I just got my posting message — what do I do first?
The clock starts the moment that message lands. Three things happen right away, in order:
- Register your relocation file. Log into your relocation portal and activate your file promptly — your priority booking window depends on it. (Confirm the exact registration window for your move; it's typically within a few weeks of your instruction.)
- Book your planning session. Don't skip this. It's the conversation that tells you your actual funding picture — what's covered, what's flexible, and what's yours to spend.
- Secure your team. You need a REALTOR® and a real-estate lawyer who are already on the third-party supplier (TPSP) list before you book your House Hunting Trip flights.
Why the order matters: people who line up their agent and lawyer after booking the HHT lose days they can't get back. The HHT is a fixed window. Every hour spent finding an agent on the ground is an hour not spent house hunting.
What does the relocation program actually cover?
The Integrated Relocation Program (IRP) is built to make your move roughly cost-neutral, and the money is split into separate buckets. Understanding the buckets is the difference between a smooth move and leaving entitlements on the table:
- Core benefits — the essentials: your House Hunting Trip (travel, lodging and meals), real-estate commission on a sale, and legal fees on your purchase.
- Custom / flexible funds — a calculated pool you can direct where you need it: extending your HHT, bridge financing, and similar.
- Real Estate Incentive — if you keep your current home and rent it out rather than selling, you may qualify for an incentive based on the commission you didn't spend.
Benefit amounts and rules are set by the current-year CAFRD directive and change over time. Treat the buckets above as the framework, and confirm your specific numbers in your planning session. When we work together, I'll walk through exactly how each one applies to your file.
Can I choose my own REALTOR®, or is one assigned?
You choose. Always. No one assigns you an agent — but your agent does need to be registered as a third-party supplier and genuinely fluent in the IRP. That's not a small thing. A relocation file has requirements a standard sale doesn't:
- Clearing the calendar for your 5–7 day HHT window — treating it as the priority it is.
- Coordinating inspections and uploading documents to your relocation portal correctly.
- Providing the comparable sales the program requires to substantiate your purchase price.
- Knowing what a "substantiating document" is without you having to explain it.
The veteran difference: I'm not learning the military world from a brochure. Ten years infantry, fifteen as an intelligence officer, and my own family moved on posting messages. I know what a compressed timeline feels like from the inside.
BGRS is now SIRVA — does anything actually change for me?
You may have heard that BGRS (Brookfield Global Relocation Services) transitioned to SIRVA as of early 2026. For your move, the short answer is: the name on the door changed, your process didn't. Same portal as your source of truth, same House Hunting Trip, same benefit structure, same need for an IRP-experienced team. You'll still see both names referenced for a while — so don't be thrown if a document says one and a person says the other.
How does the House Hunting Trip work?
Your HHT is a sprint. The families who win it are the ones who do the work before they land. We pre-tour homes by video, build a ranked shortlist, and walk into day one already knowing the contenders. There's a full playbook for this.
Read the House Hunting Trip playbook →
The mistakes that quietly cost military families money
- Booking the HHT before securing a team. Covered above — the most common one.
- Treating flex dollars as an afterthought. That pool is yours to direct; plan it, don't discover it.
- Picking a neighbourhood by price alone. Commute to your base, school catchments, and resale all matter on a 2–4 year posting. See the neighbourhood-by-base guide.
- Using an agent who's "done a couple" of military moves. The portal, the timelines, and the paperwork are unforgiving. Experience shows.
Ready to get your file moving? Tell me your COS date and your base, and I'll tell you exactly what to line up first.
Book a no-pressure call →