If you are like most people, your most valuable personal assets would be your home (if you own it) and your car or cars. Given the amount of money you likely spent on these assets, it makes sense that you would want to do whatever is necessary to protect them. That could be a problem if you have an expensive luxury or antique car that you need to relocate from one place to another place.
Hiring a Reliable Auto Transport Company
If your car relocation need is to exceed a couple of hundred miles, there is a good chance you don’t want to drive that distance yourself. After all, you’ll be busy focusing on relocating all your belongings, including furniture and valuable assets.
Short of making the long drive yourself, your best option for relocating your car or cars would be hiring a professional and reliable auto transport company. Certainly, that’s not something you will have a lot of experience doing. With that in mind, here are a few factors you should consider when trying to find the right car transport company:
- The transport company’s experience and reputation (read reviews and ask for recent references)
- The cost of shipping by mile
- The time of year because the summer season is more expensive
- The availability of the shipping company to ship to your destination
- Pickup option – door-to-door or terminal-to-terminal
- Type of shipping – open or enclosed trailer
The last factor on this list warrants careful consideration because it goes directly to how your car or cars would be protected during the shipping process. With that in mind, you should consider the following information.
Defining Open Trailer and Closed Trailer Car Shipping
Before you can reasonably assess which shipping option would best suit your needs, it would benefit you to understand how these two options differ.
Open trailer shipping entails putting a car on a semi-truck with an open trailer attached. In most cases, six to eight cars will be on the trailer when fully loaded. Each car is secured but exposed to the open air.
The enclosed trailer shipping option entails putting a car on a semi-truck with an enclosed trailer attached. At most, there would only be two to three cars secured inside the enclosed trailer.
It’s important to note that enclosed car transport can be significantly more expensive than the open transport option. That’s why enclosed trailers are often used to transport luxury and antique vehicles.
The Benefits of Going With the Enclosed Car Transport Option
If you own an expensive luxury car or antique vehicle, it makes sense that you would want to go the extra mile to protect your investment. That being the case, enclosed shipping would almost always be the right choice.
Since you would be expected to pay higher shipping costs, you would have the right to expect extra benefits from going with the enclosed car transport option. That’s fair, and indeed, there are several benefits you could expect to get. Here is a look at some of the key benefits associated with enclosed car shipping:
- Protection from the weather elements and debris during the entire shipping process
- More room for storage – fewer secured vehicles spaced further apart prevent damage
- More security when the driver has to stop for breaks or the night
- Transport companies tend to use their best drivers when transporting expensive vehicles
- More likely, the car will arrive at its final destination in the same condition it was loaded
- Greater care taken when loading and unloading the vehicle
After reviewing this list, it should be clear why shipping in an enclosed trailer is more expensive than the open trailer option.
Conclusion
When it’s time to relocate your car or cars, there is a good chance you will have a lot going on regarding the relocation process. If you want to eliminate concerns about safely shipping your car or cars, there is one clear decision you should make. You need to go with the enclosed car transport option. You would know that your car is safe during the shipping process and likely to arrive at the final destination in exactly the condition you expect.
