BETWEEN graduating from college and moving in with his fiancée, Jim Mimlitsch moved nine times in 14 years. He hated moving, but accepted it as his fate and developed a habit of hoarding cardboard boxes.

For convenience, he kept a set of boxes on standby in the back of his closets.

But after Mr. Mimlitsch, 38, bought a condominium in Irvine, Calif., in 2002, he happily handed off his boxes to a friend.

“I just didn’t want to have them anymore,” he said. “It just felt more like home that way.”

Then last June, Mr. Mimlitsch became engaged and began to prepare for yet another move, to his fiancée’s apartment in Laguna Hills, Calif., and for the headache of acquiring more cardboard boxes.

When he told the real estate agent through whom he was renting out his condo how much he dreaded this aspect of the move, she suggested he contact Spencer Brown, the owner of a three-year-old company, Rentagreenbox.com.