Question 1: Will you give me the total before you dispatch?

This is the question everything else hangs off.

Junk removal has historically been sold by volume, which means the price is decided on site, by the person standing next to the truck, at the exact moment you have the least leverage. In San Francisco that moment is particularly bad: the sofa is already pulled away from the wall, the buyer is coming at four, and nobody is sending a truck away over a number.

Listen for: an itemized total, in writing, before anyone is dispatched. "A sofa is $126, a loveseat is $119, so $126 + $119 = $245" is an answer. "It depends what it fills" is a process.

If the company works on volume, that is not disqualifying on its own — but insist on seeing the whole ladder before booking, so you know the ceiling rather than the floor.

Question 2: Is disposal included, or is the tip separate?

A quote that excludes disposal is not a quote. It is a labor estimate with an open-ended second invoice attached.

It also sets up the wrong incentive. When the tip is a separate cost the hauler absorbs, there is money to be saved by not going to the tip — and illegal dumping in San Francisco is traced back to the address the load came from, not to the van that carried it.

Listen for: disposal, transfer station charges and the recycling sort all inside the quoted number, with no fuel line and no environmental fee added at the end.

Question 3: Do stairs change the price?

In most cities this is a hypothetical. Here it is the default condition.

The standard San Francisco home is a flat above a garage: half a flight from the pavement to the front door, a full flight from there to the living floor, a narrow straight stair with a ninety-degree turn onto a landing, and no lift anywhere in the building. If a hauler prices stairs as an extra, they will be pricing an extra on almost every job in this city — and you will find out which tier you are in once they have seen it.

Listen for: carry-out from any floor included, no stair charge, no walk-up fee, no surcharge for a long carry to where the truck could actually park.

Ask the follow-up too: what happens if it will not fit down the stairs? A good answer is that the crew cuts it apart on site and that this is part of the job. That is why an oversize sofa has its own published price of $185 rather than becoming a negotiation on your landing.

Question 4: Can you produce a certificate of insurance for my building?

If you live in a managed building, ask this before anything else, because it can void the booking entirely.

Buildings across SoMa, Mission Bay and Rincon Hill, converted lofts in the Mission and Dogpatch, and a great many HOA-run buildings elsewhere require a certificate of insurance naming the building and its management company before a contractor gets past the lobby. Many also require the service lift to be booked and padded within set hours.

Listen for: "send us the management company details and we will get it over", plus a realistic lead time. Certificates take a couple of days to issue, not a couple of hours.

Ring your building manager first and ask what they require. Getting that answer before you book saves the most annoying possible version of this going wrong.

Question 5: How do you handle my street?

A question almost nobody asks, and the one that most often decides whether the day runs smoothly.

San Francisco streets are not neutral. Large parts of the Mission, North Beach, Telegraph Hill and Potrero Hill are one-way. Grades in Bernal Heights, Russian Hill and the upper Castro are steep enough that a truck cannot casually reverse to correct an overshoot. Nearly every block has a posted street-cleaning window, and most residential blocks are permit-zoned, which tolerates active loading but not an all-afternoon park.

Listen for: a hauler who asks you for the cross street, whether the road is one-way, how steep it is, and when cleaning runs on your side — and who then tells you it does not change the price, only the arrival slot.

A company that has no questions about your street has not worked here much.

Question 6: What will you not take?

Ask this before the day rather than discovering it on the day. The honest answer includes a few real exclusions, and a hauler who claims to take absolutely everything is not being straight with you.

Standard exclusions worth confirming: hazardous chemicals beyond ordinary household paint, biohazard remediation, and active pest infestation — those need licensed specialists. Everything else should be covered, including the categories a curbside collection will not handle: refrigerant appliances, electronics, construction debris and anything too large to reach the curb intact.

For reference, those all have published prices: a standard refrigerator is $164, a 42-to-65-inch television is $68, construction debris is $120, a hot tub is $322, an upright piano is $290, paint is $30 a one-gallon can and $52 a five-gallon bucket.

Red flags

  • A headline price with no list behind it. A number designed to start a phone call rather than finish a quote.
  • Cash only, no receipt. No paper trail means no recourse and no way to prove where your things went.
  • Reluctance about the certificate of insurance. It means either no cover or no experience with managed buildings, and both will cost you the day.
  • A one-person crew for a two-person job. Watch for this on mattress, appliance and solid furniture jobs. It is how stairwells get damaged and people get hurt.
  • Vagueness about disposal. "We take care of it" is not an answer to "where does it go?"
  • A quote that only exists verbally. If it is not in writing before dispatch, it is not a price.

What good looks like

Put positively, the hauler you want does five things: publishes prices so you can check the total yourself; includes disposal so the incentives point the right way; includes the stairs so the number does not change on your landing; carries insurance and can prove it to your building; and asks about your street because they have worked on it before.

For calibration, here is what ordinary San Francisco jobs come to on a published list: a sofa and loveseat is $126 + $119 = $245; a queen mattress, box spring and metal frame is $103 + $92 + $68 = $263; a washer and dryer is $133 + $128 = $261. The visit minimum is $95, and whole-flat clears run the truck ladder from $241 for a quarter truck up to $732 for a full one.

Any hauler who can put numbers like those in front of you before booking has already passed most of this checklist.

Frequently asked questions

What is the single most important question to ask?

Will you give me the itemized total in writing before you dispatch? Everything else — disposal, stairs, insurance — either shows up in that answer or is exposed by its absence.

Should I get three quotes?

Get three if you like, but compare like for like. A quote that excludes disposal, or that prices stairs as a tier, is not comparable to one that includes both. Ask all three the same four questions and the differences resolve quickly.

My building needs a certificate of insurance. How far ahead should I sort that?

A few days. Ring your building manager first, find out what they require and whether the service lift needs booking, then give those details to your hauler at the time of booking. Leaving it to the morning of the job is how bookings get lost at a lobby.

How do I know a quote will not change on the day?

Because it is itemized against a published list. A sofa is $126 whether it is in a ground-floor Bayview garage or three flights up in Russian Hill. The only thing that should change a total is you adding items once the crew has arrived — and you approve that first.

Is the cheapest quote ever the right one?

Sometimes, if it passes the same checks. The cheap quotes that go wrong are the ones that are cheap because something is missing — disposal, insurance, or a second pair of hands on a narrow Victorian stair. Work out which of those is absent before you decide.