International Moving Companies to Mexico
This article describes how to move your precious household goods internationally from the US or Canada to Mexico and what to look for when choosing a moving company.
Written by the Founder and CEO of Best Mexico Movers, Chuck Bolotin.
Lots of people don’t think to do the research of moving their household goods to Mexico until they are already living in Mexico, and their household goods are still in the US or Canada. One of the reasons I know this is that, in addition to hearing this all the time from people calling us and asking us how to move their household goods to Mexico, this is exactly what we did.
We figured “How hard could an international move from the US to Mexico be?” We had been in Mexico for almost a year and had learned a little bit about how things are done here, so we figured that moving my wife’s precious household goods couldn’t be that difficult, different, or costly.
We were wrong. We were very wrong.
So, whether you already live in Mexico and want to be reunited with your household goods or if you are planning well in advance, this article will give you the background you need.
Mexico has It’s Own Rules that You Need to Follow.
It’s easy to forget, but Mexico is a different, sovereign country than the US or Canada, so moving your precious possessions to this sovereign country is not as easy as moving from one place in the US to another place in the US or one place in Canada to another place in Canada.
There’s an international border between the US and Mexico, and in order to cross that border, you need to comply with the rules and regulations of the country into which you are moving internationally, in this case, Mexico. You are literally “importing” your used household goods to Mexico.
“OK”, you may say “I get that. However, in Mexico rules are, shall we say, elastic, so I’m sure that whoever moves my household goods to Mexico will know how to work something out at the border.”
If you thought this (like we did), you would be wrong again.
While Mexican Customs can be fairly easygoing if you drive your own car into Mexico with your own household goods or even if you fly into Mexico with some of your belongings, it is a completely different story if you have more than will fit into your private vehicle or the additional suitcases you paid extra to fly in.
How Being a “Mover for Hire” Matters
If you have more household goods to move than will fit into your own vehicle, then the person who is moving for you (even if it is just your gardener, the gardener’s cousin, or a guy who was referred to you on Facebook) is a “mover for hire”, whether he or she wants to be or not or whether he or she told you that he or she was or was not. And as a “mover for hire,” whomever is moving your used household goods to Mexico must comply with all the rules and regulations in each company in which the mover for hire operates. In the US, this means a huge amount of compliance with the Department of Transportation nationally and in each state, insurance, etc.
In Mexico, it is close to the same. And at the border, it also means that Mexican Customs officials will treat your shipment being transported by the mover for hire very, very, very differently than if you drive your SUV over with some of your items.
Your international mover for hire moving your household goods to Mexico from either the US or Canada will need to go to a completely different area than if you or I get in our little pickup and drive across. In that different area are the trucks of other movers for hire and all the other trucks with all the other commercial shipments intended for import Mexico. When you move your household goods into Mexico, you are importing your household goods. This area is secure and is only allowed to be accessed by certain people. More recently, the Mexican military is there as well.
Unlike what happens when you or your friend try to talk your way across the border with your own items, these people at the commercial area are very serious about compliance with Mexican customs regulations. Your mover for hire must fully comply, or bad things can happen.
What Could go Wrong?
What kind of bad things? The penalties can range all the way from a fine, to confiscation, not only of the offending item, but of your entire shipment. It can also result in people losing their licenses, vehicles, etc.
But what if your “mover guy” knows someone at the border he can talk to or if his nephew has crossed many times with no problems at all or he knows better how “things get done”? Perhaps it may work, and sometimes it does. And sometimes, it doesn’t.
As I write above, Mexican customs officials are very serious about making certain all the import regulations are followed, and not only are used household goods included in the need to follow those regulations, but because Mexico provides a carve out and if they qualify, used household goods are not subject to import taxes, there are even more strict regulations that need to be followed, not less.
In the case of moving household goods, the most relevant regulations are compliance with the menaje de casa. In order to use the menaje de casa, you will need a customs broker, and that customs broker will need to make submissions on your behalf to Mexican Customs in full compliance for the menaje de casa regulations for importing used household goods into Mexico.
The Importance of Insuring your Household Goods.
In addition to this, all legitimate international moving companies to Mexico offer or compel their clients to have insurance on their household goods. The risk is just too large for any legitimate mover not to mandate this. The only reason a company or person you were referred to on Facebook would not offer or make insurance mandatory on their client’s household goods is if they are not trustworthy enough for the insurance company to insure them or if they were able to offer insurance in the past and something very bad happened since then and as a result, no insurance company would underwrite them.
All legitimate international moving companies to Mexico used licensed customs brokers, comply with the regulations of the menaje de casa, and offer or make insurance mandatory. If they do not, then they are not a legitimate international moving company.
Types of Companies that Move Household Goods to Mexico.
If the international moving company to Mexico you’re considering complies with these requirements, then how do you choose which one is best?
There are basically two classes of legitimate international moving companies to Mexico:
- The traditional van lines with company names that have been around for decades and some, for just a few years short of a century. Think of Allied, United, Mayflower, etc. The model they follow is pretty much the same irrespective of which company in their network you choose and the model they each use is pretty much the same as it’s been using for those many decades plus. They use Origin Agents, transloading and consolidating (moving your household goods into and out of several warehouses in the US, Canada, if relevant, and Mexico), and Destination Agents. The Origin Agent and the Destination agent are almost never the same company; they’re just agents in the same network. And the processes of transportation, transloading and consolidating is managed by the network. These are the companies who will tell you that it will take from one to five weeks to move your household goods. (Here is how the process used by Best Mexico Movers is different than the traditional, legitimate movers.)
- All the others. Each of all the others will have their own flavor, some quite inventive and some quite effective, many times, at lower prices than the traditional van lines. Others, not so much. Whatever you do, however, make sure that if you do not use a traditional van line for your international move to Mexico, that whomever you use is in full compliance with the laws and regulations in each country in which they operate, and that they offer insurance. After that, just choose who has the best reputation and way of doing business that meets your specific needs.
