Since my last post my husband and I moved to Texas. We flew into town for my husband’s interview on June 18th. That weekend we were determined to find an apartment if he got the job. After looking at 12 apartments we found the one. We flew back to Florida awaiting the news whether or not he got the job. Well he did and he started on the 3rd of July! We had been thinking about moving to Texas for a few months and in that time we decided we would be taking the bare minimum of household items. After a very successful yard sale (read about it here) and selling things online. I was able to get rid of our furniture.
Here are a few frugal things we did to save on our cross country move.
- We decided to attach a hitch to our Honda Accord and tow a 4×8 trailer. Whatever didn’t fit in the trailer stayed behind. Renting a Uhaul to tow our car would have been around $1500 where as a trailer and permanent hitch was around $400.
- We only took one piece of furniture. The rest was kitchen stuff such as our crockpot, toaster, waffle maker, and George Foreman grill. We also brought household items such as canvases and other items that hold sentimental value to us.
- Our apartment offered a $99 deposit/application special because my husband works for one of the big tech companies here.
- We bought out couch from Big Lots. My husband actually arrived in TX a few weeks before I did and he found our sectional couch for $700. Now we have never spent more than $45 on a couch before so $700 is a lot, but compared to other furniture stores this was a steal.
- Initially, my husband slept on an air mattress he bought from Walmart. He priced matched with an amazon deal and saved money on the mattress. Now we have a mattress for company to sleep on too!
- We bought our mattress from Ikea. We live 5 minutes away from Ikea and a mattress store. We decided to check out the mattress store first and upon seeing that the cheapest mattress set was $1500 we made a bee line to Ikea. Our mattress was around $350.
- Downsizing from a 3 bedroom house to 1 bedroom apartment has saved us money on utility bills. Our rent is actually more, but in the amount we are saving in electricity it works out to be the same.
- For signing up with our electric company they gave us a 2 night stay in select hotels across the country. I still need to do some research into this deal, but if it works out expect a post about it.
- We are slowly buying furniture/ decor for our new home. Since getting rid of all our possessions we really do not feel the need to buy items for our house that do not have a purpose.
- We discovered grocery stores we did not have in Florida and have learned how their sales work. For example, I do most of my grocery shopping at HEB, but about every other week Sprouts has boneless skinless chicken breasts for $1.88 lb. My husband and I basically only eat chicken breasts so I stock up and freeze the chicken.
- HEB also has self-serve spices. This has saved me lots of money because I can buy the exact amount of spice I need for a recipe without buying a whole bottle. Usually it only costs around 10-20 cents for a small package of whatever spice I need.
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