Kristy Chin, Journalist

With school out, many families are relocating all around the nation and some into our valley. But as one North Carolina family found out, when they headed out west they ended up empty handed.

As News 3's Mitch Truswell shows us, this family thought they hired a moving company that would safely move all their belongings. Instead it turned into a gamble in which they lost everything.

With thousands of people moving in and out of our valley each month, it's easy for shady moving companies to rip people off.

Just ask Nicole Jackson.

"We had 3000 cubic feet of personal belongings, 2,600 square home worth of furniture, 8 to 10 years of personal pictures," Nicole said. Now it's all gone." For Nicole and her family, the move from North Carolina to Las Vegas came along with a good paying job and a new home.

Here's how the Jackson's lost everything: Their moving van driver didn't deliver their goods, he stored them at a local storage facility. The driver signed the storage contract stating that all the items were actually his then the driver put it in his name and never made a payment. And without payments to the storage company all the stuff was auctioned.

It's a common occurrence for unclaimed and unpaid storage. While the Jacksons made storage payments to the moving company, the moving company went out of out of business and disappeared.

That leaves the Jacksons, "...to start all over to try and have them prosecuted and hopefully that someone will hear about this and has my personal belongings and will give me back my pictures," Nicole explained.

Unfortunately, the Jackson's story is not unusual. That's why you are urged to call the Nevada Transportation Authority before you ever hire a mover. The number to the Nevada Transportation Authority is 486-3303.

The storage facility where the moving company had stored the Jackson's items did contact the person that purchased their belongings. Whether they will get any of it back has yet to be determined.