Moving Costs?

[romzilla]

My wife and I are planning on moving to Mexico, somewhere in Baja, from Florida, in a couple of years. We are trying to get an idea of relocation costs. Anyone have any info or experience in this area?

[RVGRINGO]

That's a very broad question. First, Baja is like another country so most of us from mainland Mexico won't be able to give you much advice. Moving can be a simple as loading your vehicle and departing after a huge garage sale, or hiring an international moving company to move everything for more than the furniture is worth.
So, welcome to the forum and I hope you can give more details about your plan, so that someone who has made a similar move might offer you some advice.

[El Toro Furioso]

Originally Posted by RVGRINGO

Baja is like another country so most of us from mainland Mexico won't be able to give you much advice.

Amén. Es la verdad.

[El Toro Furioso]

One question that will come up has to do with paying duty on your possessions when you move. If you get an FM3 prior to moving, you have six months from the issue date to move your possessions without paying duty. This is the official line and can make life inconvenient. We planned on getting around this by only one of us getting the FM3, while the other waited until we sold our house NoB. Big mistake! Now we have to go through renewing our FM3s twice a year instead of doing it together once a year. And we ended up discovering that you can save money anyway (over an international or an Amereican/Mexican combo moving company) by hiring an expediter at the border. With an expediter, you don't pay any duty no matter when you move. They are bilingual and, by definition, have contacts throughout the whole Mexican bureaucracy. We saved about $1,500 USD over Mexican-based international movers' quotes (we had already lived in Mexico for over 2 years).