Renovation debris removal in Minneapolis

The short answer

Volume pricing applies to larger jobs: quarter truck $241, half $431, three-quarters $587, full $732. Minimum $75 per visit.

Weight versus volume, which is the whole issue here

Most junk is bulky and light. Renovation debris is the opposite, and that is why some categories price separately.

Concrete, masonry, brick, tile and stone are dense. A quarter of a truck of concrete weighs more than a full truck of furniture, which is why it is priced at $219 per quarter truck on its own line rather than as a share of a general load.

The practical consequence: do not mix a pile of broken concrete into an otherwise ordinary load and expect it to price like an ordinary load. Tell us what the debris actually is when you book and you get an accurate number rather than a revision on the day.

Plaster and lath, the Minneapolis renovation reality

If you are gutting a wall in a pre-war house in this city — a bungalow in Nokomis or Standish, a four-square in Longfellow, a stucco duplex in Whittier — you are not taking down drywall. You are taking down plaster over wood lath, and it behaves completely differently.

Plaster is heavy. A single room's worth fills far more contractor bags than a comparable drywall demo, and each bag is denser. The lath underneath comes off as thousands of thin strips with nails in them, which is bulky, awkward and impossible to bag neatly.

Budget more than you think. A room of plaster and lath is commonly a quarter to a half truck on its own — $241 to $431 — before anything else from the job goes in.

One safety note we will state plainly without pretending to give you a regulatory briefing: older homes can contain lead paint and asbestos in certain materials. Have the property assessed before a major demolition. Materials that test positive are a licensed abatement job, not a junk removal job, and we cannot take them.

The other heavy things that come out of these houses

• Cast iron radiators. $123 each. Boiler-to-forced-air conversions are common in this housing stock and the radiators are the heaviest single items in the house. They are also almost entirely recyclable as scrap.
• Cast iron bathtubs. $185. A 1920s tub is a genuine four-person lift or it gets cut up in place. Fiberglass is $90 and much easier.
• Plaster keys and old chimney brick. Dense, and priced as masonry.
• Old flooring. Hardwood over subfloor over more hardwood is common in these houses — three layers is not unusual.
• Basement stone and block. If foundation work is involved, that is masonry at $219 per quarter truck.

Worked example for a bathroom gut in a Kingfield bungalow: cast iron bathtub $185 + toilet $64 + bathroom vanity $69 = $318.

Getting debris out of a Minneapolis lot

Access is the second practical constraint after weight.

City lots here are narrow and deep. The loading point is almost always the alley at the back, not the street at the front, which means debris travels the length of the lot. There is no charge for that carry — no long-carry fee — but it is worth knowing when you plan staging.

The best arrangement on a demo job is usually to bag or pile debris near the alley end as you generate it, rather than accumulating it in the room. Contractor bags are $41 each, ten bags $132, twenty bags $259, thirty bags $385.

If the job runs over days and generates continuously, a container is genuinely the better tool for the bulk of it — the tradeoff there is placement and permits, which on a narrow Minneapolis lot is its own problem.

The winter demolition window

Interior renovation is a winter activity in this city, for the obvious reason — it is the season when nobody can do anything outside. Kitchens, bathrooms and basements get gutted between January and March across the metro.

That works fine for removal. The price is the same year round with no winter surcharge, and the debris is coming from inside a heated house.

Two things that change:

• The path out. From the door to the alley, across a yard that is snow-covered and probably iced. Clear and salt it — that is the single most useful thing you can do on a winter debris job.
• Staging outside does not work. A pile of debris in the yard in January is a pile of frozen debris in March. Keep it bagged and inside, or in the garage, until the truck comes.

Exterior work — deck tear-offs, siding, concrete — waits for the thaw whether you want it to or not. Frozen ground does not cooperate.

What we cannot take from a job site

• Asbestos-containing materials. Licensed abatement, always. Common in older insulation, some flooring and pipe wrap in houses of this era. Get the property assessed before demolition.
• Lead paint debris where it has been assessed and requires controlled handling.
• Paint, solvents, adhesives and thinners. Household hazardous waste, to a Hennepin County drop-off. Renovation jobs generate a lot of these.
• Fuel and propane cylinders.
• Anything still attached. We remove debris, not plumbing, gas or electrical connections. Have those capped and disconnected by the relevant trade first.

Everything else from an ordinary renovation is fine: plaster, lath, drywall, timber, flooring, cabinetry, fixtures, tile, carpet and the general pile that builds up in the middle of the room.

Frequently asked questions