After two-and-a-half days on the road we're finally in Missouri, though not yet to our home. We're spending the night in Springfield at a very nice Best Western that actually has the internet access it promised in the ads! We drove all the way here from Tucumcari, NM, and we're pretty whipped. The bright side is that we'll be spending tomorrow night in our new house! Yay!
Oh, does anyone have a great idea for how to get a large quantity of cash in a city where we don't have a bank account? I've never used Western Union, but is that the kind of thing it does? I cleverly packed my checkbook onto the moving truck, but we might need to pay a month's worth of rent on the house we're buying so that we can move in early.
Missouri is a beautiful state. It's fun to watch the terrain change from the high deserts of the mountain states, to the greener plains of Texas, and then to the rolling, wooded hills of Oklahoma and Missouri. The trip has been rather nice, but I'm more than ready to be done with it and off the road for a few days. I start my new job on Friday!
no ATM card?
If you have a bank account with billpay, you can get the service to mail checks to whomever you may need to pay rent to or any other large expenses.
I need more than I can get from an ATM, and I might need it tomorrow, not in a few days.
If you still have an extant CA bank account, you should be able to have a Missouri bank confirm the balance by phone, and with you on conference call, do a wire transfer directly from that account to a new account at that Missouri location. Timing and fees depends on the banks.
Look into a credit card advance if the ATM limits aren't enough, it could end up being cheaper than Western Union if you repay the balance within a few days (though I don't really know the cost of either).
Where do I go to get a credit card advance? A bank?
If you have a PIN, you can go an ATM. Other than that, you should be able to walk into a bank. Remember that cash advances can incur a fee by your credit card company in addition to interest so you might want to call your issuer to find out what it would cost.
call your credit card company and get a PIN. Then you can get a cash advance out of an ATM. However, cash advances are general 2-3 times the normal interest rate, so I would use that as a last resort.
BTW, I think we stayed in that same BW in Springfield. Nice place, if it's the same one.
With any credit card you can go to a bank and request a cash advance against the card. It is simple and inexpensive. You will pay a charge to the credit card company but likely much less than a wire transfer or western union.
I learned this through similar experience.
Good luck in the new city!!!
Sorry I'm late to the discussion, but it you are a credit union member, many CUs now have reciprocal agreements with other CUs: http://www.cuswirl.com/locations/index.htm so you can do most banking activities at a member CU just like it was your home branch.
Michael,
My wife and I will be moving from Los Angeles County to Washington, DC at the end of the month. The road from here to St. Louis will make up the first few legs of the journey. Can you offer any advice about the drive, the route, places to stay/avoid, etc.?
heather: Yep, we found a credit union here that reciprocated with ours in Los Angeles.
adamj: We preferred to stay in the smaller towns because the hotels are closer to the freeway and easier to find. Tumumcari, NM, was nice. We stayed at Best Western hotels exclusively. Don't have many other tips than that at the moment :)
Adamj: MW and I prefer to stay in smaller towns along the way because they usually have hotels with better freeway access. Also, I-40 is under construction all along the way, so you may want to consider taking a different route.
We stayed in Kingman, AZ, Tucumcari, NM, and Springfield, MO along the way. We chose Best Western motels because they allow pets (we have a small dog) and usually have a pretty decent standard of quality across the country (I've stayed in many).
However, if you do stay in smaller towns, the quality of hotel decreases unless you pay a premium. For us, as long as the room was clean, quiet and close to restaurants and the freeway, we were good.
I would recommend Hampton Inns if you aren't traveling with pets, Best Westerns if you are or just want to pay the typical $60/night motel charge.
Avoid Gallup, NM as it is pretty crowded and run down. Actually, avoid all of NM if you can...we weren't very impressed by the overall quality of the state. The Best Western Discovery Inn in Tucumcari was ok, but I probably wouldn't stay there again.
If you decide to stay in Springfield, MO, I would recommend the Best Western Coach House Inn. It's right across the street from a Wal Mart and is all one level, so no thumping overhead.
Thanks, both of you!