Check out this exclusive interview with Expat Life Style expert and author Chuck Bolotin
As a service to those who are moving to Mexico or even considering it, Best Mexico Movers recently published their free guide: What You Need to Know About Moving Your Household Goods to Mexico, available for free download. We recently spoke to Best Mexico Movers’ founder, Chuck Bolotin. Excerpts of the interview follow.
TMP: Please tell us why you published the guide to moving to Mexico.
CB: Very often, when people contact us about moving to Mexico, there are so many times when they have either half-true information or even completely false information, so a good portion of the first time we talk can be taken up just correcting what they thought they knew to be true that isn’t true. After doing this hundreds of times, it occurred to us that we could help many more people more quickly if we just published a guide.
TMP: Can you give our readers an idea of some of the misconceptions you work with?
CB: The main category of information many times people calling us have wrong is information they received from Facebook, where the person giving the information may have even been giving correct information, but only for a particular situation, at a particular time that is no longer true. As anyone who has lived in Mexico for any length of time or dealt with the bureaucracy here knows from firsthand experience, regulations are not uniformly enforced or even the same from place to place. For example, the requirements to clear your household goods in Laredo may be different than the requirements to clear your household goods in San Diego, and then, over time, these regulations may change.
TMP: Are there other reasons there is so much confusion about the menaje de casa and the move to Mexico process?
CB: One of the biggest reasons is that, the more confusion there is, the higher the price can be charged by moving companies. One of our objectives is to explain the process as simply as possible so people can be less afraid and confused and therefore, make decisions more in their interest, as opposed to the interest of the moving company.
TMP: Does everyone moving to Mexico need to use a moving company?
CB: Absolutely not. If you have a very small amount to move, you can easily and legally do it yourself; you don’t need Best Mexico Movers or any other moving company.
TMP: Are there other ways people moving to Mexico can reduce their costs?
CB: The first way is to reduce the amount you’re bringing so that you can do it yourself. If you do that, you don’t need a customs broker and you don’t need a moving company. I would, however, urge your readers to be careful, if they have more than they can bring in themselves, not to use anything other than a legitimate moving company that is in compliance with all the rules and regulations in both the US (and Canada, if relevant) and Mexico. Believe me, there are lots of rules and regulations, and if whomever is moving your household goods is not in full compliance, he or she could face big consequences, which would not be good if your household goods were in their truck at the time they got caught.
TMP: How can our readers know if the person moving their household goods is a legitimate moving company?
CB: One of the easiest ways is to ask if they offer insurance through a legitimate third party insurance company. If they don’t give you an immediate “yes,” you know what you need to know.
TMP: Is there anything else you would like our readers to know about the Best Mexico Movers guide?
CB: Yes. Quite a bit of the guide is devoted to tips and other information we’ve gathered over the years that has nothing to do with actually moving your household goods, so it is our hope that our guide would be useful to anyone moving to Mexico, whether they use us, another moving company, or did it themselves.
TMP: Thank you for sharing information about your guide with us.
CB: It is our pleasure. Thank you for allowing us to let your readers know about it.
The guide What You Need to Know About Moving Your Household Goods to Mexico is available for free download here: https://bestmexicomovers.com/what-you-need-to-know-to-move-your-household-good-to-mexico-guide/
