay is dependent on the school. Some have parent orientations or activities that you might want to take part in. For most schools, your child will be kept very busy once he/she moves in, and parents can sometimes get in the way. It is a good time to leave, so your child can take part in all of the welcome activities and meet other students. </p>
<p>1) Pack. Then put half of it aside and don’t bring it.
2) Remember that they have stores where you’re going.
3) If your college is near an airport served by Southwest, that’s a selling point.</p>
<p>D is at school 1000 miles away. For her move-in, we (husband, daughter, myself) took a 6 am flight that got to her city at 9 am; by the time we rented a car and got to campus, it was maybe 10 or 10:30 – daughter and I put the room together while husband made the run to Bed Bath & Beyond where daughter had pre-picked out things that she wanted, and also stopped by a sporting goods store where we had pre-selected a bike (as buying an inexpensive bike was more cost-efficient than shipping her home bike). Husband was back on campus by 12 or so, we finished up the room, had lunch, went to the parent events, said goodbye around 5 pm (at the same time all parents were being asked to leave) - husband and I had dinner in town and took a late flight back home. It was actually quite doable logistically. Having said that - D is in a major city. There’s a big difference between that, and a situation in which you have to take a train or a puddle-jumper or a bus to a smaller rural area. </p>
<p>I’m wondering what is all the stuff that needs to be shipped. My parents drove me to college with my stuff in the back of our station wagon. I had a rather bulky stereo and a typewriter, but with today’s laptops and miniature electronics, I think I could have fit everything into 2-3 suitcases. I stored everything I didn’t need over the summer, and I can say that when you have to move twice a year, you don’t really want to be weighted down with a lot of stuff. That station wagon didn’t come back until I had my degree.</p>
<p>Are you really going to haul a dorm fridge all the way across the country? If you don’t rent one (and you should think about whether the extra cost is worth the benefit of not having to haul that thing around every time she moves), why not just pick it up when you get there? For what you’d pay in shipping them you could probably pick up a fan, a floor lamp, or whatever other bulky item she thinks she needs at some store near campus as well.</p>
<p>As others have mentioned, find a storage facility for the summers. By next spring your student will probably have other campus friends looking to store for summer too. Getting 2 to 4 students to share a storage place is really cost effective.</p>
<p>Based on my observations from the parking lots, those students within driving distances had a LOT more ‘stuff’ than my kids who attended college on the other coast. :)</p>
<p>OP:</p>
<p>we shipped most stuff ground (fedex and ups), to arrive at the hotel the day before we checked in. Also ordered some items online and had shipped to the hotel.</p>
<p>But, perhaps unlike some others, the bedding was taken in a box and checked on the plane (20x20x20). That way, if nothing else arrived, the sheets and pillows would be available for dorm room sleeping.</p>
<p>Purchased a power strip and fan at the local Home Depot and Lowe’s. But be wary: unlike in California, which stocks fans all year round, fans are a seasonal item in the NE. Thus, depending on check in dates, the local Home Depot could be easily out of fans. (That’s when amazon prime comes in handy!)</p>
<p>For a mini-frig, we purchased online in August and got free delivery to the hotel. Compact Appliances runs specials in the summer. Each new Frig lasted each kid all four years and was cheaper than renting the dorm version.</p>
<p>Some colleges have summer dorm storage spaces; others may work with local summer storage facilities – pick up and delivery for a nice fee. Others, you are on your own. Check the college’s website and plan accordingly. </p>
<p>@bluebayou, of course if you already own the items, it’s a lot cheaper and simpler to throw them into the back of the car if you are within reasonable driving distance, which I was. But if you’re talking about packing them up and shipping across country, or driving thousands of miles just to bring that minifridge, fan, and lamps, I think it makes far more sense just to buy locally. If my daughter ends up going to school very far away, I’m certainly not going to drive across the country just to haul her bike there. She can buy a used one on campus if she wants one.</p>
<p>We shipped a box of shoes and books student wanted to take, plus some athletic equipment for student-athlete. The rest was flown (SW, 6 suitcases) or bought there and will be stored somewhere yet to be determined over the summer.</p>
<p>I have a question, if you don’t mind. If D ends up going far away to the “big city”, do we pretty much have to count on renting a vehicle? Or can a taxi honestly work? (from hotel to dorm) Thanks!</p>
<p>I bet you could avoid renting something. First, I’d check to see if the hotel has a shuttle van and, if so, whether they’d be willing to arrange a trip for you. (Tip well, but it will be cheaper than a rental car.) Alternatively, most big city cab companies have a couple of minivans in the fleet, and you can request that if you book the cab ahead of time. Finally, my tech-savvy kids would probably tell you to check out Uber since a lot of their cars are actually Chevy Suburbans or similar vehicles. </p>