We learned our first major renovation lesson recently. No doubt this won’t be the only lesson we learn. As has come to be the case, part of the reason I had to “learn this lesson” is because I didn’t listen to my mother.
Have you seen this before?
When my mother mentioned that we should look into getting a dumpster. My immediate thought was “ Sure lady like I’m going to need a WHOLE dumpster.” “Hey this dumpster BAG looks cool!” Womp womp. I severely underestimated the size of our demo. Plus, we had also told our tenants that they could leave stuff in the apartment. They were leaving on a weekend where there would be no garbage collection the following day so our preference was to keep the stuff in the house as opposed to in the yard.
Back to this dumpster bag idea. It costs a whopping $30. What a deal, right? Wrong! The catch is how much it costs to haul it away. In NYC 1-800 Got-Junk is contracted to come pick up the full bag. You can set the schedule for pick-up online and it is supposed to cost between $300-$400.
Why’d it cost so much?
- We didn’t book online.
- Also didn’t get a truck with a crane.
- Apparently we had waaaay more construction debris than the bag could hold.
Those three factors equaled mucho dinero. When the truck showed up it was already halfway full so they picked up some of the materials, left and came back an hour or so later with an empty truck. Then they spent another hour or so filling it up. Lots of labor + Lots of time = lots of money.
After this expensive mistake we STILL had a huge amount of construction debris to get rid of. Our contractor told us we should’ve gotten a small dumpster, 10 yard, and it should only cost up to $600. We paid like triple that for the dumpster bag fiasco. Yeah, the whole internet can slap us now. Doh!
Getting a dumpster last minute was a wee bit tricky but after the hubs called the 15th place…..SUCCESS! Dumpster secured.
She’s not just pretty to look at folks. She also takes up a very precious Brooklyn parking spot. Nevertheless, this is definitely the way to go.
Tip
Have it delivered during alternate side to make sure you get a spot where you want it. It’s the easiest way to save a dumpster spot.
Lesson 1.4: Don’t leave the dumpster out for days uncovered.
On a Friday night we went shopping at Home Depot. Our usual Friday hang these days. When we got back someone had literally put a ton of concrete in our dumpster. Unfortunately, we have to pay extra if the weight of the materials is over 2 tons.
Thanks crappy human!
What lessons have you learned from past renovations?
