Junk removal in Vancouver, WA

Vancouver’s free bulky pickup, and where it stops

If you have City of Vancouver garbage service through Waste Connections, you get one free curbside bulky item pickup per calendar year: up to 5 items, each under 100 pounds, scheduled through the RecycleRight app or web tool. Items go out at the curb by 6 a.m. on your pickup day.

If that covers what you have, use it. It is free, and we would rather say so than take your money.

Here is what it will not take:

• Refrigerators, freezers and air conditioners, or anything else with freon in it
• TVs, computers, cell phones and other electronic waste
• Concrete and any other construction or demolition material
• Yard debris
• Tires
• Paint, chemicals, fluorescent bulbs and other household hazardous waste
• Anything that might contain asbestos
• Anything over 100 pounds, which rules out most hide-a-beds, safes, treadmills, pianos and hot tubs
• Item number six, and everything after it
• A second pickup in the same calendar year

That list is most of our Vancouver work. The fridge in the garage, the TV in the basement, the deck you just tore off, the sixth through twentieth items. We start where the free program ends.

“Vancouver” on your mail does not always mean the City of Vancouver

The city says it plainly: not every postal address that reads Vancouver, WA is inside the city limits. A lot of the east side and the north edge, including much of Orchards and Minnehaha, is unincorporated Clark County. The mail says Vancouver. The garbage is a county account with Waste Connections, and the city’s free annual pickup does not apply.

Waste Connections will still collect bulky items at a county address, for a per-item fee plus a trip charge.

We serve the city and the county the same way, at the same prices. North of the city line, the Hazel Dell and Salmon Creek pages cover the same ground.

What Vancouver houses hand us

West of I-5, in Hough, Carter Park, Arnada and Shumway, a lot of the housing is bungalows and four-squares from the 1910s through the 1940s. Basements with exterior stairs, detached garages off the alley, driveways too narrow to back a truck down. We carry out, stage at the street, and pad the doorframes on the way through.

Downtown and Uptown Village have blocks with on-street parking only and buildings with no elevator. Tell us the floor when you book and we plan the carry around it. Stairs beyond the first flight add a set amount per flight; the number is on the pricing page.

East of I-205, Cascade Park, Fishers Landing and Orchards are mostly subdivisions from the 1980s through the 2000s: attached garages, and often the full second-owner accumulation behind the door. Some have HOAs with rules about what can sit visible at the curb. We load straight into the truck, and nothing waits overnight.

Minnehaha and the older county pockets run to bigger lots, outbuildings and sometimes 30 years of a shop nobody has emptied. Those are often full-truck jobs.

Where it goes

Donation first, recycling second, the transfer station last. Most Vancouver loads that reach the station go to Central Transfer and Recycling on NE 117th Avenue, which charges by the ton plus $24.91 on each refrigerator, freezer or air conditioner for the refrigerant. That fee is already inside our fridge price.

TVs, monitors and computers go to a WA E-Cycle collection site instead. The state program takes them at no charge, up to 10 per drop-off, so we do not surcharge you for them. See what we take for the rest. See the full price ladder.

Vancouver questions

I already used my free city pickup this year. Then we are the next option. Book a 2-hour window online and we can often come the same day or the next.

Can you take my refrigerator? Yes. The city’s free program will not, because of the freon. We take it, and the station’s refrigerant fee is already in our price.

I am in an apartment with no elevator. Yes. Tell us the floor when you book so the carry is planned and priced before we arrive.

Am I in the city or the county? Look up your address in the Clark County Property Information Center and read the jurisdiction line. Either way our price is identical; it only changes whether the free annual pickup is available to you.