Confessions of an Expatriate Abroad: 17 Things I Wish Someone Had Told Me Before Moving Day

In the fall of 1998, International Living decided it was time to relocate our offices outside the States. We chose Ireland as our new home. That decision meant moving our business, as well as my family, from Baltimore, MD, to Waterford, on Ireland's southeast coast, about 2 1/2 hours from Dublin.

We ran headlong into this move with naive enthusiasm. That was good. You need enthusiasm--and energy--and a ready sense of humor--to make it through. Because it's easier to stay at home. And often more comfortable--more convenient. But life isn't about comfort and convenience. At least that's what I keep telling our 10-year-old.

Still, this experience has taught us a number of things that I sure wish someone had told us beforehand. It is in that spirit that I offer the following pearls of wisdom for your information.

Remember the six rules of shipping

The short story: You are probably best off not relocating your household goods and furniture with you. I'd recommend you sell everything or give it all away before the move. I couldn't bring myself to do this, and now I regret all the hassle and expense related to moving a large house full of furniture from one continent to another.

However, if you, like me, are attached to your belongings, here's what to do:

Break your move into three pieces. Pack to take with you all the airline will allow--generally, two checked bags and two carry-ons. Each checked piece must weigh no more than 70 pounds. You can arrange (and pay extra) to check additional or overweight pieces by contacting the airline ahead of your flight.

Probably, you won't be able to carry with you everything you'll need before your container- shipped goods arrive. So you'll need to arrange for a second shipment of essential items. If you pack the goods yourself, you can ship via UPS, which is a reasonably priced alternative and which will deliver your boxes within three days at a cost based on weight and size.

If you have neither the time nor the inclination to pack yourself, contact a mail- forwarding operation, such as Mailboxes, Etc. This outfit will come to your home, expertly pack what you want shipped, cart it away, and arrange for it to be delivered to the door of your new home according to a time table you can dictate. I found this group to provide exceptionally good service and to know well how to pack for shipping overseas. Not a single thing was broken or damaged in transit. The downside was the price. We shipped 20 large boxes, a total weight of about 800 pounds, for which we were charged about $2,000, including pick-up, packing, and insurance.

Shipment by slow boat

The third shipment of stuff, including your furniture and other household goods, is the most time-consuming to organize. I spent an entire day calling all the numbers in my local telephone directory listed under "Shipping/Freight Forwarding."

Finally, I identified three outfits that could provide everything I needed: pick-up, packing, customs clearance, delivery, and unpacking. I scheduled time for each to come to my home to prepare an estimate.

I chose Rose International, first because their price was one-third less than the next-highest quote, but second, because they specialized in international shipping and promised to handle all customs paperwork on my behalf.

Rose has its main offices in the UK but offices throughout the States as well. Contact Rose International in the UK at tel. (44)171-407-2220, fax (44)171-403-6089, or in the States at tel. (201)798-6664, fax (201)798-5665, website: www.rosenvo.com.

Several things are true regardless who you decide to work with:

Number 1:

Assume it will take 28 days for your cargo to make the trans-Atlantic journey. Plus, add days for packing, unpacking, pick-up, and delivery. Estimate five to six weeks, door-to-door.

Number 2:

Be present, for both the packing and the unpacking.

Number 3:

Prepare an itemized packing list of what is in each box. The company you work with should do this for you. Without it, customs will open and inspect every box and package.

Number 4:

Insist that your cargo be kept separate from anyone else's. It's best if you can arrange for (and fill) your own 40-foot container. This way, there's no chance for confusion.

Number 5:

Buy the insurance offered by the freight forwarder. You are most likely insured against complete loss of the container automatically as part of your arrangement. But anything short of that is your own responsibility. Typically, insurance costs 2% of the declared value of the shipment.

Number 6:

Don't pay any duty on your personal household belongings. You shouldn't be required to, no matter where you are relocating, as long as you claim the goods have been used prior to the move.

If you have not arranged your permanent residence in your new home by the time your cargo arrives, you can arrange for storage with the help of the freight forwarder. We had our goods put into storage in Dublin for six months after their arrival in the country, while we looked for and arranged to purchase our new home. The cost of moving our goods from the docks to the storage facility and then to Waterford, when we finally were ready to receive them, we negotiated with Rose International up front.

The storage fee we negotiated separately with the storage facility. We paid $400 per month to store a 40-foot container load of stuff.

Set up a portable global office (for less than $35 per month) One of the greatest challenges moving office and/or house to another country is arranging to stay in touch with everyone you need to stay in touch with "back home". "Bankers, credit-card companies, insurers, the phone company, utilities, publications you subscribe to, organizations you belong to, people you work with, colleagues, family, friends, acquaintances--all have to be informed of your new contact information. It can take longer to arrange for this than it can to pack up and actually move.

Unless, that is, you invest in what we call a "portable office," which can be moved with you almost transparently no matter where you go or how often you relocate. It means that your postal and e-mail addresses--your telephone and fax numbers--need never change again, regardless of your physical whereabouts. And the total cost need be no more than $35 per month.

Number 7:

Arrange for a free e-mail account.

Visit any of the following web sites and follow the simple instructions to set up free, personal, fully portable e-mail address (in fact, you can set up more than one if you like): www.mailexcite.com; www.hotmail.com; www.mailcity.com; www.mailandnews.com; www.yahoo.com. Give your e-mail address to all contacts on your list. Then, using Internet connectivity, you can access messages sent to your address wherever you are in the world.

You don't even need to own your own computer (although a portable laptop certainly makes life abroad simpler); you can use computers available in cyber-cafes, libraries, hotels, bookshops, or office-service providers. It should take less than five minutes phone time to access the Internet, download your new messages, print them out, and send your own messages.

Number 8:

Set up worldwide phone and fax numbers.

To do this, visit www.jfax.com on the Internet to follow the simple instructions to activate your new phone/fax number and to download the JFAX software (which is free of charge.) This accomplished, JFAX Personal Telecom will bill you only $12.50 per month for your personal local phone number in your choice of cities in the United States and around the world.

Your contacts can send to this number both faxes and voice messages that JFAX will instantly forward to your e-mail account. All you have to do is to check your e-mail. Faxes and voice messages will appear in your e-mail "in-box" as attachments to messages. JFAX also enables you to send faxes at low cost. Associates of ours using this service find it "foolproof and efficient."

Number 9:

Set up a permanent postal address where all your essential mail can be sent to and from where it can be forwarded to you. One way to do this is to get a P.O. box address. In the United States, this can cost as little as $40 per year--less than $5 per month. Go to the post office (with your photo ID) and complete the form. You pay six months in advance, plus a deposit for the keys.

In Europe, P.O. boxes cost considerably more than in the States, meaning that privately operated accommodation address services make more sense. You can find such services in the Yellow Pages or your local equivalent under "Office Services" or "Secretarial Services."

Once your account is up and running, have all your mail sent to this address: bank statements, personal correspondence, subscriptions, deliveries...Then either the P.O. box or the accommodation address service can forward the materials (as they arrive or however often you desire) to wherever you want them to be. You'll have to pay the postage for forwarding.

This arranged, you only have to inform the operator of your forwarding service when you move from one location to another...much preferable to having to tell all your correspondents.

Prepare for "cultural differences"

We have "rising damp." It was confirmed with a second opinion last evening.

Let me explain. After eight months of searching, wading through the challenges of a real estate market with no multiple listing system, we've finally found the place we'd like to call home here in Ireland. We're in the process of purchasing a house, about 20 minutes outside Waterford, a Georgian manor house, built in 1860, standing today on 6 acres, along with a handful of dilapidated stone outbuildings. (Yes, we're buying even though the market right now seems to be at the top, prices are, in many cases, outrageously inflated, and everyone--including us--is beginning to talk crash. Sometimes, we keep telling ourselves, you don't buy real estate because it makes sense.)

In addition to the troubles we had locating a property, we've also had planning issues (resolved by a kindly local publican who agreed, for a small fee, to swear that the addition built without proper permissions was built before 1964 and therefore didn't require such formalities)...financing issues (it's increasingly difficult, especially as a non-national, to obtain a mortgage here in Ireland, as banks, and the EU, are getting nervous given the current state of the market)--survey and boundary issues (the property we're buying was represented originally as including 7.5 acres...which became 7 when we questioned more carefully...which became 6 when we met with our attorney and reviewed the land folio; this seemed odd to no one but us; we've stopped asking questions about boundaries...

Now we have rising damp issues.

I hadn't heard the term until two weeks ago, when we had a painter out to the house to give us an estimate on work to be done. Studying the walls, he told us he was concerned about rising damp and thought we should have someone out to "look at things." Did he know someone, we asked? Well, he might, he said. Last night we stood again in front of our peeling wallpaper, with our painter and his friend Dermot, Dermot with a screwdriver in his hand, poking holes in our floor moldings, and shaking his head gravely. "I don't like the smell of this," he said more than once, laying his finger alongside his nose, nearly poking himself with his screwdriver.

We stood silent, following the pair from room to room, as Dermot poked more holes. Yes, he told us, the trouble can be sorted out. There is a remedy. He gave us an estimate. He'll begin the work in a couple of weeks.

This work and the related expense weren't in our schedule or our budget. Nor was the problem addressed in either one of the two "surveys" done of the property during early negotiations. The surveyors (or inspectors, as we would call them) evidently failed to notice the extensive dry rot in our wood moldings. Again, no one seems to think this odd but us.

Dear Reader, you're not in Kansas

My point in sharing this story with you is that, well, buying real estate in another country is not the same as buying real estate in your home town. And the differences can be subtle.

Number 10:

You expect the law to be different. You expect the red tape to be different. You expect the fees to be different. What you aren't prepared for are the cultural differences, which are just as important. (We'll call this Number 10 on our list of Things You Should Know Before Moving Day.)

The boundaries of country properties in Ireland, we've learned, can be "more or less" defined. It's up to you to pin down the borders precisely. Surveyors here, evidently, are likewise difficult to pin down. Their reports can be vague, their recommendations sketchy. And when you later discover their oversights, you've really no recourse...other than to fix the problem and move on.

The burden here in Ireland is on the buyer. The real estate agent does nothing more than show you the piece of property. Once negotiations for purchase begin, you engage a solicitor to represent your interests. We have a good one, I think. Still, we've done a lot of leg work ourselves, including a trip to the Planning Permission Office in Dungarvan.

Americans are accustomed to safety nets. In the States, there's always someone you can go to who will help you redress your grievances. In much of the rest of the world, it doesn't work that way. So move slowly and carefully. And, above all, keep your sense of humor.

Prepare for practical differences

I wish someone had told me to bring more sheets and towels from the States. This, therefore, is my recommendation.

Number 11:

Ship all the linens you and your family will need.

Not that you won't be able to buy them in your new home. Plenty of shops here in Waterford offer towels and sheets. But they're smaller than we're used to and thinner, even the "top-of-the-line" variety. My husband, especially, finds them unusable.

Furthermore, we've discovered that bed sizes don't translate directly. "Queen-sized" sheets don't fit our queen-sized bed; they're too small. And there's no such thing as a U.S. king-sized anything here.

What you don't bring with you, you can order from a catalog. Lands End, for example, will deliver anywhere in the world.

Number 12:

Also bring with you electrical adapters and transformers, as required, for your computers, radios, and other electrical appliances.

We brought a few with us, thinking we'd buy the others here. However, we discovered that, in Ireland, you can buy Irish-to-U.S. Adapters, as you might expect, but not vice versa. There's not enough need for stores to carry them. Again, you can buy what you don't bring with you through a catalog.

Number 13:

Use Visa or MasterCard check cards.

These used to be called debit cards, or combination ATM/debit cards. They let you access your cash directly. You can stick the card into a cash machine anywhere in the world and get the local currency you need. For large amounts of cash, you'll still need to go to a bank and ask for it. But for everyday money, ATMs are the way to go. You'll get a good exchange rate, often far better than elsewhere. And you can't beat the convenience.

Number 14:

Renew your passport and driver's license as far out as possible before moving.

It's much easier to do this through the mail at home than to deal with it long distance. And, often, you can drive on a U.S. driver's license, for example, for up to a year in your new country of residence.

Number 15:

Arrange for on-line payment of credit card bills.

You can arrange (at least for all major credit cards) on-line automatic payment of a minimum amount. Then, each month, you can also arrange, on-line, to pay an estimated actual amount due that month. This way, you don't have to worry about credit card bills catching up with you...or being billed late fees or finance charges.

Number 16:

Don't count on financing, especially when purchasing real estate.

Depending on your new country of residence, it may not be available to you at all as a foreign buyer. In those countries where it can be arranged (Ireland, for example), you'll find the process more complicated and time-consuming than you'll probably expect.

Number 17:

Seek as much advice as possible from others who are doing what you're planning to do. To that end, I've included two very different real-life tales in the Free Reports section of the International Living website. They're called A New Life on the High Seas and An American Family Buys a Chateau. You can read them here.