What a garage cleanout costs in Kansas City

The short answer

Garages price off the truck-fill ladder because nobody itemizes forty things: quarter $241, three-eighths $338, half $431, five-eighths $513, three-quarters $587, seven-eighths $661, full $732.

Where Kansas City garages usually land:

• Detached single-car garage off a Brookside or Waldo alley: quarter to three-eighths, $241 to $338.
• Attached two-car in Prairie Village, Raytown or Gladstone: three-eighths to half, $338 to $431.
• Three-car in Olathe, Lenexa, Leawood or Lee's Summit: half to three-quarters, $431 to $587.
• Three-car plus a shed on an acre in Cass County or outer Johnson County: full truck, $732, sometimes more.

Minimum visit is $75 if you only have a couple of things.

Why the garage is the Kansas City junk room

In metros where houses have no basements, the garage is a car park. Here it is the second basement. Most homes in this metro have both, and both fill.

What consistently comes out of them:

• Lawn and garden. A lawn mower is $65. On a half-acre Johnson County lot there is often a dead one behind the working one.
• The abandoned gym. Treadmill $115, elliptical $97, weight bench $69, weight set $93, home gym or multi-station $241.
• Furniture in transit that never left. Sofa $126, dresser $126, bookcase in particleboard $100.
• The second fridge or the chest freezer. $164 and $146.
• Grills and patio. Charcoal grill $59, propane grill $71, patio table $89, patio chairs $30 each.
• Kids' equipment. Portable basketball hoop $115, bicycle $37, baby gear $33.
• Undifferentiated pile. Small junk pile $82, medium $129, large $208.

The climate problem

Kansas City garages are unconditioned space in a climate that swings hard both directions. January runs into single digits and the freeze-thaw cycles repeat all winter. August runs into the 90s with dew points to match.

What that does to the contents, over a few years:

• Particleboard furniture swells at the joints and never recovers.
• Upholstery in a garage picks up humidity and goes musty. That sofa you were storing for the basement remodel is not coming back in the house.
• Cardboard boxes on a concrete slab wick moisture from underneath and collapse at the bottom.
• Mattresses stored flat against a garage wall mildew through.
• Small engines that sat through four winters with fuel in them are usually done.

This is why so many garage cleanouts here are not decluttering so much as disposal of things that quietly stopped being usable.

Worked examples

Once you are past six or eight items the ladder normally beats the list. The quote compares both and gives you the lower one.

What does not go on the truck

Garages are where the awkward stuff lives, so be straight about it before the day:

• Paint, solvents, pesticides, pool chemicals and old fuel are household hazardous waste. The metro has household hazardous waste programs on both sides of the line — check the one that serves your address for current drop-off arrangements.
• Propane tanks. Exchange them or take them to a site that accepts them.
• Tires often need a separate route.
• Ammunition and anything similar is not a haul-away item.

Everything else — furniture, appliances, sporting goods, tools, decking scraps, the rusted shelving unit — is normal.

Timing it

Two good windows in this metro. Early spring, once the ice is done and before severe-weather season gets going, when you want the mower out and the garage usable. And October, when people finally admit the car is never going in there and want it clear before the first ice storm.

Avoid the week after a big hail night if you can — every truck in the metro is busy and the driveways are full of roofers. And if you are prepping to list the house, do the garage before photos. Buyers in Johnson County look at garages the way buyers elsewhere look at kitchens.

How the day works

• Pull out anything you are keeping the night before and put it on one side or in the driveway. Sorting under a truck's clock is expensive thinking time.
• Crew arrives, you point, they load.
• Shelving and workbenches get broken down on site if they are going.
• Sweep-out at the end, so you get a bare slab back.
• Alley-loaded garages in Brookside, Waldo and the Northeast: tell us, so the truck comes down the alley rather than blocking a narrow street.

No stair charge, no long-driveway charge, no fee for the detached garage at the back of the lot. Disposal is in the price.

Booking it

Pick a truck size based on how much of the floor you cannot see, book a slot, and adjust on the day if it turns out to be bigger. The ladder just moves a rung. Prices are the same in Olathe, Lee's Summit, Gladstone and Kansas City, Kansas.

Frequently asked questions