California Family Experience Best and Worst Society Has to Offer During Move to Texas

There are plenty of horror stories out there about residential movers, or some type of moving services ruining furniture, charging exorbitant ‘surprise’ fees, and just completely scamming people out of their possessions entirely. Moving nightmares like these are not limited to professional commercial movers though, as this recent story from Texas illustrates.

Count Peter and Isabel Romero among the 63% of American adults that have moved to a new community at least once in their lives. Everything was running relatively smoothly for their big move from San Diego, Cali to Mesquite, Texas where Peter just got a new job as a guidance counselor. Instead of enlisting professional San Diego moving services, the family of five children rented a truck and made the three-day road trip themselves.

More than one-in-five U.S.-born adults (23%) say the place they consider home in their heart isn’t where they’re living now. Among those who have lived in two or more communities, fully 38% say they aren’t living in their “heart home” now, and chances are the Romero family certainly didn’t feel at home when they first got to Texas. They stayed at a Hampton Inn in Mesquite the night before they were set to start moving into their new home, but when they woke up in the morning they found the movers truck they rented had been stolen, according to the Dallas-area news site WFAA.com.

“From one moment to another, everything got taken,” Peter said.

“Everything we earned and we had worked hard for, and it’s gone,” Isabel added.

In a perfect example of the best and worst sides of society, news quickly spread throughout the town of what had happened and soon complete strangers were helping them out with supplies and essentials to get them through sad circumstance. Even the previous owner of the house they bought, Cindy Price, heard about what happened and took action by bringing them things to help them out.

“I was heartbroken when I handed my keys over to them this morning, because they didn’t have anything,” Price said. “I had to do it.”

Further proving the point that good ultimately triumphs over evil, the Romero family got a call from police investigators later that very evening to tell them they had found the moving truck 12 miles south in Seagoville. Unfortunately, the truck was emptied of contents. However, a search of a nearby abandoned house was soon found to be the hiding place of the would-be thieves.

Once found, 15 local police men and firefighters took the role of makeshift movers and packed up the family’s belongings in under an hour (quite a feat considering it took the Romero’s two full days) and returned the possessions to their rightful owners in their new home.

The average American moves 12 times in their life, but most likely the Romero’s aren’t looking forward to another one anytime soon. It was certainly an emotional experience that highlighted both the bad and good sides of human nature.

“That’s not common, you know, to see people do that stuff. It’s awesome,” Peter said.