How to get rid of appliances in Jacksonville

The short answer

Each price includes carrying it out - from the kitchen, the carport, the garage, the utility closet or the upstairs laundry - and full disposal. Minimum $75 per visit.

Refrigerant: handled, never a surcharge

Refrigerators, freezers, window and portable air conditioners, outdoor condensers, heat pumps and dehumidifiers all contain refrigerant in a sealed system. Federal rules require that refrigerant to be recovered properly by certified technicians before the appliance is scrapped, rather than vented into the atmosphere. That is why white goods are treated differently from ordinary bulky waste almost everywhere.

Two things to be clear about.

We handle it. Sealed-system appliances go through a disposal route that does the recovery properly. You do not need to arrange anything, find a technician, or produce paperwork.

There is no surcharge for it. A refrigerator is $164. That is the price with the refrigerant handling already inside it. There is no environmental fee, no EPA fee, no recovery charge and nothing added after the job. If another quote you are comparing shows a separate line for this, that is a real difference between the two prices and worth asking about.

One related warning. If someone offers to strip a fridge or an AC unit for scrap in your driveway, do not let them. Cutting a sealed system open to pull the compressor vents the refrigerant, and the appliance came from your address.

Retailer haul-away: one day only

The genuinely free route is the delivery crew that brings your new appliance. It is worth taking, and it is worth understanding why it so often fails.

Haul-away is arranged at the point of purchase and happens on the delivery run. Not before, not after, and not as a separate visit. That single-day window is the whole problem, because these are the conditions that get it declined on the doorstep:

• The old unit is somewhere else. The new fridge goes in the kitchen; the old one is the beer fridge in the carport. Delivery crews generally take the one they are replacing, in the spot they are working.
• It is still connected. Water line to the ice maker, gas line to the range, hardwired dryer. Most delivery contracts do not include disconnection.
• It is upstairs. Second-floor laundry is standard in the newer two-story builds out toward Bartram Park, Oakleaf and Nocatee, and carrying an old washer down is not always covered.
• It is dirty or moldy. A front-loader gasket after a few Jacksonville summers, or a fridge that sat unplugged and closed, can be refused on sight.

Confirm haul-away in writing when you buy, and state where the old unit actually is. Then have a backup plan for the second appliance, because there is almost always a second appliance.

Before we arrive: the disconnection checklist

Simple rule: we handle plug-in and shut-off-valve disconnections. Gas and hardwired connections need a qualified tradesperson first. That is a safety boundary, not an upsell.

• Refrigerator or freezer. Unplug it, shut the water line to the ice maker, and empty it. If it has been off and closed, open it outside first - a sealed fridge that lost power in a storm is genuinely unpleasant.
• Washer. Shut both supply valves, disconnect the hoses, drain the standpipe hose into a bucket. There is always more water in it than you expect.
• Dryer. Electric: unplug, or have a hardwired unit disconnected by an electrician. Gas: a licensed tradesperson caps the line. Detach the vent duct.
• Dishwasher. Water off, drain line and supply disconnected, and it is usually screwed to the underside of the counter.
• Range. Electric: unplug or disconnect. Gas: the line must be shut and capped by a qualified person before we touch it.
• Water heater. Power or gas off, water off, and drained. A full tank is far too heavy to move and draining takes a while - start it the night before.
• Window AC. Leave it in the window. We will lift it out; they are awkward and they fall outwards.

Worked totals

The laundry pair. Washer $133 plus dryer $128. $133 + $128 = $261. A stacked combo counts as one unit at $189.

Garage cold storage. Refrigerator $164 plus chest freezer $146. $164 + $146 = $310.

Full kitchen swap. Refrigerator $164, electric range $134, dishwasher $109, countertop microwave $30. $164 + $134 + $109 + $30 = $437. A half truck is $431, so on a kitchen job book the half truck and put the old cabinets and countertop in it too.

Cooling clear-out. Two large window units (2 × $109 = $218) plus a portable unit $85. $218 + $85 = $303. A quarter truck is $241 - book that.

Water heater and washer together. $131 + $133 = $264.

Truck ladder for reference: $241 / $338 / $431 / $513 / $587 / $661 / $732.

Why Jacksonville is hard on appliances

We collect a lot of units that should have had years left, and the reasons are local:

• The garage fridge. With no basements in Florida, the second refrigerator lives in the garage or carport and runs flat out through six months of Northeast Florida summer. They do not last, and they are the single most common appliance we haul.
• Salt air. Near the ocean at Atlantic Beach, Neptune Beach and Jacksonville Beach, outdoor condensers, window units and carport laundry corrode from the outside in.
• Storm outages. After a multi-day power loss, chest and upright freezers full of spoiled food are routinely written off rather than cleaned. That is our busiest post-hurricane category.
• Lightning and restoration surges. Northeast Florida gets one of the heaviest thunderstorm seasons in the country, and control boards in modern appliances do not enjoy it.
• Hard water. Households on wells out on the Westside, the Northside and into Clay County go through water heaters faster.

What about the free routes?

Two are worth trying before you book, and both have limits.

Scrap collectors. Metal-heavy items - washers, dryers, water heaters, steel-bodied ranges - genuinely do disappear from Jacksonville curbsides. They will not take plastic-tub dishwashers, microwaves, or modern plastic-heavy fridges, and they come when they come, which may be after several days of rain.

Utility recycling programs. Some electric providers run schemes aimed at old working second refrigerators and freezers, sometimes with a rebate. Availability changes, so check directly with your provider. The usual catch in Jacksonville: the garage fridge has to still be running to qualify, and by the time most people want rid of it, it is not.

And check your city bulk-waste page for how white goods are handled in your scheduled collection - appliances often have separate rules from ordinary bulky items.

Booking it

Tell us which appliances, whether they are disconnected, and where they are - kitchen, garage, carport, utility closet, upstairs laundry. That is enough to fix the price. There is no stair fee for the second-floor laundry and no carry-distance fee for the long driveway.

If you are replacing several units at once, book one window rather than several. The $75 minimum is per visit, and the crossover into truck pricing usually makes a multi-appliance job cheaper than the sum of its parts.

Frequently asked questions