Junk Hauling case study

The situation

A young couple had just bought their first place at a house on the northern Gold Coast and the previous owners had left a fair bit behind. The settlement agent had called it "a few odds and ends". When I rang back, the husband laughed and said it was more like a trailer load and a half: pallets and crates, mixed heavy waste and long timber and fencing.

Why the customer needed help

Their main worry wasn't the cost. It was not knowing what could legally go where, and not wanting to damage the house getting it all out. Both of those are part of the job for us.

What was at the property

By my count there were pallets and crates, mixed heavy waste and long timber and fencing, along with the usual loose odds and ends that build up around a job like this. It's typical of what we see from acreage properties.

The initial assessment

I arrived at the property and the first thing I noticed was the access. Before I look at the pile, I walk the route it has to travel: doorways, steps, the driveway slope, overhead wires, where the truck can park. For this job I paced it out and worked out we'd need about two-thirds of the tipper.

How the job was planned

I gave them a fixed price there and then, based on volume, and explained what was included: heavy and oversized load handling, two-person crew as standard and strapped and covered transport. They said yes on the spot, so we planned to load in one visit rather than two.

Preparation

We checked the weather, laid out the straps and blankets for anything worth saving, and agreed a hand signal for "stop" because the truck was right on the road.

Step 1

Step one was clearing a working space. We shifted the easy, loose items straight onto the truck so we had room to manoeuvre around the awkward ones.

Step 2

Step two was the stuff in the hard-to-reach spots: the top of the garage racking, under the house, behind the water tank. That's usually where the surprises live, and this job was no different.

Step 3

Step three was the clean-up. Once the last item was out, we swept the floor, raked the ground where needed and walked the customer through the space to make sure nothing they wanted had gone.

Removal, sorting and loading

I'm fussy about the load. A well-packed truck means one trip instead of two, and that's the difference between a fair price and an inflated one. We netted the top before we drove off.

From the truck it went to a licensed transfer station, where recyclables were dropped off separately, and anything usable went to a local op shop before the tip run.

Challenges we ran into

There was a nest of ants under an old tarp, and a lot of the material was mixed in a way that made sorting slow.

How we handled them

We treated the ants, worked from the outside in, and sorted on the tray as we went rather than on the ground.

Completion and final result

When the last load was strapped down, the space was empty and swept. The customer walked through with me, signed off, and paid the price we'd agreed at the start, not a dollar more.

What I learned

What stuck with me was how much of it could be reused. People expect junk Hauling to mean everything goes to landfill. On this job, close to a third of it went somewhere useful.