If you have started calling around for junk removal prices, you have probably noticed that most companies will not give you a straight number over the phone, and the ones that do give you a number so low you know it is not real. I want to just put ours on the page, explain why Massachusetts costs what it costs, and tell you honestly when you would be better off not hiring us at all.
The short answer
Junk removal here is priced by volume, meaning how much room your stuff takes up in the truck rather than how many pieces there are. There are only two numbers:
- The minimum is $120. That covers a small pickup, one or two items, a loveseat, a mattress, a few bags. For a very small job close to our Salem base we can sometimes come down to $80 to $100, so it is worth asking.
- Above that it is about $80 to $100 per cubic yard. If the load is light and we can walk straight to it, the rate drops toward $70 a yard. Heavy material, or a long or awkward carry, pushes it the other way. For scale, our truck holds 20 cubic yards, which is about 8 pickup truck beds.
Labor, hauling, dump fees, fuel and donation drop offs are all inside those numbers. The final price is set in person before we start, and once we give you that number it does not move.
I used to publish quarter, half and full load prices and I stopped, because they were not honest enough. Two jobs that both fill half a truck can be hundreds of dollars apart depending on what is in them and how far it has to be carried, so a single number for “half load” was always going to be wrong for somebody. The rate per yard is what we actually work from.
Why those numbers look high next to what you read online
This is the part almost nobody explains, and it is the thing I get asked about most.
If you search for junk removal prices you will find national guides putting a full truckload somewhere around $600 to $850, and a typical job at $150 to $350. Those numbers are real, they are just not Massachusetts numbers, and two things make the difference.
The first is what it costs to get rid of anything here. Disposal is priced per ton at the facility, and every truckload we bring in gets weighed. Depending on which facility we are at and what is in the load, we pay between $185 and $300 a ton. The national average sits closer to $50 to $85, so a full load of somebody’s basement can carry several hundred dollars of disposal cost before anybody has been paid for the work.
The second is that the state is running out of room. MassDEP’s own 2030 Solid Waste Master Plan is built around cutting disposal from 5.7 million tons a year down to 4 million, and the analysis behind it expects Massachusetts to effectively run out of landfill capacity around 2030. A lot of what gets thrown away here already leaves the state, and in 2023 the places taking the most of it were Ohio, New York, New Hampshire and Alabama. Trucking trash to Ohio is not cheap, and that cost lands in the tipping fee.
So when a national guide tells you $700 for a full truck and a Massachusetts company quotes you noticeably more, the company is not necessarily gouging you. Ask what their disposal cost per ton is. Anybody actually paying it will know the number.
What moves your price up or down
- Weight, not just volume. Concrete, tile, dirt, books and roofing take up very little room and weigh a tremendous amount. A small pile of concrete can be a full load in practice, so heavy material gets priced by weight instead.
- Access. A third floor walk up with a turn in the staircase is a different job from a garage ten feet from where the truck parks. It is the same junk and a very different amount of labor.
- Distance. We are based in Salem and most North Shore towns sit inside standard pricing. A job far outside that can push the minimum up.
- What is in the pile. Some items cost us more to get rid of than the rest of the load put together, which brings us to the next part.
The items that get priced separately, and the reason why
Massachusetts bans a list of materials from ordinary trash disposal, and two of the most common household items went on that list on November 1, 2022: mattresses and box springs, and textiles, meaning clothing, shoes, linens and curtains. They join things that were already banned, including TVs and computer monitors, whole tires, appliances containing refrigerant, yard waste and most construction debris.
Banned does not mean we cannot take it. It means it cannot go in with the regular load, so it goes to a specific recycler and carries its own fee. That is why mattresses, box springs, TVs, monitors, tires, paint, chemicals, motor oil, insulation and concrete are quoted separately rather than folded into the load price. We tell you that number before we start, not after.
One thing worth knowing, because it scares people unnecessarily: MassDEP has said plainly that it does not generally enforce these bans against individual households. Enforcement is aimed at haulers, municipalities and businesses moving large amounts. You are not going to be fined for a mattress. The reason it costs more is that the recycler charges us, not that you broke a law.
How to get a real number without waiting for a site visit
Text photos of the pile to 978-915-3399. A photo tells us most of what we need, and we can usually come back with a solid estimate quickly. Stand back far enough to get the whole pile in frame, and if it is in a basement or a third floor, say so, because access is the thing photos hide.
The in person number is the one that counts, and it gets confirmed before anybody touches anything. If there turns out to be less than the photos suggested, the price comes down. It does not go up.
Five ways to pay less
I would rather tell you these than have you overpay and feel bad about it afterwards.
- Check your town’s bulk pickup first, if you can carry the item out. With one couch and no deadline, your city will almost certainly beat us on price. In Salem it is $20 an item through Waste Management, and we wrote up exactly how that works. The catch is that it is curbside only, meaning they collect what is already at the curb and will not come inside for it, so if the item is upstairs or in a basement and you cannot safely move it, the fee does not buy you anything. Use it when it fits. Call us when it does not.
- Separate the heavy stuff. If you have concrete or tile mixed into a general pile, tell us up front. Priced as its own load it is often cheaper than dragging the whole job into a weight based rate.
- Get it to the curb or the garage if you can do it safely. Most of what you pay for is labor and access. Junk that is already outside is a smaller job. Do not hurt yourself doing this, and do not do it with anything heavy or awkward, but a pile of bags is a pile of bags.
- Sell or donate the good things first. Furniture and appliances in usable shape are worth something to somebody, and everything you move out that way is volume you are not paying to haul. Anything still usable that ends up on our truck gets donated anyway, mostly to Big Blue Bargains in Swampscott, More Than Words in Boston and The Salvation Army, but you may as well get the value yourself.
- Do it in one trip. Two trips cost more than one, every time, because the minimum and the drive get paid for twice. If you know the garage is next, do the garage now, and here is what a garage cleanout runs on its own, since the paint and the propane out there are priced apart from the load.
Things to be careful of when you are getting quotes
- A price with no site visit and no photos. Nobody can price a basement they have not seen. That number is going to change.
- “Starting at” pricing. Find out what the job actually costs before anyone is in your driveway.
- No written confirmation of what is included. Dump fees and labor should be in the number, not added later.
- Nobody asking about access or heavy material. If they are not asking, they are either going to be surprised or you are.
- No proof of insurance. Ask. We are licensed and insured and will show you the policy limits without being asked twice.
If you want us to look at it
Call or text 978-915-3399 and a real person on our team picks up, never an AI and never a call center. We will tell you honestly whether your job is a city pickup job or a truck job, and there is nothing attached to asking.