What an apartment cleanout costs in Salt Lake City

The short answer

Two ways to price it, and you should check both. By volume, a quarter truck is $241, three-eighths is $338, a half truck is $431. By item, you add up what is actually going. A studio or a lightly furnished one-bedroom in Salt Lake City typically lands at a quarter to three-eighths. A fully furnished two-bedroom is usually a half truck or a bit over.

The minimum visit is $75, so if you are down to a mattress and two boxes it is a small job, not a truck job. A queen mattress and box spring set at $143 on its own is the whole invoice.

A worked example

A one-bedroom in the 9th and 9th area, tenant leaving at the end of the month, everything staying behind:

That is $126 + $143 + $126 + $83 = $478, which you can walk in steps: $126 + $143 = $269, then $269 + $126 = $395, then $395 + $83 = $478. Against the ladder, a half truck is $431 and three-eighths is $338. So in that case you book the truck fraction if it genuinely fits, or the item list if you want certainty about exactly what is leaving. Either way you see both numbers before you commit, which is the point of publishing them.

Where apartments actually are in this valley

Salt Lake apartments are not one thing, and the building decides the day more than the contents do.

• Converted houses in the Avenues and Central City. A 1905 home cut into three units. Narrow interior stairs, a shared landing, and the upper unit reached by a staircase that turns twice. Nothing gets carried flat.
• Walk-up fourplexes along 700 East and 900 East. Two or three storys, no lift, exterior stairs that ice over from December through February.
• Basement apartments. Very common here — a separate lower-level unit in a family home, often with its own side entrance under a window well. Carrying up out of one is its own skill.
• Newer mid-rise buildings downtown, in Sugar House and near the Granary. Lift access, but a loading dock, a reserved lift, and a building manager who wants notice.

Stairs and lifts do not change your price

There is no walk-up fee and no stair charge. A sofa out of a third-floor unit on 3rd Avenue is $126, the same as a sofa out of a ground-floor unit in Murray. That is the single most useful thing to know when you are comparing quotes for an older Salt Lake building, because access is exactly where on-the-day estimates tend to grow.

What we do ask is that you tell us the access when you book — floor, lift or no lift, whether the truck can get within twenty feet of the door. It does not change the number. It changes how much time we schedule and what the crew brings.

Building rules to sort out before the day

For anything with a lift or a shared entrance, five minutes of admin saves an hour:

• Book the service lift or freight lift if the building has one. Many downtown and Sugar House buildings require it and will turn a crew away without a reservation.
• Confirm where the truck may stand. Downtown and near the university, street parking is the constraint, not the stairs.
• Ask whether there are protected hours. Some buildings do not allow moves before a certain time on weekends.
• Check whether anything is banned from the dumpster. Mattresses, electronics and appliances almost always are, which is usually why you are booking us.
• If it is a basement apartment in someone's home, make sure the homeowner knows a truck is coming and which side of the house to use.

End-of-tenancy and turnover work

Landlords and property managers across Millcreek, South Salt Lake and Murray usually want the same thing: a fixed number they can put against a turnover budget before the crew is dispatched. That is what upfront pricing is for. Send the list or the photos, get the total, approve it, and it does not change.

Abandoned-property jobs come with legal timelines that vary — do not rely on us for that part, follow your own notice process before anything is removed. Once you are clear to clear the unit, the removal itself is straightforward: a typical abandoned one-bedroom is a quarter to a half truck, $241 to $431, and we sweep the unit out.

Timing the booking

The last four days of any month are the busiest, everywhere in the valley, because leases end together. Late April and early May adds student turnover around the university and Westminster on top of that. If your handover date is fixed, book a week out.

Winter needs one extra thought: exterior staircases on older walk-ups ice up, and the parking lane may have a plow berm in it. Salt the stairs before we arrive and tell us if the only approach is a steep driveway. We will still do it. It just goes faster and safer when nobody is surprised.

Frequently asked questions