Re: How much will a 20ft container hold?
 

20ft is a standard shipping container (Actually called a "Twenty Foot Equivalent Unit or TEU). There is nothing smaller so if you are only shipping a partial container you make what is called a groupage or consolidated shipment. Your shipper/removal company will consolidate your shipment with other shipments going to the same or nearby destinations. That way you only pay for what you need. The downside is that consolidated shipments usually take longer as time is required to receive, consolidate, load, ship, unload, deconsolidate and then deliver goods. As there is more handling involved there is arguably more risk of damge but this can be minimised by good packaging.

Re: How much will a 20ft container hold?
 

Hi LL,

We normally say as a guide the average contents of a 3 bed house would fit in a 20ft container, but then everyone is different right? depends how much stuff you like to have! If it helps I have an excel spreadsheet that you can put all your items into and it will tell you the total volume, 1050 cubic feet is what we suggest will fit in a 20ft container (actual capacity is more i.e. if you fill it with water, but we allow for the awkward spaces between furniture etc).

Send me your email address by private message if you'd like me to send it over to you? There is another version on our website which is a webpage rather than excel if you'd rather that, but this involves submitting your details for a free quotation so depends if you're at that stage yet?

hope that helps!

Kirsty

Re: How much will a 20ft container hold?
 

If you don't have that much furniture, you should be able to arrange it quite nicely inside the 20' container, a bit like an trendy IKEA studio showroom. Pack plenty of sandwiches, and save yourself the airfares by going across inside your container.

Re: How much will a 20ft container hold?
 

I understand that you can only get modules of 20 & 40 ft which is so that they can stack them on the ships. You can get smaller containers smaller but I don't think the shipping companies use them.

We had a forty foot container and we ask for storage costs prior to placing our booking (highly recommended as it allows you to still negotiate with them) and they quoted two costs. An initial cost to offload into storage (from memory @$400/lump sum) and a storage cost (again from memory @$450/month). Others quoted highly and lower prices but they were all about the same give or take 10%. A 20ft should be cheaper.

One thing worth considering is that if you have a small amount of good, it might be worth selling / gifting items rather than shipping them as the cost of the container might be more than replacing them (we worked out how much our goods were worth and then used a Canadian Website (try the Brick - http://www1.thebrick.com/brickb2c/js...FRBsgwodgXYHDQ) to see how much it would cost to replace our goods. Obviously having your goods avoids having to shop straight away. A lot of UK items such as sofas are smaller than Canadian ones and sometimes seem lost in the bigger homes that you find in Canada.

Hope this helps.

Re: How much will a 20ft container hold?
 

Hi
Presumably you would not...in that case....forget to take some oxygen cylinders with you...as they are AIRTIGHT.....unless you get a broken old one....If air and daylight can get in....so will water.....not clever when travelling by sea.......but I do know you woz joking though!!!!!
lol.....lol.....lol:rofl::rofl:
Stef

Re: How much will a 20ft container hold?
 

Hi,

We had a 20ft container and managed to fit the contents of a 3 bedroomed house into it. The only thing we did not take were items with plugs on them. It is amazing how much stuff you can fit into one. :ohmy: and with 2 kids, lots of toys came too.

Re: How much will a 20ft container hold?
 

We had a 20ft container, it was delivered last Friday. Customs never looked sideways at us. We packed probably about half the small things ourselves, not only does it save money but was we were both done working and we were really bored!
Customs was great, they only asked if any alcohol/seeds/tabacco as we had none, said no, they stamped it again and whoosh out the door. We did take our 2 yr old grand daughter and she got more attention then our container did lol

We took about 70% of our things from a 3 bedroom house. and still had a bit of room left over. No breakages and everything went like clock work

Re: How much will a 20ft container hold?
 

Hi, we did this just last month (boat arrives next week yippee!) and none of the companies I saw (RObinson, Doree Bonner and one other I forget the name) would allow us to pack for ourselves if we also wanted insurance. I guess it's their neck on the line if you smuggle in illegal marmite. We fitted a 3 bed house with a lifetimes worth of tat in boxes in a 20ft but I would caution that the packers don't really make best use of space, so flat pack everything possible or else they will carefully wrap round every bookcase, leave cupboards and drawers empty etc.. I filled every nook and cranny and then left them open to for the guys to have a poke around. They didn't really bother so I did manage some marmite and half empty bottles of sherry after all ;)

Re: How much will a 20ft container hold?
 

The reason for them not allowing insurance is correct. To get insurance you need the container to be packed and accounted for by a professional packer.

There are also options to use freight forwarders instead of the moving companies you mention. I am working on this possibilty with my company who have multiple containers from the UK to Canada each week to be able to offer these services from door to door. It looks like there are a lot of people on this site who could use this freight service. Once I have more info together about how we can help I will post a message on here.

Re: How much will a 20ft container hold?
 

We've had a quote from the US back to UK for $5,950 for a 20' which includes loading and unloading, door to door plus the terminal handling charge at the US end.

Insurance isn't covered and a zero deductible is 3.95% so for say $15,000 is another $600, 1% or $150 less for $500 deductible..... I have a question, is ther any cheaper way to get insurance? Travel insurance or similar?

Also, any idea of what the terminal handling charge will be at the UK end as that's not covered either?

Re: How much will a 20ft container hold?
 

When we emigrated, we did not fill a 20' container, so our local shipping company rented part of the container, maybe a quarter of it. It duly arrived in Vancouver 6 weeks later.

The answer to your other question, how long can you keep stuff in storage, is surely as long as you go on paying for the storage.

Brian

Re: How much will a 20ft container hold?
 

Sorry if this is a silly question but does the container arrive in the street to be filled?

Re: How much will a 20ft container hold?
 

Not a silly question at all! There are two ways really, and will depend on the move plan (i.e. when you need your items collected, when the sailing date is etc) and the access at your property (i.e. will a container lorry fit, can it get near enough to the house for loading and can it park for long enough to load it?) so the mover will either load on site if its accessible or if not they might take your items back to their depot and move them onto the container lorry there. Ask when you get a quote how the mover plans to do this and they should be happy to explain the options with you. Hope that helps!

Kirsty

Re: How much will a 20ft container hold?
 

Thanks very much Kirsty just got a quote from EVL and they say they come with the container and have to pack it all..

Re: How much will a 20ft container hold?
 

I recently had a 20ft container, Liverpool to Calgary. Packed everything myself and loaded the container for £2500. I brought everything apart that wasn't nailed down apart from 'white goods' and there was loads of room left so I wouldn't worry. Customs didn't check ours either, just looked at the packing list and stamped it so I don't think it makes a difference who packs it. I just made sure my packing list was extremely detailed. I also made sure that my son's bike and a tool kit was placed at the entrance of the container just in case customs wanted to check them but they didn't.