Hi all.

I'm packing my life (minus my furniture) up into my 09 fit (sport, if that matters) to move across the US. I'll have two passengers with me (one human, one dog). I've been looking into getting a cargo trailer or even roof storage just so i have to part with less of my stuff, but cost is an issue. I don't think I'd be willing to pay over $300-$400 to move more of my stuff, since it's not super valuable.

I figured I'd ask if anyone has recommendations for low-cost ways to transport more stuff in the Fit that'll be safe and secure for the 40-ish hour freeway journey.

Thanks!

 

You have a couple obvious options, depending on the amount of stuff you have, the volume of your stuff, and the weight of your stuff.

In descending order of "stuff," your options are:

1). Rent a U-haul (several sizes available) and tow your Fit behind with a dolly that you can also rent from U-haul. This saves wear-and-tear from potentially overloading the Fit and allows you to take as much of your stuff as you want, but you're not going very far for $400.
2). Install a hitch ($100-$150; more if you get fancy) and pull a small trailer ($400-$500 at Harbor Freight; you just missed a 25% off coupon on the 4th of July) with your Fit. There are many posts here, including one from just a few days ago, where folks do long-distance moves pulling a small trailer with a Fit. Some of the posts recommend installing a transmission cooler.
3). Install a hitch and mount a cargo tray on the back of your Fit. Gives you a bit more cargo capacity, but really only useful for low-weight items because of leverage.
4). Add a cargo box on top of your Fit. Minor increase in (volume) capacity but limited safe increase in weight. I would personally choose any of the preceding options before I would ever put weight on top of a Fit, which changes both the center of gravity and the cross-section profile (i.e., how big of a "sail" your Fit becomes with a strong cross-wind). I have read some recent posts suggesting that mounting a cargo box on a Fit is likely to damage to roof, which is another obvious downside.

Note that the official payload capacity of a Fit is around 850 lbs, including passengers, fuel, and stuff. I would personally be comfortable pulling around 1000 lbs on a trailer (including the weight of the trailer) with about 100-150 lbs of tongue weight, which I would subtract from the weight I was putting in the car. So, let's call it 250 lbs for the trailer, 750 lbs on the trailer, and 700 lbs in the Fit including passengers and fuel (approximately 6 lbs/gallon, or around 70 lbs for a full tank).