Que Pasa NYC

My apologies for the lack of posts in the last month. I've been in the midst of an apartment switch, but am beginning to settle into the new place and ready to bring you highlights of events and deals in this fabulous city of our. There were some money and time saving lessons learned during this process that I'll share with you.

#1 Never Pay For Boxes There are free boxes to be had, you just have to look. My local supermarket was not the ideal place for boxes. Their boxes seemed icky (very technical moving term) or lacked full covered bottoms. The best sources in my neighborhood were Whole Foods and Starbucks. Ask what days of the week they receive shipments and the best time to come back for boxes and you'll hit the mother load.

#2 Spend the money on the good packing tape This is not the item to be a cheapskate on. My preferred brand of packing tape is the Duck Brand. Can't go wrong there. I went through about 4 rolls for a 2 bedroom apartment.

#3 Pack It In Boxes No Matter the Distance So you say you're only moving downstairs and you don't need to pack it all up? WRONG!!! Regardless of the distance, packing your belongings in boxes makes the moving process faster and more orderly and limits the likelihood of damages. Boxes are much easier to port than bags and other odd shapes. It also makes settling into your new place easier because you can itemize contents on the outside of the box, which facilitates finding things as you unpack.

#4 Donate Unwanted Items There are so many people in this city who could use that furniture that just won't fit in the new place or those clothes you don't really wear anymore. Give directly by posting on pages like http://newyork.craigslist.org/ or the Freecycle NYC yahoo group. There are also a bunch of Thrift shops that will take your donations and resell them to raise money for a variety of worthy causes. My favorite is Housing Works which has thrift stores located all over Manhattan and one in Brooklyn. Click here for location info.

What tips do you have?