I see that you're looking to do a PCS Advice column. My husband will be finishing The Basic School in the next 6 weeks and we will be PCSing to our first duty station. We were wanting to get some honest feedback on advantages of DITY, Partial DITY, and a full military move. We were wondering how much money we could make on a DITY and if people thought it was worth it. Also, has anyone done anything like PODS? We are thinking about storing our stuff for about 5 months. (He has to leave for a school about two months after we get to our duty station) Thank you so much!
Kerry-Ann's Response:
C.E.S., this is a really great question. PCSing can be quite stressful but what a lot of people may not realize is that although they may not have any control over their next duty station, they do have control over the type of move they prefer. This can create a less stressful situation for your family.
My husband and I chose to do a DITY move on our first move from FL to CA. The advantages of that was that we had 100% control of how we packed our things and if things were to go missing or get broken, it would be our responsibility. We were also responsible for packing, moving and unloading our entire household. We ended up making quite a bit of money from this. We actually made it a road trip between some of our college friends and my husband. At the time I was pregnant with our second son and our 1st son was only 2 1/2 years old so I opted to fly to CA while hubby drove cross country with our cars, household items and our friends. Due to the fact that we got a good amount of cash, we were able to book one way tickets back to FL for the 3 friends who helped us move. The money we got was also able to provide us with financial security to get everything set up (security deposit, 1st month's rent, cable, light, water, groceries, etc) and still have what I like to call "cushion money" left over since we opted to not live on base when we first got to CA.
When it was time for us to move duty stations from Camp Pendleton to MCRD San Diego we used TMO to move us since it was much easier to have them pack, move and unload us since by that time we had 2 very active little boys to consider. :)
When we got orders to Hawaii I actually checked into pricing to do a DITY move and the pricing was extremely expensive so we had no problems letting TMO move us from CA to Hawaii.
I don't have personal info regarding a partial DITY move but my husband informed me that with a partial DITY move you are given a certain weight limit for your household items to be packed by the military then you are responsible for the rest of the packing. The military will then reward you accordingly for the items you'll be packing. I tried searching for people I know who've gone through this process but I wasn't able to. I'd suggest that you contact your hubby's Command and TMO office on his current base for a complete explanation so that you know exactly what your options are.
At the end of the day I'd suggest that you choose the best move option for your family depending on where you'll be moving from and where you'll be relocating to. Also consider your comfort level of whether you're ok with packing up and moving your own stuff or if you'd prefer the freedom of having the military do it for you. Feel free to check out our recent PCS advice post from fellow Milies for more tips on PCSing.
