hello

My friend is going to move back to europe in two moths. He asked me for an advice but I couldn't help him. Do you anybody have any idea what the best way to send all the belongings back is. He has been here for one year only so he doesn't have to many things ( no furniture ) just personal stuf, some clothing, computer and stereo altogether around 200 - 250kg. Also if you have any idea how much this can cost. Thank you.

Better to use a shipping company (to prepare all the paper work with both customs) and try to bring as much as he can with him in the plane.

Shipping by boat will take about 30-40 days (where in Europe?) and we just relocate an expat with 100 Kg / 1 cubic meter (shipping companies work more on cubic meters than kg) and was very expensive, just for the documents about 300 Euros + shipping, if I'm not wrong 250 Kg (let's say 2 cubic meters) all in all should cost your friend not less than 600 Euros, may be more.

Most of expats take their belongings in different flights (also with the help of some friends who keep the balance @ their homes for quite a while or delivery some of the goods when they come back to home country 4 vacation as well) and try to sell the most locally.

Further expenses are related to the delivery from European port to door and to anti-terrorist law enforced recently by some european countries which apply an additional tax to every shipment to cover the costs of a deep inspection by the custom police (in U.S.A. is about 1,000$ extra each 20 feets container and is killing the export of some european conpamies).

desktop and HiFi = it's more expensive and dangerous to ship rather than buy new ones in Europe.

My HiFi (relocation paid by company) got broken during inspection!!

Another solution (for small items and small packages) is to try to use the post service and hope not to clear custom in Europe (in this case may be VAT is applied on the declared value, declared value reasonable but mainly UP 2 U)