What Dumpster Size For 865 sq.ft. House Removal

[Glen Cooper]

Hello all. I've been searching the net today trying to determine the proper size dumpster to rent to remove my mothers' old house my father built in the back yard by extending the garage about 40 years ago.

The house is about 30 feet by 28 feet, one story, wood framed, it has 5 rooms, and a gable composite roof with about 3 layers of roofing and wood siding.

It has a concrete slab that I really don't need to remove at the moment as I'm mainly interested in making the property safe, the house is in really bad shape and my 82 year old mother is their alone.

Will a 30 yard dumpster hold the walls and roof?...40 yard? What about a

20 yard? I know biger is better because it cost to dump but I don't have much money, I'll be doing the work by myself.

Thanks Ed

[marson]

I'd say you are going to fill a 40 yard dumpster and then some

[Glen Cooper]

A 40 yard is like 650 bucks here for the cheapest one for a week. Man thats a lot of money. I've called about 2 dozen companies so far. I live in Houston, Texas.

Does anybody know of a cheap company around here?

[Doug Miller]

Rental charge is based on the size of the container, how long you keep it, and a charge to deliver and pick up.

Get those charges broken out when you call around to get prices.

I don't know what the total volume is going to be, but let's suppose that it's

40 yards, and suppose that it's going to take you eight weeks to fill it.

You could rent a 40-yard dumpster for eight weeks, and have one drop/tip charge.

Or you could rent a 20-yard dumpster for four weeks twice. You'd have two drop/tip charges, but the rental portion of the total charge would be a *lot* cheaper because you're renting a smaller container.

Or a ten-yard dumpster for two weeks, four times ...

Unless the drop & tip charges are exorbitant, you're probably better off with a smaller container.

[Glen Cooper]

Well I am going to call every number in the yellow pages because everyone has a different price that varies a great deal.

I guess me thinking all that would fit into a 20 yard container is just wishfull thinking.

I wish I knew someone that tears down houses. These people on the phone all want me to get the 40 yard container. It's hard to tell their motive. Maybe a 30 dumped twice would make for a better deal.

[DT]

We demolished a 28 x 12 one story portion of my home. That included 68 linear feet of the 3 exterior walls and the 336 sq ft ceiling and roof, no interior walls, no flooring, and just the roof structure (rafters, deck and shingles), from the other 25 x 30 (750 sq ft) portion. Plus the cedar wall shingles from 3 sides of the 25 x 30 portion. Plus the debris from building the new walls and roofs, although that was minimal compared to the teardown.

It took a 40 yard and an additional 20 yard container. We packed the dumpsters layer by layer and they were completely full with very little wasted space. And there was lots of smaller stuff left over that I bagged and threw away for weeks.

You're gonna need a bigger dumpster. I would say you will go through two 40 yarders.

-- Dennis

[Glen Cooper]

Wow that's a lot. I will definitely keep that in mind. I had no idea. Usenet is great.

Thanks to all for the fast responses. I guess the 40 would be the best choice afterall.

Ed

[Pat]

The house is 10 yards by 10 yards, or 100 square yards. Now imagine the walls disappearing and you having only the floor and roof (flattened). How tall would the pile be, maybe 2 feet (or 3). At 2 feet, you have 200 cubic yards. I bet if you are careful you can compress it to maybe 100 cy.

That sounds like a lot, but I'm tired, so check the math.

A big factor in this is how much you compress it.

When you call, make sure you are telling them that you have C&D material. That's a lot cheaper than garbage.

[Glen Cooper]

I'll make sure to mention C&D.

Have a good night.

[gfretwell]

This is going to be several diumpsters They fill at least three 30 yard dumpsters building the house. That stuff doesn't really pack in there that well and if it did the dumpster would be too heavy to carry on the truck. Then you are taking stuff out berfore they will take it. Maybe you just need a fire.

[hallerb]

find a legal dump and price borrowing or renting a dump truck.

it might be a little cheaper.

disposal costs so much today because the stuff is basically put in a tomb, rubber liners, clay layers rubber top lots of government inspections.

having done some demo its going to be a big long dirty miserable job.

get some quotes from demo companies it might be cheaper they come in with a backhoe and its gone in a hour loaded in dump trucks.

pro companies get better dump rate since they do it often.

[Paul Franklin]

A little too tired, I think. 2 feet is .66 yards so if the pile was 2 feet high it would be 66 cyds. Still a lot, but better than 200.

Paul

[Glen Cooper]

Well it is a bad neighborhood with bums and gunfire. New years is coming up. The neighbor behind me had two homes burn down on two different July

4th holidays... No I'm not kidding.

Naw... a good thought though. I'm thinking 30 yarders because the 40's are too high for my old bones and a bunch of 3 mil trash bags now. My sister has a hardware store heh heh...

Ed

[Glen Cooper]

Thanks again for all the help.

Good night

Ed

[Pat]

Some demo companies use a really big chipper -- like for trees -- for demo to get the things for dense. They basically put all of the wood through it. But renting it is another cost.

[Pat]

Dohhhh

[Doug Miller]

Well, you can make a guesstimate. Here's how I'd go about it:

First, consider that it's going to take a truly unreasonable amount of time to try to separate the roof decking from the rafters, and the floor from the joists -- so you need to consider the floor as an 865-sf by 1 ft thick slab, and the roof approximately 30% more than that.

You're already at two thousand cubic feet = 74 cubic yards, and haven't figured in *any* of the walls yet.

Contact your local fire department, and see if they'll burn it down as a training exercise. I've seen that done before -- it's pretty impressive. They'll burn it, put it out, relight it, put it out again, relight it...

[Doug Miller]

Not necessarily. Working alone, you're not going to be able to fill that up very fast, and you'll be paying rental for a mostly empty dumpster most of the time. Even if you have a hundred cubic yards total, you may be better off renting ten- or twenty-yard dumpsters repeatedly, rather than a 40-yard unit that will be half-empty for several weeks. It takes one man a *long* time to do enough demolition work to fill a 40-yard dumpster.

You may be able to avoid that particular problem by not renting the dumpster until after the demolition is complete: once you have the structure torn down and cut up into pieces you can handle alone, you should be able to fill a

40-yard container in a week easily.

Local zoning and health-and-safety ordinances may not permit you to leave that much trash lying around for as long as it will take, though.

And that raises another point: you probably will need a permit from the city/town/whatever to do the demolition.

[Doug Miller]

The local fire department may just do that for him as a training exercise. There would probably be an income tax deduction for the value of the house, too, as a donation.

[hallerb]

yeah fire departments burn down homes for training for free and clean up all the debris, provided it can be done safely

why not fix the home and rent it out?