When you’re building a new home and at the same time selling your current home, you’re privy to a lot of unique circumstances, some of which are more pleasant than others. One of those decidedly unpleasant circumstances is coordinating your move, while still maintaining a place to lay your head at night. And when your current home sells faster than your new home is being built, you have to arrange not only a place to live, but also a place to put all your stuff. Enter portable storage units and the one tried and true lesson learned. Such was my experience recently and here are the lessons I learned.

Because we were unsure whether our new home would be ready by the time we had to be out of our old home, we decided that portable storage units would be the best option for our move. Now PODS (Portable On Demand Storage) is the most well known, but 1-800-Pack-Rat has been making strong inroads so I researched them both and because the actual container was better AND because their price was cheaper, we decided to order a 16′ Pack-Rat unit, good for 3-4 bedrooms according to their website.

Several days into loading the unit and only a couple of days until we had to be out of the current house, we realized that even their large unit wasn’t large enough for 3 bedrooms, not by a long shot. We called 1-800-Pack-Rat again to order another unit, and though they could deliver the unit the next day, they wouldn’t be able to pick it up until 2 days AFTER we had to be out of the house. Not an option.

So we bit the bullet and called PODS. Not only could they deliver their unit the next day, they could also pick it back up the following day (our moving day). Sold! Moving day then came and we had two units in our driveway, one from each company. Both companies called the morning of the move to tell us they would picking up the units, but only PODS could give us a 2 hour window when they would be there. Not a deal killer, but irritating none the less.

Fast forward a couple of weeks and it’s the Friday before we close (the following Monday) so we call to schedule delivery of our units so they’re in the driveway when we get back from closing. PODS had no problems scheduling for a Monday delivery, and even scheduled us for delivery prior to 11am. 1-800-Pack-Rat on the other hand was another story. First their phone system kept hanging up on me, and finally after going through a different menu option I got to a service representative would couldn’t find my account.

After finally finding my account, the representative tells me that the Houston warehouse is closed Saturday – Monday (but couldn’t tell me why), and the earliest they could deliver my container was Wednesday – a full two days after we moved in. After much protest, the representative told me he would have the warehouse manager call me – which never happened, even after two more subsequent calls. Wednesday arrived, as did the Pack-Rat container and we unloaded it into the garage. Finally, I called Pack-Rat back to schedule a final pickup – and although I shouldn’t have been surprised at this point – the earliest they could pick the unit up was the FOLLOWING WEDNESDAY! A full week later.

So what did I learn? I was reminded again that you simply Get What You Pay For. Check out our Chart A below for a general summary of MY experience with both companies. While 1-800-Pack-Rat’s container was superior, I would have been far better off spending the extra $40 for PODS. Lessons learned… and now… shared.