How long can ou leave furniture on the curb?

[micky]

NextDoor is a swamp, that sucks you in like quicksand is alleged to do.

Tonight someone complained that two couches are on the grass between the sidewalk and the curb, (This is a nice middle-class single family home n'hood). She says they should have been taken to the dump.

She wanted to know how to contact the local HOA but people from elswhere joined in. Everyone joined in and said to call code enforcement and so forth. She doesn't know them so she's not willing to knock on teir door.

She posted two pictures, she says they look raggedy. I say they look nice, (imitation) leather, and even if they are raggedy, they're plenty good enough for a poor person or someone just out of school to use.

Acc. to etiquette how long is one allowed to let a 2-seater and a

3-seater sit on the grass before you have to rent a truck or hire someone to take the stuff away?

We recently got our free bulk collection back, but only twice a year and it was about 4 weeks ago, so it's not again for 5 months. Regular trash won't take something anywhere near this big.

BTW, it's Sunday evening/night and they've been there since Saturday morning .

[trader_4]

Obviously that's going to vary by local jurisdiction, plus you've added in an HOA which can also set whatever rules they choose. Here the township does bulk pickup once a month on a given day and you're supposed to put items out just before, I think the limit is the weekend before the pickup.

[Ed Pawlowski]

Usually stuff like that will be picked up by the fairies on trash night if it has some value, If in good shape and clean, Salvation Army may take it

The HOA will get on them now.

[micky]

Tnanks to both of you.

No one seemed to know the HOA contact.

AIUI the Salvation Army here won't take furniture esp. big heavy things like these upholstered sofas, and they certainly donm't pick up.

He's not waiting for a scheduled bulk pickup, he's waiting until someone sees them and wants them, or calls someone who wants them.

The first day they just say there, free to take, but the second day a sign was added that says Free. IMO he had doubts that people would know they were free.

So the question is how long ETIQUETTE, traditional but unspoken standards between neighbors, allows the sofas to sit there before he must borrow or rent a truck or hire a carter to remove them? A range of times would be fine.

[Mark Lloyd]

About 10 years ago, a neighbor left an old big-screen TV (rear-projection, with 3 CRTs) on the curb. it stayed there about a week and a half before the trash truck picked it up. Now we have trucks with mechanical arms that won't pick anything up unless it fits in a special container.

[micky]

I went there this morning. Only knew the name of the HOA, but a ReMax google hit outlined the borders. Only about 10 blocks long spread over

6 streets, and the sofas were on the 4th block.

Even nicer than I expected. The light made some reflections look like damage. I thought the surface might be cracking into little squares, stuck to the cloth backing, but the surface was in one piece. And 4 out of 5 seats are recliners.

The house is for sale and may be vacant by now, but I didnt' look in the window.

The large one sells new for between 1000 and 2000. the small one between 500 and 2000. So even now, these are worth $750 or more. Maybe one small slit that can be repaired, or taped from behind. I had one person who agreed with me last night, and 3 more this morning, but there were 4 last night who were more vigorous in their disgust for free furniture.

So I put an ad in the FREE section of Next Door, but I don't fault the owners for not doing that. They had a sign that said Free.

And it just started to rain, but my experience in more than one case is that these things can dry out and be fine.

I wonder how the thread would have gone if I'd only seen the very first post, if I would have been able to show the other side of the coin, but instead there were several others suggesting code enforcement etc. and by that time, I'd lost my temper, couldn't be a mediator, only an advocate.

I suspect the angry ones are first-time homeowners. My friend who went to law school had a summer job in a court in Staten Island NY, and until they built the Verrzaano Narrows Bridge in 1964 or so, Staten Island was only accessible from NY by the ferry, still had farmland. After the bridge, it got a lot of new houses and first-time homeowners, and they acted like it. In one case, two next-door n'bors both had garages but they shared a driveway. (not a road, but a regular driveway to the back of the lot.) And one guy got mad at the other and built a fence on or near the property line down the middle of the driveway, so the other guy could not use it. :-)

[TimR]

Was there or was there not some spare change in the cushions?

Did you or did you not check? And then did you or did you not leave some small change, just to see if anyone else was going to check?

Enquiring minds.

[micky]

Good question. I'm short of money right now and I shoudl have checked.

That would have been hard.

I actually never checked if the recliners reclined, but I think the odds that all 4 are bad are very slim, and to fix one there is access to the mechanism from undernaath, right?

Put an add on CraigList two nights ago.

Didn't go yesterday, but went this afternoon and they are gone, so 5 days from first appearance, well within what one friend says is acceptable.

Probably went to a guy who monitors CL to resell free things. That's good. I hate waste.

That's good. If you don't ask questions, you'll never learn the answers.

[Roger Blake]

In most places roving Puerto Ricans driving beat-up old pickup trucks will quickly pick up stuff like that. Is that in some kind of gated community where such riff-raff are kept you?