If you have searched this, you have probably already found four companies that will not tell you. Here are the actual numbers.
The short answer
Most residential junk removal jobs in Fairfax County fall between $249 and $499.
| Load size | What it looks like | Price |
|---|---|---|
| Single item | A mattress, a sofa, one fridge | $95 – $175 |
| Quarter load | A small bedroom, a dozen boxes and a dresser | $249 – $329 |
| Half load | A packed single-car garage | $389 – $499 |
| Three-quarter load | A two-car garage, a furnished one-bedroom | $539 – $649 |
| Full load | A whole-house clearing | $679 – $795 |
Those are our published rates and they apply identically across Fairfax, Loudoun, Prince William and Arlington. No zone pricing, no fuel surcharge.
Why almost nobody publishes this
Every national franchise operating in Northern Virginia — and most of the local outfits — will ask you to call for a free estimate.
There is a reasonable-sounding justification, which is that jobs vary. And there is the actual reason, which is that a phone call gives them information that a website cannot. Your postcode. How urgent you sound. Whether you flinch at the first number. Whether you have already called three other people.
None of that is relevant to what the job costs. If pricing is genuinely by volume, the volume tiers are fixed, and a photograph tells you more about the job than a conversation does. So the only thing the phone call adds is the opportunity to price you rather than the work.
What actually changes the price
Three things legitimately move a junk removal quote, and all three should be disclosed before anything is loaded rather than after.
Weight, on specific materials. Concrete, brick, dirt, roofing shingles and ceramic tile are disposed of by weight, not volume, because that is how the Fairfax County I-66 Transfer Station and the I-95 Landfill Complex bill for construction and demolition waste. Half a truck of drywall and half a truck of tile cost very different amounts to tip. Anyone quoting a flat volume price on a tile tear-out is either going to lose money or add a charge later.
Special disposal routes. Refrigerators, freezers and window air conditioners contain refrigerant that federal law requires be recovered by a certified technician before scrapping. Paint, solvents and pool chemicals need household hazardous waste handling and cannot go in a truck at all — Fairfax County takes those from residents free at both facilities above.
Demolition before loading. A shed, a deck or a hot tub has to come apart before it can go anywhere. That is labour on top of hauling and it gets quoted separately.
The fees that are not on the estimate
This is where the difference between a published price and a phone quote actually shows up.
- Stair fees. Charged per flight by several operators. Carrying it downstairs is the service.
- Long-carry fees. Common where a truck cannot park near the door — which describes a large share of Reston clusters, Burke Centre pathway units and older Arlington streets.
- Fuel surcharges. A percentage added at the end, frequently scaled by distance.
- Rush or same-day charges. Urgency is most of why people call a hauler. Charging extra for it is charging for the need.
- Minimum load charges dressed up as something else, applied when the job turns out smaller than quoted.
- Disposal fees billed separately from the quote, which is the one that catches people hardest.
We do not have any of these. That is not a moral position, it is the natural consequence of pricing by volume: if the number is set by how much room your stuff takes in the truck, then how many stairs it came down is our problem to solve.
Hourly pricing is worse than it sounds
Some companies quote by the hour instead, and it can look cheaper on paper.
The problem is what it prices. An hourly rate charges you for the difficulty of your house. A 1958 Annandale rambler with a narrow basement staircase and a turn at the bottom takes considerably longer to clear than a Fair Lakes townhouse with an interior garage — for exactly the same volume of stuff. Under hourly pricing you pay more because your house is older, which is a strange thing to be billed for.
Volume pricing means the number is set by what you are throwing away.
When a dumpster is cheaper
Worth saying, because we would rather you spent your money correctly.
Rent a container if you are gutting a whole house, or running a project over several weeks where debris appears continuously and unpredictably. Cost per cubic yard is lower and you fill it on your own schedule.
Hauling wins if you are doing one room, one garage, one basement, or a cleanout. Here is the comparison for a typical single-room renovation:
A twenty-yard dumpster in Northern Virginia runs roughly $450 to $700 for a week-long rental, before tonnage overages. It needs a permit if it sits on a public street in Fairfax, Arlington or most incorporated towns. It damages the driveway surface underneath it. It collects your neighbours’ contributions overnight. In most HOA communities — which is nearly all of Centreville, Ashburn and Gainesville — it needs written approval and has a maximum permitted duration.
A half load from us is $389 to $499 with all disposal included, and there is nothing in your driveway on Saturday.
What a fair quote should look like
Whoever you use, the quote should meet three conditions.
It should be given before anything is loaded, out loud, after someone has looked at the actual job. It should name the exceptions specifically — this much is volume, the concrete gets weighed, the fridge has a recovery fee. And it should be a number that can go down. If the load comes in smaller than the driveway estimate, the price should drop. That happens regularly and it is the entire point of quoting before rather than after.
If a company will not commit to a number until the truck is half full, that is worth noticing.
Prices in this article are our published 2026 rates for Fairfax County and the surrounding Northern Virginia counties. See the full pricing table, or send us a photo for a firm number on your specific job.