Sending your child off for college is a large milestone in not only your son or daughter’s life, but yours as well. It’s understandable to be nervous. There are many things to organize when your child goes to college. Luckily transport can be made easier with car shipping.
Why Ship a Car to College?
Students often attend university far from home. And while this arrangement might ensure that your child gets a good education from a respectable college, it can be problematic when it comes to arranging transport.
Unless your child will be staying within walking distance from campus, they’ll need to have a car when they leave for college. However, letting your child drive through all the way isn’t ideal.
There are a few benefits to shipping a car for college:
- Keep mileage down: If you bought your child a new car, keeping the mileage down could help the vehicle retain its value for longer.
- Stay safer: Chances are your child will mostly be driving in the city once they arrive at college. This is safer than driving long distances, because the risk for a high-speed accident is lower. When using car shipping, you can allow your college student to drive in the city while avoiding the risk that comes with driving long distances.
- Enjoy more convenience: There are going to be many things to get ready before your child goes to college, and while letting them drive there might seem like less of a hassle than organizing shipping, it’s not. Driving could mean extra arrangements like accommodation and planning the best route to take.
- Help with mental preparation: Going to college will be a big adjustment for your child. The stress of driving such a long distance right before starting classes can take away from their time to stay calm while mentally preparing for the change they’re going through. With car shipping, your child can fly down to their new home and get settled without the stress and exhaustion of driving there.
Shipping a car for university clearly has its benefits. It’s especially a great option of your child isn’t a particularly good driver yet.
How to Arrange University Auto Transport
With the right auto transporting company, shipping a car to college should be easy. However, there are a few things about arranging auto transport that’s useful to know beforehand:
- Book dates ahead of time: Unfortunately shipping a car isn’t like taking a bus. There aren’t carriers leaving to every location every day. However, it should be easy enough to arrange dates that line up with your plans well. Just be sure to arrange for car shipping ahead of time so you still get space on a carrier before it’s booked full. Waiting till the very last-minute isn’t always a problem, but you wouldn’t want to take chances.
- Find a good auto transporter: Not all car shipping companies are equal. Always ask if a company has insurance before allowing them to transport your car. Also stay away from companies that charge for car shipping quotes. Whenever possible, read some reviews about a business before working with them.
- Prepare the car for shipping: Before shipping, it’s good to record all damage currently on the car. If possible, you could even take some photos of dents and scratches. Remember to check both the inside and exterior of the car when recording current damage. This will help for if the car is returned to you with new damage. In the unlikely event of your car being damaged, an auto transport company with insurance should be able to pay out the cost of having it fixed. Other than that, you should also remove all of your personal belongings from the car, seeing as those won’t be covered by the auto transporter’s insurance.
When it comes to finding a reliable auto transporter, you may sometimes be able to take advantage of seasonal discounts. However, stay away from companies that quote you significantly lower than the rest.
As a general rule, car shipping companies will offer discounts during quieter seasons when business isn’t booming. But stay away from a company if they try to pressure you into making an immediate decision to get a discount. In such a case, the company might even say they’re only offering this discount specially to you.
If a company is offering a temporary discount to attract more customers, they should be able to give you exact dates for how long you can take advantage of the lower price. And in the same way a supermarket wouldn’t offer you a special price on something without giving the same discount to all their other customers, an auto shipper shouldn’t try to reel you in with discounts they aren’t officially offering to all their customers.
Kids leaving for college is a big step. Both you and your child will need time to adjust to the change. This is one of the biggest changes you’ll have to go through in life, so it’s understandable if you want everything to go down as smoothly as possible.
While auto shipping won’t help you deal with the emotional loss of being an empty nester, it can put you at ease regarding your child’s safety. Because even though your child will be transitioning into adulthood, you know very well that they aren’t quite there yet, and it’s normal to still feel responsible for keeping them safe. As time goes by your child will gain more and more independence until they’ll no longer need the extra support, but this is a process, and it won’t happen overnight. Trust us here at Suncoast Auto Transport to get the vehicle to your college student, on time.