1) Ask local retailers. Retailers get hundreds of orders shipped in every day and have to recycle a lot of boxes. Because they have to get rid of them anyway, they are often times more than happy to give them away. Try and ask the manager for extra boxes in the late morning when they aren’t too busy, but after shipments have arrived.
2) Buy them on Ebay Ebay usually has cheap offers for moving boxes in bulk. You can usually find boxes for as little as 25 to 50 cents and can be delivered in a few days.
3) Craigslist Free Stuff If you are familiar with Craigslist, the free stuff section will sometimes have moving boxes. Simply do a search for moving boxes, boxes, or cardboard boxes once you have navigated to the free section of Craigslist in your local area. San Jose residents can use this link, http://sfbay.craigslist.org/search/sby/zip
4) Check in with your friends and family, especially people who have moved recently. Using Facebook or another social network could be the fastest way to check in with everyone to see if they have boxes lying around.
5) Finally, reduce the amount of boxes you need by getting rid of your old things before you move. Moving time is a great time to throw out old junk and other rubbish. It might be years before you take another close look through all of your things. Going through the trouble of taking all this with you just to get rid of it later might be a hassle. Consider using a junk hauler once you have an idea of the items you will get rid of.