Interior Demolition
Strip-outs and gut demolition, taken back to the shell the next trade needs.
More on interior demolitionConstruction Debris Removal in New York City
Construction and demolition debris does not leave a New York site with the trash. It leaves with a registered carter and has to reach a registered facility, so we plan it into the demolition rather than treating it as an errand at the end.
Where the material actually goes
Demolition produces heavy, mixed, mostly non-compactible material: masonry, concrete, plaster and lath, timber, metal, glass, and the finishes that came off first.
We separate it where separation is useful, load it to the route the site allows, and carry it to a facility licensed to receive it. Removal of construction and demolition debris is registrable activity in New York City, and a registered carter carries it.
That is not a detail of the paperwork. It decides how the material leaves the site, how many trips there are, and what the job costs.
What that rule means for you Under the city's trade-waste rules, removing construction and demolition debris, including waste a business generates itself, requires a registration, and the material has to reach a facility licensed to receive it. The practical consequence is that your debris leaves with a registered carter and arrives somewhere licensed to take it, and we plan that route into the job rather than leaving you to arrange it.
Whether you can simply put it out
This is the question most people arrive with, and the answer turns entirely on who did the work rather than on how much of it there is.
If you did it yourself, small-scale work with no contractor involved, the city collects it. Materials from a do-it-yourself project go out at the kerb: mostly-metal and mostly-plastic items with the recycling, everything else with the trash, up to six large items per collection day. Treated wood, plywood and composites are not compostable and go out as trash, bundled and tied when they will not fit a bin. Glass windows and mirrors cannot be recycled at all and are set out with the trash, taped, with broken glass double-bagged.
If a contractor did the work, none of that applies. Construction and demolition waste generated by a professional cannot be discarded as residential garbage. It leaves in a container arranged through a private carter, and the Business Integrity Commission certifies the haulers approved to carry that material and keeps the list of them.
The line is drawn at who held the tools, not at volume. One partition taken out by a contractor is professional waste. A basement a homeowner emptied slowly over a month is not.
Why it is priced into the job
Because it is not optional and its volume is knowable in advance. A gut of a given size produces a predictable amount of material, and the number of containers and trips is part of the estimate rather than a surprise on the last day.
The alternative is a pile in a yard or a hallway while somebody arranges collection. That costs more, blocks the next trade, and in a building with an alteration agreement is usually a violation of it. In a walk-up it also means carrying the material twice.
What drives the number
Four things, and only one of them is how much stuff there is.
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Weight, not volume
Containers reach a legal weight before they reach a full one. Masonry and concrete price on tonnage, so a bulky but light gut of timber and plasterboard prices very differently from the same volume of slab.
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How many containers, and where they stand
Kerb space, permits where the container sits on the street, driveway width and overhead clearance. On some sites a container cannot stand there at all, and we load the material straight to a truck instead.
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How far it is carried
From the room to the container. A fifth-floor walk-up and a loading dock are the same volume of material and a very different number of hours.
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When it can move
Building working hours, street rules and the crew's schedule. Material that can only leave between nine and eleven has set the number of days.
What separation is actually for
We sort where sorting changes where the material goes, and not as theatre.
Metal comes out separately because there is a route for it. We keep clean masonry and concrete separate because they are handled differently from mixed debris. Timber, plasterboard and finishes go as mixed construction and demolition material, because separating them further does not change their destination.
What does not belong in a demolition container at all: anything with a fuel or refrigerant in it, paint and solvents, batteries, tyres, and suspected asbestos-containing material. Each of those has its own route and its own rules, and the last one stops the job rather than changing the container.
How we leave the site
Swept, clear and safe to walk. Protection comes out last rather than being cleaned around, and the carry route is uncovered only once the last load has gone.
We take the containers with us. A container left standing on a kerb after the work is finished is somebody else's problem to solve, and it is usually the customer's, so we schedule the final collection as part of the job rather than as a call you have to chase.
Questions about debris removal
Can I just get a container and load it myself?
For household clear-outs, often yes. For construction and demolition debris the rules about who removes it and where it goes still apply, and a container arriving is not the same as a compliant route out. If demolition work is producing the material, it is simpler and usually cheaper to have it leave as part of the job.
Do you take asbestos, lead paint or contaminated material?
Suspected asbestos-containing material stops the work on that element and goes to a licensed abatement contractor before demolition resumes. Where a building predates 1 April 1987 and the work needs a Department of Buildings permit, an asbestos assessment by a DEP-certified investigator is part of the owner's filing and comes ahead of demolition in the sequence. We tell you on the first call if what you are describing is likely to sit in that sequence, so it can start early.
How many containers will my job need?
That comes out of the walk-through, and it is arithmetic rather than a guess: the area, the material and what it weighs. You get the number before the work starts, and the estimate says what happens if the job produces more than expected.
Can the container go on the street?
Sometimes, and it depends on the street and on what permission the site has. Where it cannot, we load the material direct to a truck on a schedule instead, which changes the price rather than the possibility.
Do you clean up at the end, or just take the debris?
We sweep the space and take our protection out last, and that is included. A finish clean before a handover to a tenant or a buyer is a different trade.
The rest of what Breakara does
Debris removal is the last stage of each of these, and we plan it in at the first.
Concrete Removal
Sidewalks, slabs, driveways, steps and foundations, broken out and carried off the site.
More on concrete removal
Building Demolition
Whole structures, where the filing and the sequence come long before the machine.
More on building demolitionTell us what is coming out, and where it is.
You will get a straight answer on the first call, including whether it needs a filing before it can start.