Moving long distance can be expensive...depends on a whole lot of factors. If you pack or if they pack, how much of what you have has weight to it.
Your are often better off if you can fill an entire truck rather than be part of a load. A full truck usually means the truck travels from point A to point B. A partial load means that the truck will travel around to different areas till it's full. Your delviery time is then based on where in the truck that load is. The chance of damages and items getting lost or stolen or broke increases with the amount of time on a truck.
What worse is if your stuff has to go into storage. That's another level of movement from the truck to the warehouse then back to the truck and hopefully your home. This where most damage happens.
ALWAYS apply the rule that if something bad is going to happen to delay your load it will. That way you can plan for the unexpected.
Stuff happens, trucks break down,weather conditions can turn bad, trucks can be impounded for parking in the wrong place and suddenly your without your stuff for longer than planned.
Moving a car or truck is not usually something the moving company handles, there are exceptions. Usually you have to go thru a transport company and that is not cheap either. If you go the transport company route I STRONGLY suggest you do a high quality video of the inside and outside of the car just before it leaves your possession.
I've done 5 long distant moves in my life time using a variety of different moving companies. MUCH depends on how the driver and the packers work together. The driver is the one in many cases that decideds how the load will be packed into the truck. If the driver and packers aren't communicating well then stuff is going to get damaged...egos surface sometimes and it's the homeowner's stuff that gets the damage.
Under no circumstances leave the packers or movers to do their job without someone there watching them.
Do not expect the boxes they pack to have what is labled on them. USUSALLY the last item in the box is what the box gets labled. So if they are packing the kitchen and have room in the box for something from the bathroom the box is going to get labled bathroom despite the fact that 99% of the items in there are from the kitchen.
Do not allow them to take furniture apart and then tape the hardware to the underside of the pieces. Instead lable the bag of parts for what they belong to and put them into your last packed box, first unpacked box. Do that with all your hardware they remove. It reduces the chance of it getting lost and you having to scramble to find a replacement.

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You can get a lot of good info from movingscam.com. Check out the forums there. We just had 2 cars shipped from MI to CA by DAS with no bad things happening. It's slow though--if we didn't have a ton of pets and a toddler we would have driven at least one car!

Here is a link that might be useful: http://www.movingscam.com/

When I moved from Alabama to Wisconsin in 1997, it cost about $2,000 to move the contents of a one-bedroom apartment (included a baby grand piano, though).

I plan to pack myself, Ive already started, I will check out the car transport company, we to have 3 young children and a huge german shepherd. I just hate this part, before we put our home on the market I rented a 20ft garbage container and went through everyroom and tossed everything I wasnt going to bring with me and at the same time decluttered the house and closets, I think its time for a major furniture sale....

We just moved from Columbus OH to Northern Virginia. We had a 5000 square foot home plus a grand piano. We did use packers which cost $1000. The cost to load the truck, transport, and unload was $11K. We've used United twice for interstate moves. The first time was great. They could not have been better. The second time? Not so much. Our movers were very disorganized and we both lost items and incurred more damage than I've experienced with any move. The claims process was miserable. Make sure you take plenty of close-up pictures.

I can't believe you're packing yourself...more power to you.

I'm an organizing freak!!!! I need to know what is each box and label all the sides of what room that box is supposed to go in at the new house, we have moved a couple of times and I hate when i find a box that is in the attic and its supposed to be in the basement and its a heavy one! Hahahaha! I always have big zip lock bags with box cutters, tools etc. because once i reach my destination, I hate trying to think ok I could put this thing back together if i had a screw driver!!! and i always take nuts and bolts away from the moving men and have a box of little sandwhich bags and label what bed they belong to and carry that with me too, i dont think ill pass security at the airport this time, Ill have to pack all that in my laugage.....

You might check out ABF. We moved from CA to UT and used them with very good success. Especially since you're packing yourself. We also liked to know what was in each box and wanted to know that the truck was packed well. It was much cheaper and we had no problems of broken stuff- because WE packed it. You only pay for what space you use, but that also means you might have other stuff on your truck. We used a full container so it wasn't a problem with other stuff on it. They drop a container off and you pack it. They pick it up and drive it to your destination and then you unpack it. For your car, you'll probably have to find another option. Anyway, we loved it since we didn't have to drive it (like U-Haul) and we could pack it, thus saving a lot of money.

We thought about using ABF U-Pack when we moved recently from SoCal to Oregon but we could work out the schedule - it was around Thanksgiving and we couldn't wait for them to take off the holiday. So we ended up using U-Haul. I really liked the ABF idea though.

And some people like PODS, especially if you're going to be packing yourself.

One thing you have going for you with that particular destination and origin is one very direct rail line. Check out Amtrak auto train for the car. Last time I checked for a different route a rail car cost 1600 for cargo but it was pretty complicated and involved transporting everything by truck to the railroad then again at the destination. I do my moves myself but last time got pretty much a truckload shipped for $800 and that was directly to my door with liftgate. I'm also a big fan of Uhaul if you're in the mood for an adventure and have some flexibility you can save a ton of money that way but you have to be patient and flexible.

I can't give you an estimate for the cost of the move but I can tell you it is possible to move a vehicle in the moving van. We have moved 3 times in the last 11 years, once across country and twice on the west coast, and each time a vehicle went in the van. The first time across country it was a station wagon and the last two times it was a full size pickup truck. These were corporate moves and our things were the only ones in the van. Certainly get the price comparisons for shipping it with an auto transport company but I know that can take a long time to get delivery of your vehicle.

Packing yourself is a good idea. I did it for the first move and nothing got broken unlike the second two moves.

I am NOT a UHaul fan. Penske yes but UHaul no. We helped our daughter move and even though we had made a reservation far in advance there was no truck available. Thank goodness Penske came through at the last minute. Google UHaul problems and you will find we weren't alone having problems.

You mentioned you have a dog to move too. Consider hiring a professional company such as Canine Compaions to transport your dog via the airlines.
To move a dog you have to have a health permit which is only good for 14 days and the dogs shots must be up to date.
Airlines will only allow animals to be shipped in a very narrow window of temps. Too hot or too cold and the animal is grounded. If you run into a period where the temps stay high you may have to have the health certificate reissued. With all you have going on it's easier to hire a company to take care of it.

Not to start an argument but I rented a penske truck once and it was awful. The speedometer didn't work so I never knew how fast I was going and it's not like shifting gears in a ferrari, nearly ripped my arms off trying to drive that. Their trucks are not always better. The last uhaul truck I rented was brand new and had never been rented before. They do have availability issues some times though and your appointment really isn't worth the paper it's printed on if they don't have what you need. It's best to go through the corporate stores instead of the franchises which don't have an accurate or sizable inventory. Thats why I said flexibility and patience is the key. They will send out roadside assistance if you need it and they will negotiate on price big time unlike the other providers, budget and penske.

We moved this last time with U-Haul and the first truck was so bad it was funny! Chuckling even now ... we went with a small company that rented the trucks out of a Travelodge motel because it was closer than the U-Haul center. The truck was older but looked ok. When my husband went to unlock the driver's door, the lock came out! And fell onto the ground. The whole lock assembly. There was just a hole left in the door. He picked up the lock and went back to the office and the man there promptly did a credit for our charge card. And then we went to a big U-Haul center where they had a lot of trucks. We got a fairly new one and it was nice. They've redesigned the inside so it's now completely flat, no wheel wells to pack around.

We moved cross country in August and I did the move in 2 parts using Uhaul 27 foot trucks. Both trucks were near brand spanking new, clean and spotless. I had been warned not to use them but I had read that over the last year or so they have done a remarkable change over replacing their whole fleet. I bought my boxes and rented blankets etc all at the UHaul store. I certainly couldn't complain. If anything check out their website because their rates go up and down depending on the availability of trucks in a particular city or region and they can change quite dramatically from a few hundred dollars on a one way move to a few thousand for the same trip when trucks are scarce and demand is high. For example when I first checked their website in May, had I reserved that day the price per one way trip was $500 for the truck.. by the time I reserved in early July that same truck for the same date was $2500.
Then you have to add in gasoline and motels etc. which is substantial.. still in all I think I saved half of the cost of Mayflower who were lowballing me. How do I know that.. they quoted my furniture etc as weighing 11,000 lbs.. well I took 7,000 pounds to the dump etc and still had more than half it to go when we moved.

OK, here's the secret to getting a killer deal on Uhaul.

first, forget about online reservations.
call up the reservation center 1-800-go-uhaul number and give them your name, phone number (your real phone number) and when you need to rent the truck and get a quote but tell them to call and follow up with you. Someone always does anyway but just ask.
The person that calls is a closer. They will do whatever it takes to close the deal. When they call, tell them you haven't made a reservation yet but just got a quote that was half the price of theirs from Penske or Budget (Don't say Ryder because they don't rent to the public anymore and don't say Budget if you need trailers since budget doesn't rent them. You can say Enterprise if you're only calling about a small cargo van- they only rent the box trucks to businesses or for local use only)
Without any haggling or further negotiations, the guy will say "hmm let me see here... OK we can do it." Don't hesitate another minute and give the man your credit card number!

I've had my share of u-haul frustrations but the fact remains you cannot beat their prices and they do keep their fleets in service until they're ready for the crusher that's why their prices are low. I think they hire ex-cons straight out of the big house also but hey, it's a bargain. They're not all bad. The center here installed a new hitch on my truck for $5 the morning of my move. The service usually is pretty good but patience.... patience is the key.

Another tip, The size guide will say that a specific truck or trailer will hold X number of bedrooms, multiply that by 3 and and that's how many trucks and trailers you need.

Their decks heights are only two feet also which is nice. So is Momma's attic.

One very STRONG WARNING about Budget... If you've had any traffic citations in the last 3 years, have them run your license before you make your reservation. They told me once that if you have had 3 more more tickets in the last 3 years they won't rent to you but the morning of a trip, I went to rent a car, walked all the way to the place, then they said sorry we can't rent to you even though I didn't have that many tickets. Better yet, don't rent from them, they're a bunch of bstrds.

Got an staimate today that I think we are going to go with. 13,000.00
truck cab to myself, they are packing and unpacking with their boxes, they are driving my car to NY (gas and tolls included), 80,000 worht of insurance, 5 guys are packing the house and loading the truck, 3 guys are driving to NY and unpacking. My house is a little over 5000 sq ft and I am moving into a 1900 sq ft house. anyone live in miami and need furniture???? Thanks for your help everyone, and because Im so crazy about knowing what in each box or what room it belongs in....I think I will make labels and place them in each room and slap them on the boxes... any other good ideas to keep organized???

We went the UHaul route. They mapped everything out for us. The truck was enormous and all of our stuff (3000 sq.ft. home)fit in it. I think it was a brand new truck. All we had to do was drive the truck the 200 miles to our new home.

UHaul arranged for guys to load us at the old location and another crew to unload us into our new place. We then returned the UHaul locally. Could not have been happier. Don't remember the cost but it was a fraction of having a moving company. The two crews that did the heavy lifting were from local moving companies and were insured.