From Royal Oak to Livonia to Bloomfield Hills to the downtown area itself, Detroit is a sprawling metropolitan area with a lot of character and history. If you live in this area and are looking for a Detroit dumpster rental, there are many businesses in the city and the surrounding suburbs that provide the service you need. This guide will help you navigate toward the best dumpster rental company for your needs.

A Disclaimer about Recommendations from Friends and Family

The important thing to remember as you search for a dumpster rental in the Detroit area is that what works best for you might not necessarily what works best for someone else. If you have friends or family in the area that have rented dumpsters in the past, by all means, ask for their advice. However, also take any recommendations with a grain of salt. Depending on your situation, you may need a dumpster rental company with very specific services or policies.

Preparing for Your Detroit Dumpster Rental: Self-Reflection Is the Most Important Step

If you want to find the ideal Detroit dumpster rental for your upcoming project, you need to spend some time thinking about what your project entails. This bit of self-reflection is the most important thing you can do to lay the foundations for a successful rental. It’s more important than making a list of potential rental companies, more important than reading customer reviews online, and more important than comparing price quotes. Why, you may ask? Because when you know exactly what your project looks like, you can find a dumpster rental that fits that project like a glove.

So, the operative question is this: what type of project are you undertaking? Perhaps you recently bought a run-down Detroit home for cheap and plan to renovate it extensively to make it livable. If so, you need a dumpster where you can deposit large quantities of construction debris—from clumps of drywall to discarded pieces of roofing or flooring. Not all dumpster rental companies let you put construction debris in their bins. Some companies demand that you rent a specific type of dumpster specifically for building waste. Other businesses, meanwhile, let you throw just about anything in the bin—be it construction waste or regular household trash. In most cases, you would do best to rent a dumpster with limited restrictions on what you can put in it. If you do need a bin that can accommodate construction debris, though, just make sure you aren’t renting a bin that doesn’t allow for that kind of waste!

Other project plans can also affect the type of bin you will need—sometimes in ways you might not expect. For instance, say you are preparing for a move and need a place to put anything you don’t want anymore. Or say you are doing a basement or garage cleanout for the spring and you need an easy way to dispose of all the junk you are sure to find. Because these scenarios are among the most common reasons to rent a dumpster, people often assume they won’t have to worry about restrictions.

However, the fact is that every dumpster rental company is different when it comes to rules. Some will let you throw anything away if it isn’t hazardous waste of some sort. Others have rules about larger furniture items (mattresses especially), appliances (like refrigerators), or electronic waste (especially big TVs). These types of waste are difficult to dispose of safely and ethically, and some dumpster rental companies simply opt not to deal with them. If you plan on depositing any of these items in your rental dumpster, you will need to make sure you aren’t renting from a company with a lengthy “restricted items” list.

Even if you don’t think you are throwing away anything objectionable, it’s always best to ask what you can or cannot throw away. Some restricted items might surprise you. For instance, did you know that most landfills in the United States don’t accept tires? As a result, many dumpster companies don’t allow them either. Bottom line, you will never know if you are breaking the rules unless you ask what the rules are.

The Sizing Question: How Much Dumpster Do You Need?

If self-reflection is the most essential part of the dumpster rental planning process, dumpster sizing might be the most challenging part. Depending on what dumpster rental companies you look at, you might end up with half a dozen or more sizing options at your disposal. On one end, you can rent a 10-cubic yard dumpster for your project. On the other end, you can go up to 40 or 50 cubic yards of space. Which option is right for you?

A cubic yard is about the size of a standard residential appliance, like a dishwasher or an oven. Even having that picture in your mind, though, it can still be extremely difficult to figure out sizing. What looks like 20 dishwasher-size clumps of junk in your basement could end up only taking up half that space in a dumpster. Most people just aren’t great at estimating measurements at a glance, which can cause some big problems for a dumpster rental.

While having the freedom to choose a dumpster size can be nice—especially if you really do have a lot of junk and require an industrial-sized bin—it tends to be a burden for a lot of clients. Wouldn’t it be easier if you didn’t have to make the sizing call? Luckily, there are some dumpster rental companies out there that offer a one-size-fits-all service. The fact is that most residential clients don’t need more than 10-12 cubic yards of dumpster space. The option to rent larger dumpsters, therefore, causes these clients to pay for more space than they need. To avoid pointless overspending, look for a dumpster rental company that will bill you according to the amount of dumpster space you actually use.

Keep It Green

Landfills across the country are overflowing. They are producing gases that smell bad and are environmentally harmful. They are making the land for dozens of miles around them undesirable and practically worthless. These problems will only worsen as time goes on and will only be made more problematic as the average person produces more and more garbage. Therein lies one of the most significant benefits of recycling: not only does it keep junk out of landfills, but it also disposes of it more safely.

Of course, if you are renting a dumpster, you are probably in pursuit of speed and convenience, and the simple fact is that it is more convenient to toss all your junk into a single bin that it is to sort it into separate piles for trash and recycling. If you want to make sure you are being as environmentally-conscious as possible, but don’t want to add hours or days of sorting time to your project, look for a green dumpster rental company. Instead of shuttling everything off to the nearest landfill, these businesses sort your junk for you and pull out items that can be donated, recycled, or reused/repurposed in some way. Choosing a green dumpster rental company can be a surprisingly effective way to reduce your carbon footprint—all without killing the efficiency of your cleanout or renovation project.

By following the tips above, you should have no problem finding the right Detroit dumpster rental to suit your needs. Good luck as you move forward with your project!