“It’s a beautiful day in the neighborhood,
A beautiful day for a neighbor.
Would you be mine?
Could you be mine?
Won’t you be my neighbor?”

If only making friends with your new neighborhood would be as easy as singing this nostalgic song of Mr. Rogers. But, wait, it is! While meeting your new neighbors after a move may seem intimidating at first, following these steps will make it seem as easy as putting on and taking off a cardigan sweater!

One Kind Word

Meeting your neighbor does not have to involve you pounding on their door with a list of get-to-know-you interrogation questions. You can simply start with a smile, maybe a hello and a kind phrase like “Have a nice day!” That’s it. You’ve started a relationship with your neighbor. Simple as that!

Come Out to Play

If you stay hidden away in your house all day, every day, your neighbors will not have the pleasure of meeting you. Hang out on your porch while sipping on some coffee. Maybe one day choose to water the grass yourself with the hose instead of letting the automatic sprinklers do it. Strike up a conversation when you see your neighbor as you get your mail. Take as many opportunities to get out there and make yourself known!

Help Out

Another great way to make connections with your neighbors is to give them a helping hand! Help someone bring in their groceries, take out the trash or hold the ladder while they string their Christmas lights. Consider offering to dog sit or collect their mail while they are on vacation. You might even surprise them by doing some random acts of kindness like bringing them a coffee, raking their leaves or baking them cookies. People always need help and are often more receptive to you once you’ve solved a problem that makes their life a bit easier.

Make It Your Community

A great way to get to know your new community is to become a part of it. Get involved by volunteering for a community event, participating in a local race for a cause or simply attend the neighborhood spaghetti feed. By doing so, not only will you feel more like you belong, but now you have something in common to talk about with your neighbors.

Invite Your Neighbors for Dinner

A great way to get to know your neighbors is to invite them over for a housewarming party or a backyard cookout. Consider visiting each neighbor personally to invite them to your party. That way they know that it’s a genuine invitation and that you truly want to get to know them. When you welcome people into your home, you show them that you are trustworthy, approachable and care about your community and the people in it. Plus, it’s a lot easier to get to know people in the relaxed comforts of your own home.

Conclusion

Meeting new people may not be the easiest for everyone, but once you start getting to know your neighbors and involving yourself more in your community, your new home will start to feel, well, homier. If you’re ready to move and need a reliable, community-oriented moving company, give the professional movers and Moving Forward San Francisco a call for a FREE quote!

Moving is exhausting. After all the planning, preparing and physical moving, by the time you get to your new house, unpacking can seem extremely overwhelming. Fortunately, there are some strategies to ease the overwhelm and help you unpack efficiently. Call us crazy, but you may even enjoy unpacking with these three tips for a better unpacking experience.

1. Pack Properly
   Pack Properly The first and most crucial part of improving the unpacking to process is to optimize the packing process. This involves proper labeling.
   • Use a permanent marker to label boxes by room and by contents. When you know exactly what’s in each box as well as what room it belongs in, you are giving yourself a head start by organizing all your stuff before you even open a box. You will be amazed at how much brain energy you save just by labeling your boxes.
   • Aside from tangled Christmas lights, there’s nothing more brain boiling that a bundle of cords and electronic pieces with no instruction manual. Save yourself the headache and not every step of assembly as you disassemble your electronics. Then label your electronics with some masking tape and and colored markers to color-code the assembly steps.
   • Number your boxes in sequence of importance or urgency. This will eliminate the analysis paralysis that takes over when you’re looking at a room full of boxes.
2. Separate Belongings You Will Need Within the First Few Days
   When you first arrive, you may feel a rush of adrenaline as you look at the a blank canvas in front of you, waiting to be transformed from a house into a home. You may even begin ripping open boxes in an enthusiastic push to create your home. But after a few boxes you will find a mess and that adrenaline rush will shift to overwhelm.
   Satiate the giddiness inside and pack a First-open box or two. Not only will this help you jumpstart the unpacking process and quiet that panicky, “Where should I start?” voice, but you can pack these boxes with the items you will definitely need in the first couple of days. Pack these couple of boxes with things like pajamas, toiletries, smartphone chargers, bed linens, and other items you will need the first night in your new home.
3. Stay Focused
   No matter how much preparation work you do during the packing process, you will discover that unpacking requires a lot of focus and energy. You’re in a brand new space and you want to put it together exactly how you envisioned. This work takes creative, strategic, organizational, and physical work, so it’s imperative that you use this energy wisely.
   Stay away from any typical distractions that could drain your motivation and energy. Turn off your phone and stay off social media, even those supposed “inspiration” platforms. Before you know if you will find yourself several hours deep in a rabbit hole with dozens of boxes still left to unpack.
   Of course, you don’t need to work in complete silence and isolation. Keep the mood upbeat with podcasts, playlists or ebooks. Sounds and music do wonders for warming up the environment and breathing some life into your new home.

Ready To Move? We Can Help.

Looking for professional Redwood City movers who respect your time and handle your belongings with care? Moving Forward professional Redwood City movers are your people. Gie us a call for your FREE quote.

If you’ve ever moved, then you know how all those little details add up to a pretty substantial moving checklist. Add a brand new job, a family and coinciding responsibilities to that, and you can lose your lid pretty fast.

Our professional movers here at Moving Forward SF have assisted with many job relocation moves, and we know very well that moving for a job typically means having a shorter timeline to get your act together, pack up, and hire a professional moving company to help you on your way.

Whether you’re moving across the country for your current job or starting fresh in a new city with a completely new job, moving for a job is a life-changing experience that takes some serious organization (if you want to keep your cool, that is!). Keep your brainpower for the things that really matter by staying organized with these 4 job relocation tips.

1. Ask Your Employer About Financial Relocation Assistance

Many companies provide financial relocation assistance to help with the overall cost of moving. It is important to ask your employer if this is something they offer. While it can be intimidating to ask for additional financial assistance, when you look at your budget and the overall cost of moving, it is definitely work the ask. The worst they can say is no, right?

2. Create Your Budget (And Stick to It)

Once you know for sure exactly how you will be paying for the move, it’s in your best interest to create a budget to keep track of your spending. Even if the word “budget” terrifies you, or you have never tracked spending in your life, moving for a job relocation is a great time to give it a try. Moving expenses add up quickly, and once you settle into your new home, your bank account is likely to scare you way more than the budget would have.

When making your budget, be sure to include absolutely everything you will need to buy for the move. This includes all packing and cleaning supplies, meals and accommodations during travel, and increased costs associated with settling into a new home. These include an increased grocery bill, rent deposits if you’re a renter, utilities and internet setup fees, etc.

3. Write Everything Down

Don’t rely on your memory to keep track of everything that needs done. Designate a single notebook to keep track of all your moving details. This includes quotes and other information from professional moving companies, dates for turning off/on utilities and internet, switching your address, meetings and appointments, etc. It could be helpful to organize your notebook based on personal to-dos, professional to-dos, and moving to-dos so they don’t all get jumbled up.

4. Hire a Professional Mover

That last thing you want to deal with when moving is the actual moving part. Save your energy for that first day of work by taking the time to research reputable moving companies. Hire a professional moving company to pack and transport your belongings safely and efficiently.

Looking for quotes now? Call your professional Moving Forward Palo Alto moving company today to receive your free quote.

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Finding Legitimate a Professional Moving Company in Sunnyvale

Moving can be a stressful, emotional time. There’s plenty to do and it’s usually on a tight deadline, not to mention life keeps moving forward as if you don’t have an entire household to uproot. The one team you need to have on your side is a professional moving company.

As you begin researching moving companies and collecting quotes, you might be wondering what exactly you should be looking for in a legitimate moving company. There is much more to a moving company’s value than their moving rate, and in order to get the best bang for your buck, you need to know what you’re looking for.

Don’t let a moving company scam ruin your relocation process. Look for these key traits in a professional movers to ensure you are vetting legitimate moving companies in Sunnyvale.

Registration

If you’re on a budget, the freelance moving guy with a van might sound appealing. However, a lot can happen over the course of the move, and the last thing you want to deal with is theft, an accident, or damage. Minimize the possibility of this and only hire professional movers that have a USDOT number and are registered with the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration.

A Physical Business Address

This is a minimum requirement, so if you are not able to find a physical address for the moving company, this is a major warning sign you’re dealing with an fake driver.

Licensure

A legitimate moving company will always be fully licensed and insured. This information will be available on their website. Here at Moving Forward SF, we are fully licensed and insured.

The Estimate

Legitimate moving companies will come to your house and perform a formal walk through in order to accurately assess the cost of your move. Once this is done, they will produce an estimate based on the walk-through. If a company does not come to your house to create the estimate, or does not provide an estimate at all, then this is a red flag.

Another red flag can be found in unusual estimate details. If they request a high down payment or if the estimate is suspiciously high or costly, the company could be hiding something. Be sure to get estimates from several companies so you can compare rates and fees.

Mover Ratings

Check the Better Business Bureau for ratings on the drivers and the moving company as a whole. If the company has bad ratings, then don’t bother including them as a candidate. BBB ratings are not something you should be lenient about.

The Moving Truck

A legitimate moving company will always have trucks with some form of branding on them, whether it’s the logo, the company name, the tagline, and contact information. If the moving company has generic trucks with no business information, this is could be a scam.

Ready to hire a top tier professional moving company in Sunnyvale? Call us today to get a free quote!

Keep Your Fish Safe With These Simple Tips For Moving Your Aquarium

As you begin taking inventory of your belongings before your move, you may have noticed some items are more delicate than others, and those delicate items will need special packing and transportation care. This is often true for pet gear like bird cages, cat climbing structures, and aquariums. Of the three, aquariums and the fish that live in it are extremely fragile and require special consideration on a move. Our professional Redwood City movers have helped many pet owners pack their pet’s belongings safely, but if you intend to do this part yourself, we’d like to share a few key tips for doing it right.

If you plan to take your fish and their aquarium with you to your new home, then use these tips to safely pack and transport them.

Aquarium Packing Essentials :

• 5 Gallon buckets
• Packing supplies
• Fish bags
• Masking tape
• Marker

How To Pack And Transport Your Aquarium

• Pour all of your aquarium water into the 5 gallon buckets to preserve the work you’ve already done distilling the water (it takes a lot of time starting this over again, so you may as well bring it along with you!). Be very careful to clean the buckets before you place the water in them, otherwise this portion of the work will be a waste of time.
• Use the masking tape and a market to label all the wires and hoses that connect to your aquarium tank. Once you have labeled the wire and hoses, bundle them for easy transport. The more work you can do up front here, the easier the unpacking will be and the less stress your fish will endure once you arrive.
• Use soft packing paper as well as bubble wrap and other packing materials to safely pack your tank, filtration system and tank accessories. Consider the tank itself is extremely fragile and was built to sit on a stable, unmovable surface. Reinforce the tank with plenty of packing material so the glass doesn’t shatter during the move.

How to Pack Your Fish

• There are some precautions to take while moving your delicate fish. The main idea is to return your fish to their familiar environment as soon as possible. Freshwater fish are not fans of change, and they will certainly be affected by you transporting them between several container before they return to the aquarium. It’s not uncommon for fish to stop eating, and no matter what you do, the fish could still die during transport. It’s the risk of moving fish, but there are some simply ways to try and prevent this.
• First, clean your tank the week before the move and refrain from feeding your fish about 24 hours before the move. On the day of the move, the aquarium should be the absolute last thing you pack. Place your fish in sturdy plastic bags and secure them with a rubber band. Before you arrive to your new home, plan where you will keep the aquarium so the set up is swift.
• With these tips, you are on your way to creating safer circumstances for moving your aquarium. For more information about moving or to get a free quote,call our Redwood City professional movers today.

Moving can be a tough experience. Even if you are moving for all the right reasons, whether you just bought a place of your own, are getting married or even when you are starting a new family and need more space for the children that will come, moving isn’t fun. It might be exciting at first, getting the chance to clean up and get rid of old things. If you are an organizer, you might even enjoy boxing everything up. However, the magic will soon wear off. Your back might start hurting; you will feel like you will never get it done. You might run out of boxes or tape and need to go to the store to get more. And, hard as you try, you might end up wrapping fragile things the wrong way, risking them breaking.

Even if you call your family or friends, they might be willing to help you for a couple of hours, but they probably won’t offer much more. After all, boxing things up and having to carry heavy furniture around isn’t an idea of fun for anyone.

So in order to save yourself the hassle that it implies, you might want to consider hiring a moving professionals company that can get it done for you. The truth is that you will find out that this is a service totally worth paying for. Your body will thank you. Your mind will thank you. And your unknowing friends would thank you as well.

A professional company can send trained personnel to your house; they will bring all the necessary equipment and tools to get the job done efficiently, and making sure that everything is packed correctly and safely. Although they will let you lend a hand if you want to take part in it, they will gladly get the job done for you. They will make sure that you have all the information on how things were packed, what to find in each box, where each box should be placed in the new house, and where your valuables and fragile items are.

With such an experienced team, you won’t need to worry about anything but getting yourself to your new place and starting a new chapter in your life. Moving Forward will be able to provide you all of this, along with an excellent, high quality service that can leave even the toughest clients completely satisfied. Why break your back over something like this? Get some help.

Hiring a professional moving service might always be a good idea when the time comes. If you already feel overwhelmed by just looking at everything that needs to be done, then perhaps it is time to hire someone that is able to do the job for you. You can then focus on switching things over and making sure that your job, kids and other aspects of life are taken care of. Here are the main benefits for hiring a Piedmont moving service.

Benefits of Hiring a San Francisco Moving Service:

• Do not move the items on your own. This includes those really large, bulky items that you would need to ask others for help moving.
• Have them pack the items for you if you do not have enough time to pack them before the move date.
• Allow them to bring their truck and pack it up, as well as take the items out and put them in the new home when they get there.
• Have the added security of knowing you’re working with an affordable, trustworthy company that is helping you move.
• Do not call friends or family in for favors for anything. The movers have the move, and you can focus on the other things that need to be done.
• They will provide you with an estimate and this is what you can stick with when it comes to having a budget and using them.
• All of your items are insured along the way, so you get piece of mind while working with them. Not only that, but the right moving company will also provide you with a contract to sign.

Always make sure to ask your movers for references. You do not want to hire a moving company without knowing more about them. You’re trusting them with all of your items and in your home. You need to make sure that you’re protected at all costs, which means doing the background work on finding out more about this company.

When the time comes to go through everything and get the job done, make sure to call Moving Forward. Not only can we help with all of the moves that you have local to the San Francisco and surrounding areas but we can help with the packing. Any type of moving help needed, we have you covered from start to finish. Allow us to help you with your next move.

So you have decided to move. The idea of moving can be a big undertaking in your mind, especially if there are many of you in the household, or you have quite a bit of stuff. From the beginning of the entire process there are many things you have to do like schedule movers, pack, clean the house before you leave, and then move. It can be an exhausting task, but there are some things you can do to make the process go a little smoother from beginning to end.

The first thing you need is someone to move all of your things on moving day. Go ahead and book your movers early. If you are moving anytime around the beginning or the ending of the month, you can guarantee that other people are as well. Knowing the date you need to move can save you time and money. You want to get your spot secure so you aren’t looking for moving services at the last minute, and possibly have to pay an inflated price. How far you are moving is of no consequence when you need to get movers. You could be going from Woodside, CA to Hillsborough, CA and you still want to reserve your movers as soon as possible. If you are not sure of your move date, find a moving service who can accommodate you with short notice. They may be a little pricier, but it is worth it knowing your items will be there the day you need them.

Once you get your movers set up, start packing up rooms in advance and use paper plates if you can. Whether you live in a one-bedroom apartment or a four-bedroom home; packing must be done. You have to throw all of that stuff in boxes. Instead of trying to have a two-or- three-day push with day and night packing, start packing up rooms you aren’t using and things you don’t need. If it is summertime you know that you don’t need your heavy winter coat and clothes. Pack them up. Go ahead and throw them in the box. Unless you are planning a major dinner party before you move, you can move forward with packing up most of the kitchen. You can by paper plates and cups and plastic cutlery and eat off of those for a couple of weeks. It seems to make the packing process slightly less stressful when you are rushing to put boxes together while the movers are there.

Advance planning is the best remedy for any move. It will help you to side step many headaches. Chose the best moving service company in the San Francisco area, and make your move a little easier.

1. Pack all of your overnight essentials in one bag. During a move we are never sure which days will be spent at the old place and which will be spent at the new place. In order to make your life easier and a tad less stressful, pack all of you toiletries and change of clothes into one bag you can easily carry back and forth.
2. Things you will need first should go into clear containers. You will absolutely need to eat once you get into the new place. Things like paper plates, utensils, paper towels, and box cutters should go into one clear container you can easily spot once you’ve lugged all the boxes in. Another clear container should hold cleaning supplies so you can make the place sparkle before placing furniture in their new homes.
3. Use clean socks to pack stemware. Since the bottle of wine will be one of the first things opened at your housewarming party, you will need to have pristine glassware to go with. Instead of wasting an abundance of packing paper on wrapping them, use your clean socks. They provide padding and give to keep your most precious stemware in great condition.

Moving Forward Moving Services are proud to offer top of the line professional moving services for the San Francisco Bay Area. We will gladly help move your belongings to and from the cities of Palo Alto, Redwood City, San Francisco, Sunnyvale, and surrounding cities. Give us a call today for your free moving quote!