How to get rid of a refrigerator in Colorado Springs

The short answer

Flat prices. Carry-out from any floor and disposal are included, and there is no refrigerant fee, no stair charge and no same-day surcharge. Minimum per visit is $75.

The garage fridge, which is the real Colorado Springs job

Almost every house we go to here has a second refrigerator or a freezer in the garage, and it is usually the one that needs to leave. It is the old kitchen unit that got demoted when the kitchen was updated, and it has been running in an unheated detached or attached garage ever since.

That is a harsh place for a refrigerator in this climate. Most household fridges are designed to work in a fairly narrow ambient band, and a Colorado Springs garage does not stay in it — a January morning below freezing and a July afternoon in the high nineties are the same appliance's operating environment. Cold ambient temperatures confuse the thermostat and the freezer section stops cycling properly; hot afternoons run the compressor hard. They limp along for years and then fail all at once, usually with something in them.

A standard unit out of the garage is $164. If it has failed with food inside, say so when you book — it does not change the price, it just means the crew brings the right kit and does not open it in your driveway.

Chest freezers and the hunting-season cycle

The other appliance this region has in unusual numbers is the chest freezer, and it is there for a specific reason: game. A family fills one in the autumn, runs it down through the winter, and either replaces it when it starts frosting badly or stops using it entirely when the household changes shape.

A chest freezer is $146 and an upright is $149. The practical problems are the same ones every time. Chest freezers are long, heavy and have no useful handholds, they are usually against the back wall of a garage behind everything else, and if the unit has already failed the interior is a sealed problem you do not want to deal with. We take it as-is, closed, and we would rather you left it closed.

The two windows where these calls cluster are early autumn, when people discover the freezer will not hold temperature just as they need it, and late spring, when garages get cleared before the warm months.

What refrigerant handling means, and what it does not cost

Refrigerators, freezers, wine coolers and ice makers are sealed systems. Refrigerant has to be recovered by someone qualified before the metal is processed, and that is genuinely part of what happens to your appliance after it leaves.

It is not a separate charge. There is no refrigerant fee on our invoice. The compliant handling is inside the $164, the $183, the $146. Nothing is added when the crew arrives and notices that a refrigerator is in fact a refrigerator.

Two things to leave alone: do not attempt to vent or drain the system yourself, and do not remove the compressor. Neither is necessary and both make the unit harder to handle safely.

One thing that is genuinely useful: if the fridge is going to be sitting in a garage or on a driveway before we come, remove the doors or secure them shut. That is a child-safety habit worth keeping regardless of who is taking it away.

Getting it out of the house, which is the part people underestimate

A French-door refrigerator is a $183 line item and a genuinely awkward object — wide, top-heavy, and with a door swing that does not clear most interior turns. Where that meets Colorado Springs housing stock:

• Walkout basements on slope. Rockrimmon, Mountain Shadows, Cheyenne Cañon and parts of the Broadmoor put the basement bar fridge or the second freezer a floor below grade with a landing turn in the stairs.
• Narrow older doorways. Old Colorado City, the Westside, Ivywild and Patty Jewett houses were not built around modern appliance widths. Doors come off the fridge, and sometimes off the door frame.
• Detached garages and long drives. Black Forest and Falcon properties can put fifty yards of unpaved ground between the appliance and anywhere a truck can stand, and in spring that ground is soft.

None of it changes the price. The number on the list is what it costs to get the appliance from where it actually is to the truck, not from the curb.

Timing it around a delivery or a move

Two situations account for most of these calls, and both reward booking early.

A replacement delivery. Delivery crews will sometimes take the old unit and sometimes will not, depending entirely on what you bought and from whom. Confirm that before delivery day, because the failure mode is a new fridge in the kitchen and an old one blocking the garage on the same afternoon. If the answer is no, have us come the same week.

A PCS or a house sale. The garage fridge is the appliance most likely to still be plugged in on the last day. It is not on the household goods list, the packers work around it, and it will fail a walkthrough or a pre-listing clean. A standard fridge and a chest freezer together is $164 + $146 = $310, booked for after the packers and before the inspection.

There is no same-day surcharge if it does come down to the last minute, and no price difference for booking three weeks ahead. Booking early just buys you a choice of time.

Clearing the whole appliance set

Appliances tend to go in groups, especially in a pre-sale clean or a kitchen refit. The arithmetic, shown so you can check it:

• Standard fridge and a dishwasher: $164 + $109 = $273.
• Garage fridge and an upright freezer: $164 + $149 = $313.
• Kitchen set — French-door fridge, electric range, dishwasher: $183 + $134 + $109 = $426.
• Fridge with a washer and dryer: $164 + $133 + $128 = $425.

Once a list gets to that size, check it against volume pricing: a quarter truck is $241, three-eighths is $338, a half is $431. We price both ways and quote the lower one. Appliances are heavy rather than bulky, so item pricing usually stays cheaper — but we run the comparison for you rather than making you ask.

Frequently asked questions