What an apartment cleanout costs in Seattle

The short answer

Apartment cleanouts price by volume, because nobody can itemize a flat accurately over the phone.

• A micro-unit or studio — a quarter truck, $241. Sometimes three-eighths at $338 if the storage cage is coming too.
• A one-bedroom — a half truck, $431, is the most common answer.
• A two-bedroom — three-quarters at $587, or a full truck at $732 if it was properly furnished.
• A part-furnished unit where the tenant took most of it — often a quarter truck at $241.

Minimum visit $95. If you only have two or three named pieces, per-item pricing is cheaper: couch $126, queen mattress $103, dresser $126.

Why Seattle apartments are their own category

Three features of this market shape almost every apartment job here.

Micro-units and small one-beds. Capitol Hill, the U District, Belltown, First Hill and Lower Queen Anne have a great deal of very small housing, some of it purpose-built as micro-apartments. Small units produce less volume, but every item in them is a squeeze getting out — a sofa that came in before a doorway got a new frame, a desk assembled in place.

Relocation churn. This city fills up with people who came for a job at a tech employer and leave two or three years later when the job changes or the company reorganizes. The furniture was bought for the lease, not for life, and almost none of it is worth shipping to the next city. That produces a very particular load: flat-pack, a mattress, a desk, a monitor, and a lot of boxes.

Old walk-ups next to new towers. A three-story 1920s building on Capitol Hill with no lift sits a block from a tower in Denny Triangle with a service lift, a loading bay and a certificate-of-insurance requirement. The same job in each is a completely different morning.

The access questions that actually matter

When you book, the useful information is not how many boxes you have. It is:

• Which floor, and is there a lift? There is no walk-up fee — a third-floor Capitol Hill flat costs the same as a ground-floor one — but the crew needs to know what they are walking into.
• Is there a service lift, and does it need booking? In the newer South Lake Union and Belltown buildings the lift is reserved in slots, and they go quickly at the end of a month.
• Does the building require a certificate of insurance? Many managed buildings do. Ask your front desk, ask days in advance, and pass it on.
• Where can the truck stop? On the older blocks of Capitol Hill, Ballard and Fremont, parked cars leave one travel lane and there is nowhere to idle. That is normal here and it is not a surcharge, but the crew plans differently for it.

What it costs by item

The classic Seattle one-bed leaver's load, priced by item: a couch, a queen mattress, a metal bed frame and a desk is $126 + $103 + $68 + $83 = $380.

That is close enough to a half truck at $431 that if there are also boxes, shelving and a monitor, volume is the better buy. Ask for both numbers when you book and take the lower one.

The deposit arithmetic

The reason to book rather than improvise is usually financial, not logistical.

Most Seattle buildings post their dumpster enclosures against bulky items and charge back whatever they have to remove. That charge lands on your deposit, at a rate nobody agreed with you in advance, and it typically arrives weeks later when you have no way to contest it.

Leaving a sofa beside the enclosure is therefore not a cheaper version of disposal. It is the same disposal at an unknown price, paid later, with a deduction attached.

A quarter truck at $241 with a receipt is a known number on a date you chose.

Timing it around the lease cycle

Seattle has real seasonality and it is worth planning around.

The end of every month is busy, and the end of August and September is the peak — that is when the U District turns over as the university year starts, and when a large share of the city's leases flip. Book a week or more ahead if your move-out is in that window, especially if a service lift has to be reserved too.

The other timing point is the weather. If your move-out is between October and June, do not stage anything in a corridor, on a balcony or by the bins the night before. Damp boxes tear, damp mattresses are refused, and a wet sofa cannot be rehomed by anyone.

A realistic booking checklist

1. Decide what is going and what is not, and physically separate them.
2. Post anything solid and worth having to a neighborhood group with a two-weekend deadline.
3. Ask the building about the service lift and any insurance certificate requirement.
4. Book one visit for after your rehome deadline, not two.
5. Be in the unit for the window. On the tight streets around Capitol Hill and Ballard the crew cannot sit outside waiting.
6. Keep the receipt for your deposit.

Frequently asked questions