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Junk removal price list: loads, disposal and what to charge
Most haulers price by how much of the truck a job fills. Current price cards run $280–$314 for a quarter load, $412–$430 for a half and $649–$650 for a full truck, with minimums from $144 (Orange Crew in Chicagoland and Clear Waste Solutions in South Florida, checked October 2026). Both charge extra for special items; Orange Crew adds $50 per mattress.
Calculate a price
Starting point: $700.00 per load. Full load, 13–17 cubic yards (US guide): $600.00–$800.00 per load. Our midpoint of that range, rounded to cents. Removal by load volume; difficult access and special items can add labor. Angi: junk removal prices by load volume, checked 2026-10-15.
Extras, travel and minimum
Use 0.25 for a quarter load and 0.5 for half. Enter your full-truck rate and state the truck's capacity in the quote. Account for heavy items separately.
Enter truck-load fraction.
Junk removal price list: published rates
| Job or unit | Published price | What the price covers | Source and date |
|---|---|---|---|
| Minimum pickup, South Florida | $144 per visit | The smallest job they book; bigger piles move up to the load prices. | Clear Waste Solutions: South Florida load prices · Checked |
| Quarter load, 80–120 cu ft (US guide) | $100–$150 per load | Household junk. Published May 2024, the oldest figures in this table. | HomeGuide: junk removal prices · Published · Checked |
| Quarter load, 3–4.5 cubic yards (US guide) | $125–$200 per load | About the same size as an 80–120 cu ft quarter load; hard access and special items add labor. | Angi: junk removal prices by load volume · Published · Checked |
| Quarter truck, South Florida | $314 per quarter truck | A quarter of this company’s truck; special items cost extra. | Clear Waste Solutions: South Florida load prices · Checked |
| Quarter truck, Chicagoland | $280 per quarter truck | Labor, hauling, recycling and standard disposal; mattresses add $50 each. | Orange Crew: Chicagoland truck-load prices · Checked |
| Half load, 180–240 cu ft (US guide) | $200–$300 per load | Household junk, from the same May 2024 table. | HomeGuide: junk removal prices · Published · Checked |
| Half load, 4.5–11 cubic yards (US guide) | $200–$400 per load | A wider size band than the 180–240 cu ft half load; hard access and special items add labor. | Angi: junk removal prices by load volume · Published · Checked |
| Half truck, South Florida | $412 per half truck | Half of this company’s truck; special items cost extra. | Clear Waste Solutions: South Florida load prices · Checked |
| Half truck, Chicagoland | $430 per half truck | Labor, hauling, recycling and standard disposal; mattresses add $50 each. | Orange Crew: Chicagoland truck-load prices · Checked |
| Full load, 420–480 cu ft (US guide) | $400–$450 per load | Household junk, from the same May 2024 table. | HomeGuide: junk removal prices · Published · Checked |
| Full load, 13–17 cubic yards (US guide) | $600–$800 per load | Removal by load volume; difficult access and special items can add labor. | Angi: junk removal prices by load volume · Published · Checked |
| Full truck, South Florida | $649 per full truck | This company’s full truck; special items cost extra. | Clear Waste Solutions: South Florida load prices · Checked |
| Full truck, Chicagoland | $650 per full truck | Labor, hauling, recycling and standard disposal; mattresses add $50 each. | Orange Crew: Chicagoland truck-load prices · Checked |
How do national price guides compare with local truck cards?
Mostly lower. HomeGuide’s May 2024 table lists $100–$150 for a quarter load, $200–$300 for a half and $400–$450 for a full load. Angi’s September 2026 table gives $125–$200, $200–$400 and $600–$800. Both current local cards sit above HomeGuide’s bands at every size, so treat the 2024 figures as a floor and price from your own costs.
The sizes line up better than the prices. A cubic yard is 27 cubic feet, so Angi’s quarter load of 3–4.5 cubic yards is about the same 80–120 cubic feet HomeGuide uses. Each hauler’s “half truck” is its own, though: half a pickup with a trailer holds far less than half a box truck, so ask what is behind a competitor’s price before you match it.
Set a minimum, too: Clear Waste’s is $144. A single recliner still means a drive, loading, a dump stop and an invoice, and the minimum is how that trip gets paid.
How do you tell how much of the truck a pile will fill?
Know your own truck in cubic yards: multiply the bed’s length, width and height in feet, then divide by 27. Mark the quarter, half and three-quarter lines inside the box so the crew and the customer see the same thing. Size the pile from photos that show all of it, and allow for how it loads: a sofa takes more room than its size suggests, while bagged trash packs tight.
Pick cubic feet or cubic yards and use the same unit on every quote. Bulky single items such as a sofa, a piano or a hot tub are often easier to price per item than by volume. Walk the agreed items with the customer before loading; if the pile has grown since the photos, give the new total while everything is still on the ground.
What belongs in the load price?
Put loading, the drive to the dump, unloading and your standard disposal fee into the household-junk price. List anything outside it on the quote before booking: mattresses, refrigerators and other appliances with refrigerant, heavy debris, taking things apart, or a long carry. Customers compare totals, so extras belong on the quote, not at the curb.
Check what your transfer station or landfill charges and what it accepts. Most dump fees follow weight, so a half load of shingles, wet carpet or soil costs far more to tip than a half load of furniture, and it can reach your truck’s payload before the box is full. Price dense material as its own category.
When should you charge extra for stairs and long carries?
Price the route from the items to the truck. Basement stairs, a third-floor walk-up, a long hallway or a far loading dock can turn a quick garage pickup into a much longer stop. Ask for photos of the way out, check whether an elevator has to be booked, and write the expected carry into the scope.
When the customer stages everything in the driveway, quote it as a curbside pickup and take off the carrying time you save. The drive and the dump fee don’t change, so leave them in.
How do you keep the dump fee from eating the profit?
Build the job cost from crew time, the truck, the dump fee, special handling and overhead, counting the trip to the dump as well as the time in the driveway. Then divide by one minus your target margin. If a half load costs you $294, a 30% margin means charging $420 ($294 ÷ 0.70), right inside the $412–$430 half-truck cards above.
For crew pay, BLS puts the national mean wage for refuse and recyclable material collectors at $24.62 an hour (May 2024). Add payroll taxes and workers’ comp on top of that, and pay yourself for the hours the truck spends driving to the dump and back.
After each job, keep the scale ticket with the time record. If dense loads keep costing more than you allowed, raise that category, not every household pickup. Price the haul as if nothing sells. Any resale money is extra.
Worked prices
Each example multiplies the loads, fees or crew hours and adds them up. The rate’s source is under each total.
A garage half load at the 2024 guide rate. One half load (up to 240 cu ft) from a level garage at $275, inside HomeGuide’s May 2024 $200–$300 band. That is now the low end: the current half-truck cards above are $412–$430.
Household-junk pickup, loading and standard disposal: 1 load up to 240 cu ft × $275 = $275.
Example total: $275. Rate source: HomeGuide: junk removal prices, checked 2026-10-15.
A cleanout that fills two full trucks. Two full trucks at Orange Crew’s $650 rate, with its standard labor, hauling and disposal included. Customers often ask for a deal on the second load; any discount has to come from labor, because the second trip to the dump costs as much as the first.
Full-truck household-junk removal: 2 provider full-loads × $650 = $1,300.
Example total: $1,300. Rate source: Orange Crew: Chicagoland truck-load prices, checked 2026-10-15.
A half truck with a mattress. Orange Crew’s $430 half truck plus its $50 mattress fee. Standard loading, hauling and disposal are already in the load price.
Half truck of household junk: 1 provider half-load × $430 = $430.
Mattress fee: 1 mattress × $50 = $50.
Example total: $480. Rate source: Orange Crew: Chicagoland truck-load prices, checked 2026-10-15.
What a half load costs you before truck, overhead and margin. Two people for 2.5 hours at the BLS May 2024 median wage for refuse and recyclable material collectors, plus 1,200 lbs (our assumption for a mixed half load) at Seattle’s $174-a-ton transfer station rate. Truck, fuel, payroll costs and margin go on top.
Crew time, two people for 2.5 hours: 5 crew-hours × $23.24 = $116.20.
Transfer station fee, 0.6 ton: 0.6 ton × $174 = $104.40.
Example total: $220.60. Rate source: Seattle Public Utilities: transfer station rates, checked 2026-10-15.
Frequently asked questions
Should I charge for empty boxes by the load?
Agree whether the customer will flatten them before you arrive. Loose boxes fill a truck while weighing almost nothing; breaking them down takes crew time but can save a trip to the dump. Quote whichever you agree on, so a photo of unflattened boxes doesn’t turn into an argument at the truck.
What if the customer adds more junk on arrival?
Walk the new items with them and give the new total before loading. They can keep the original price by leaving the extras behind. Tag what is staying so nobody loads something the customer meant to keep.
Can I quote lower because some items look resellable?
Quote the removal on its own. If you want to buy or resell a piece, agree a credit for that named item and show it as a separate line.
How do I quote an apartment cleanout?
Note the floor, elevator access, loading-dock rules, parking and the walk from the door to the truck. Ask who can approve the removal and let you in. A photo quote shows the volume but not the hallway and the elevator wait, which is often where an apartment job’s time goes.
Can construction debris use the same price list as furniture?
No. Price dense debris separately: check the material, its likely weight and where it can be dumped before choosing the truck and the price. A truck that is only partly full can already be at its weight limit.
Should a recurring property-manager pickup cost less?
Only by what you actually save. A known address and a staged pile cut quoting and access time, so price from those savings. Keep special items and oversized loads outside the routine pickup so the contract stays workable.
Sources
- HomeGuide: junk removal prices · Published · Checked
- Clear Waste Solutions: South Florida load prices · Checked
- Orange Crew: Chicagoland truck-load prices · Checked
- Angi: junk removal prices by load volume · Published · Checked
- BLS OEWS: May 2024 employee wages · Published · Checked
- Seattle Public Utilities: transfer station rates · Published · Checked