Shipping items without renting a 20ft container

Contact Arden Brink of Ship to Costa Rica (I think) about including your things in a container she’s shipping here. She’s one of the preferred businessfolks on the wlcr.com website. Her e-mail address is: arden@shipcostarica.com

Too, please rethink your decision not to bring your household belongings when you move. Opinion is divided, but I believe there is a compelling argument for bringing your stuff.

Okay, fredo, you asked . . .

First, the financial argument. If you sell everything you own in the U.S. at garage sales, etc., you’ll probably get about 15% of the replacement cost in the U.S. Take a look at your homeowner’s insurance policy for their estimate of the value of your household goods. It’s invariably 25 to 50% low. But let’s say the figure is $100,000, so you might get $15,000 if you sold everything out to the bare walls, if that’s even possible.

Now, you bring your $15,000 down here and start filling up an empty house. While you certainly can buy serviceable furniture at reasonable prices, the total cost will far exceed your $15k. Remember, we’re talking furniture, bedding, kitchen, bath and bed linens, dishes, pots and pans, plasticware, silverware, glasses, cups, kitchen gadgets (measuring cups, spoons and spatulas, etc.), cutlery, the vacuum cleaner, lamps, rugs, decorative pieces, ash trays, outdoor furniture, upholstered furniture, the computer desk, end tables, nightstands, dressers, dining room furniture, exercise equipment, and a host of other items that you’re used to living with.

Too, unless you’re buying a condo, you’re going to need all that stuff in your garage — garden tools, hand tools, etc — that you’ve spent your adulthood accumulating. You’ve bought all this a piece at a time and have no appreciation of how much you’ve spent on it. This has to come out of that $15k as well. Go price a good electric drill but bring along someone to catch you when you fall. A good hundred foot garden hose will cost you most of $90. What did you sell yours for?

The first shock you’ll encounter when furnishing this new house is that not everything you’ll need is made in Costa Rica, and anything that’s imported comes with a hefty import duty. So the silverware you paid (say) $200 for in the U.S. will cost more like $300 here and you got $30 for yours in the States, so you’re already down $270 or so and the party’s just begun. That applies to everything, and you have a lot to buy.

The second shock will come when you try to actually find acceptable replacements for all that perfectly good stuff you left behind. Yes, there are sources for many things, but locating those sources can be a daunting task, especially in a country you’re not familiar with and which has a national prejudice against street signs, decent maps and comprehensible directions. Don’t let your tank fall below half full; you’re going to be doing a lot of driving.

What’s more, most things are “one of a kind” items that are only stocked by one merchant. So when you see the cost of a set of silverware, for instance, your first reaction will be to go price shopping. Only nobody else carries the same item, so price shopping isn’t worthwhile, but you’ve still spent the time and burnt the gas. Yes, you can buy a Natuzzi recliner sofa but only at La Artistica in Pavas, only for half again what you’d pay in the U.S., and only for a selection of two styles and two colors (if that).

So you go back to the first source only to learn that the only one they had was sold yesterday and they won’t be restocking it or anything like it for six months. This is, after all, Costa Rica. You thought you were shopping at Wal-Mart?

The third shock will occur when you learn that there simply is no source for some of what you want or need. You may find a vacuum packer or a set of pots and pans all right, but finding the type and quality of what you’re used to isn’t a slam dunk.

Bear in mind, too, that anything you purchase here that was imported will include the import duty — on new merchandise. Whatever you import in your container will be used and taxed at a much, much lower rate, if at all.

Somebody quoted around $5,000 to bring a 20-foot container here. Even if you figure three times that, you’ll be far ahead financially to bring your lifetime’s accumulation of household goods.

And then there’s the esthetic argument. Not only are some things you’re used to simply not available here, but the cost of somehow shipping the “non-negotiables” (the artwork, the coin and stamp collections, all those Hummels, the ashtrays the kids made at camp, the family albums, your grandmother’s quilt, the wedding pictures, and heaven knows what else that’s important to you) will not be cheap. Aerocasillas can do it a box at a time, but bring your credit card. You don’t have that much cash.

And finally I’d argue that sending a container constitutes a fixed cost to you while replacing everything here will be a treasure hunt of undefined financial proportions. You have no way of knowing what you may be getting into. What if you’re on a limited budget and the $15,000 doesn’t stretch? What if you need bed linens before you can go to bed on the night you arrive? What if you want to prepare a meal but have no kitchenware? If you think you can fully furnish a house in a day or two of shopping in the U.S., I think you’re kidding yourself. If you think you can do it here, you wil be sadly disappointed either by what you end up with or by what you cannot find and certainly by the cost in both money and time.

I would also make the point that moving to another country, with its different culture, strange foods, unfamiliar bureaucracies, and probably foreign language, etc, is a daunting enough task without your also having to make too, too many compromises. You may downsize your space. You may learn to get along on the linens that are here. You may be happy driving a clunker instead of the newer car you’re used to. But taken together, these compromises can all be erosive of your morale. Let’s face it — each of us is what we are. We’re the accumulation of a lifetime of experiences and expectations. You can’t just turn your back on all that and expect to be and remain happy. At least you home should be familiar, comfortable territory.

“And (to paraphrase the little girl in the big rocker) that’s the argument.”

Edited on Oct 13, 2009 13:04

Hey, David,

WELL DONE! *Exactly* the case I’m often making to folks, so it’s great to hear someone else (who isn’t “selling” shipping services) saying the same thing. I have to completely agree!

Chet has written to me and we’re in communication already, but to others who might be reading this thread, we *do* have some ways to send shared containers which can be a cost-effective alternative if you’re really completely sure you don’t want to send everything down, or maybe you’re coming on a “trial” basis and you want to send *some* of your stuff, but not everything yet. Weight doesn’t matter (see my recent article here on the WLCR site) — it’s priced by the cubic footage and there are some discounts for greater volume. It’s *possible* to send anything from a few boxes to 1000 cubic feet (or more) so it can be a good option if you really don’t need to send a container full.
–arden–
Ship Costa Rica

i didn’t ship anything. brought down lots of bins full of stuff from the States on each trip but i bought every single piece of furniture and appliances here, most of a higher quality than i would ever buy in the States. i did bring down some artwork but i am now fretting that this was a mistake when i removed a painting from the wall and saw there was mildew on the reverse side. i still have the house in colorado so i think of that as my great big expensive storage shed for all my collectibles and really valuable stuff that i don’t want stolen or ruined from mildew. the few knick-knacks i did bring have provided residence for some creepy crawlies. boxes of paperwork promptly smell of mold, so i have been purging what little i have. lovely antique linens that were stored in drawer now also smell. my camera equipment that was stored on a closet shelf was covered in mold, and that happened in less than 4 months. a neighbor of mine had all kinds of infestations in boxes of stuff he hadn’t unpacked. this is truly a lesson in less is more. i’m sure most of us have more stuff than we really need and besides the bugs and mildew, who wants to worry that any of it will get stolen when the ladrones pay you a pre/Xmas visit!?

actually cr is my primary residence now, and trust me, i miss many of the beautiful things i have collected over the years, but it is also heartbreaking to see some of my things destroyed by the climate in cr. it’s really hard to get mildew out of 100 year old linen sheets! (and i run a dehumidifier!) over the years i’ve met so many people who hauled down stuff they should’ve given away — ikea type furniture that literally comes undone or upholstered items that mold and have to be tossed within 6 months of being here. and then there is the clutter — oh, boy, do some gringos have lots of that stuff, and it is really a magnet for things looking for a new home. my home here is furnished with some of the most beautiful hardwood and custom pieces of furniture that i had made to fit my house at a fraction of what similar things would cost up “there.”

that is too too funny. haven’t had any of my furniture sprout yet. i’ve seen water hyacinth stuff — surely you don’t mean that green goo, do you???