How to get rid of appliances in Seattle

Step one: disconnect it properly

Before anything moves, the appliance has to be safely off its services. This is the step people skip and the one that causes damage.

• Electric: unplug it, or switch off at the breaker for anything hard-wired.
• Gas: a gas range, dryer or water heater must be disconnected and capped by someone qualified. This is not a job for a removal crew and it is not a DIY task.
• Water: shut off the supply and drain the line for a washer, a dishwasher, an ice maker or a fridge with a water connection. An old shut-off valve in a hundred-year-old Seattle house is often seized — plan for that rather than discovering it with the machine half out.
• Water heaters: off, cooled, and fully drained before it moves. A full tank is far heavier than an empty one and this matters a great deal on a basement stair.

If you are not sure, get the trade in first. A plumber or electrician for an hour is cheaper than a flooded floor in a house with a finished basement below it.

Step two: prep the unit

• Empty it. Fridges and freezers completely, including the door shelves and the ice drawer.
• Defrost a freezer a day ahead, with towels down. An upright freezer that is still frozen drips the whole way out, which in a Seattle house means down a wooden basement stair and across a hall floor.
• Drain washers fully, including the residual water in the hose.
• Tape the doors, or take them off if the unit is going to sit anywhere at all before collection.
• Clear the route. Rugs up, doors wedged open, the landing clear. In a Craftsman with a turn at the bottom of the stairs, the turn is where the paintwork gets taken off.

Step three: pick the route

Four options, in rough order of cost:

1. Retailer haul-away with the replacement delivery. Cheapest when it applies — but ask about your access when you order, because it is usually limited to the ground floor with a clear route.
2. A scrap collector, if the unit is already in a garage, a driveway or an alley.
3. Municipal collection, if your city accepts appliances at all. Many exclude anything containing refrigerant. Check your own city's current bulky-item page.
4. A flat-price pickup from wherever it stands. Fridge $164, washer $133, dryer $128, dishwasher $109, water heater $131.

Minimum visit $95. Refrigerant recovery and disposal are inside the listed prices.

Why the route matters more in Seattle than elsewhere

Because appliances here are so rarely in an easy place.

The laundry pair is in the basement. Not a walk-out basement with a door to the driveway, but a real one down a narrow stair with a turn at the bottom and low headroom above it — the standard arrangement in the Craftsman stock across Wallingford, Phinney Ridge, Columbia City, Mount Baker and Beacon Hill.

The water heater and the furnace are down there too, in a corner, usually behind something.

The second fridge is in a detached garage that is damp nine months of the year and often at the bottom of a short, steep driveway.

And the whole house may sit fifteen exterior steps above or below the sidewalk, on a street where the truck cannot park outside.

That is why so many free routes quietly do not apply, and why the flat prices here carry no stair charge, walk-up fee or long-carry fee. The access is the job in this city.

The full appliance price list

Common combinations: a laundry pair is $133 + $128 = $261. A kitchen refit where the fridge, the electric range and the dishwasher all go is $164 + $134 + $109 = $407.

The basement mechanical swap — old furnace and old tank water heater out together — is $131 + $131 = $262.

The heat pump conversion

A lot of Seattle houses are changing their heating, and it produces a distinct disposal job.

Out goes the old furnace at $131, frequently alongside the tank water heater at $131 if that is being replaced at the same time. In some houses an old oil tank surfaces during the same project — $461 empty, $847 still full of oil.

And outside there is the old outdoor unit: an AC condenser or heat pump outdoor unit is $115.

Plan this as one visit at the end of the installation rather than several. The installer will usually take what they replaced; what tends to be left behind is the older equipment nobody was contracted to remove — the decommissioned furnace from two systems ago, still sitting in the basement corner.

What not to do

• Do not leave it on the parking strip. It rusts within weeks in this climate, and it becomes a code-enforcement matter with your address on it.
• Do not leave a fridge or freezer outside with the door attached. It is a genuine hazard to children.
• Do not take it apart for scrap yourself if it contains refrigerant. That has to be recovered properly, and it is included in the price anyway.
• Do not move a full water heater. Drain it first.
• Do not stage it in the driveway the night before. Standard Seattle mistake, and it only makes the unit wetter and heavier.

Frequently asked questions