Renting Dumpsters - What Size do you Need?

Dumpsters are extremely useful if you have bought a house that was in foreclosure or short sale. The odds are pretty good that in addition to buying drywall, carpeting and the kitchen sink, you may have also inadvertently purchased garbage, rotting food, and human waste left behind. Hopefully your house isn't that bad, but if you've ever watch reality house flipping shows you probably have seen the worst-case scenarios happen.

So be prepared to rent dumpsters for your renovation and cleanup project. Even if you got lucky and the last tenants took all other personal property with them, there is still a good chance that you're looking at a massive remodel to make the home your own, which means you'll be disposing of a lot of large and bulky items, such as drywall, carpeting and appliances.

There are some things you cannot dispose of in dumpsters, including biohazard products, propane tanks, tires, paint and some types of chemicals.

But, for the most part, everything you pull out of a house can go into a container, including furniture and house components like drywall.

Depending on how massive of a job you that you have, you may need anything from a ten yard to a forty yard container. A good way to estimate how much size you will need is to think of it in terms of pick-up truck loads. A ten yarder will hold about five pick-up loads of garbage and debris. As you go up in size a thirty yarder can hold up to twelve pick up loads of garbage.

Plan ahead on your container rental and call the company in advance to arrange for a drop-off time and make sure you understand how long your rental period is. Some companies will let you rent for two weeks before they empty it out, others will give you more or less time as you request.

If you're looking at a big job and anticipate having a dumpster on the property for a while, take some simple precautions to eliminate dumpster diving. It's a good idea to put up a no trespassing sign and if your garbage container has a locking lid, utilize that feature. You may not care if people help themselves to the items you are tossing, however if they get injured doing so it is a liability issue for you.

If you're not sure what size of container you actually need for your project, talk to the rental company and let them know the size of your project and they should be able to help guide you to the correct size.