Moving The Tiny House

September 25, 2019Macy M4701 views

I’m so scared!

This is not what my particular house was designed for. Sure, it was designed to be able to be moved once or twice. My focus was much more about making it a cozy little cottage, though. I always knew moves would forever be stressful. It’s heavy. It’s huge. It’s got big windows. Drywall. Tile. All things that are weird decisions to make if you want to move a whole bunch. Fortunately, this will be our tiny’s last move. If ever we sell our property the house goes with it!

My options

Folks, I drive a Prius. James drives a Pilot. Neither of those are anywhere near capable of pulling a gooseneck. Not that I’d even want to! That makes this go out to public bid. A stranger will be pulling our home. Not only that, the 300 mile road between point A and point B is ‘rugged’ at best. I’m pretty sure this drive will take at least eight years off of my life.

Limiting Factors

Normal pre-winter conditions – in fact, every trip we’ve made this year they have been cleaning up one rock slide or another.

We are aiming for October 3rd. This is before the real rainy season when mudslides become commonplace. We’ll definitely go before snow flies, that’s a given. Avalanches are WAY worse than mud slides.

There are two giant grades to go up, Whitebird and Lewiston. They add up to approximately 5,000 foot climbs over 14 miles of road.

Whatever isn’t a giant mountain to crest is a winding river road with limited pull outs. I am prepared with current enough tires (one year old and kept covered from UV rays) but I can’t stop thinking about if one blows out… which I hear is common for mobile home tires.

It’s not all bad

I mean, one of the grades is better than it used to be…

This is what Whitebird USED to look like…

How much will this cost?

The total move is about 300 miles. It takes about 5.5 hours with no precious cargo. I am making sure I find a driver with cargo insurance, should anything go horribly wrong. I am using uship.com to find a driver.

How much do you think this will cost? Bids are starting to come in. Some are lower than a grand, some are much (much) higher. I figured I would wait for five days so I can compare all of the bidders qualifications and then choose. I’ll be looking at their pull vehicles. Their reviews. Their price. Their insurance plans.