How to get rid of a refrigerator in Salt Lake City

The short answer

The most common booking in this market is two at once — the kitchen fridge being replaced and the old one already in the garage. That is $164 + $164 = $328, one visit, one $75 minimum. A kitchen fridge plus the basement chest freezer is $164 + $146 = $310.

The Utah second fridge

Almost every household in this valley has more cold storage than the kitchen provides. A second refrigerator in the garage, an upright freezer in the basement, a chest freezer in the storage room — sometimes all three. It is a genuine regional habit, tied to bulk buying and to homes that were built with the basement space to make it practical.

The consequence is that fridge removal here is rarely about the kitchen. It is about the garage unit that stopped holding temperature two summers ago and has been sitting unplugged with the door taped shut ever since, or the chest freezer in the basement that has been down there since the Clinton administration and is now going to have to come back up.

The stairs are the actual job

A chest freezer that went into a basement in 1998 came down empty, with help, before the stair carpet was laid. Getting it back up is a two-person job with straps on a staircase that, in most pre-war Salt Lake houses, is narrow, steep and turns at the bottom. In the post-war ramblers across Rose Park, Glendale, Murray and Taylorsville the stair is straighter but the door at the top opens inward into a kitchen.

That carry is included. A chest freezer is $146 whether it is on a garage floor at street level or at the bottom of a basement stair in the Avenues. There is no stair charge in this market, which is the specific reason most appliance calls here end up with us rather than with a delivery crew.

Why the delivery haul-away often does not apply

If you are buying a replacement, take the retailer's haul-away. It is the cheapest route by far. But check the conditions before you count on it, because it fails here for three predictable reasons:

• It is only the delivery day. Miss the window, or be out when they arrive, and the offer is gone.
• It is like for like. Buying a kitchen fridge does not get the garage fridge taken, because nothing is being delivered to replace that one.
• They will not do stairs. Delivery crews generally will not bring an appliance up from a basement, which rules out most of the freezers in this valley.

Refrigerant, and the scrapper question

Every fridge and freezer contains refrigerant, and it has to be recovered by someone certified before the shell can be scrapped. That is a federal requirement, and it is why your bin service will not take one.

We handle it as part of the removal. No refrigerant fee, no reclamation charge, no environmental surcharge — a standard fridge is $164 and that is the whole number.

Which brings up the free option. Put a fridge at the end of a driveway in Rose Park or South Salt Lake and somebody with a trailer may well take it. Sometimes that is a legitimate recycler. Sometimes it is someone who will cut the lines out in a field in Magna, and venting refrigerant is precisely the regulated act. Ask where it goes before you hand it over.

Prep, in the right order

1. Empty it a day ahead, and use up or move whatever is in the freezer compartment.
2. Defrost it. A freezer that thaws in transit makes a mess of your hallway and our truck. Put towels down and give it twenty-four hours.
3. Disconnect the water line if it has an ice maker. Shut the valve, disconnect at the fridge, and have a towel ready.
4. Unplug it and leave it unplugged.
5. Clear the route. Basement stairs, the side door, the garage apron. In winter, shovel and salt it first.
6. Measure the narrow point if you remember it being tight going in. That tells the crew whether the doors come off.

Do not leave it outside with the doors on

A fridge parked at the side of the house or on the park strip is a safety issue where there are children — that is the reason the advice about removing doors exists, and it has not stopped being true. It is also illegal dumping if it goes on the park strip without a scheduled collection, and the notice goes to the nearest address.

And the weather finishes it. A unit left out through a Salt Lake winter takes snowmelt into the compressor housing and the door seals, and comes out of spring heavier, rustier and smelling like something that should have been dealt with in October. If it has to wait for a booking, leave it in the garage.

Booking it with the rest

Because the minimum is charged once, most people bundle. A real example from a kitchen remodel in Millcreek: standard fridge $164 + dishwasher $109 + electric range $134. $164 + $109 = $273. $273 + $134 = $407. Against a three-eighths truck at $338, the truck wins if it all fits — which for three appliances and nothing else it usually does not, so that one books per item.

Add the garage fridge and the basement freezer to the same visit and the comparison changes again. List everything, price both ways on the pricing page, and book the lower number.

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