How to get rid of a mattress in Baltimore

The short answer

Mattresses price by size:

The minimum per visit is $75, so every one of those clears it on its own. If the bed frame is going too, a standard metal or platform frame is $68, and a solid, upholstered or storage frame is $126 for twin through queen or $152 for king.

Disposal is included. There is no stair charge.

Why a mattress is worse than it looks in a Baltimore rowhouse

A mattress weighs less than a sofa and is harder to move, because it flexes in the middle and grabs every wall it touches.

In a typical Canton or Patterson Park rowhome the bedroom is on the second or third floor, the stairs are narrow and steep, and there is a turn at one end with no landing. A queen mattress folds enough to make that turn. A king usually does not without a fight, and a memory foam king is a genuinely heavy, floppy object that two people have to control on a steep run.

Then there is the box spring. Box springs are rigid. They do not fold, they do not bend, and they are the single most common reason somebody calls us after giving up. A standard queen box spring will not turn a winder stair in a lot of older Baltimore rowhomes, which is why so many of them were split in half to get up there in the first place.

If yours came up in two pieces, it is going down in two pieces, and it is still $92.

Your options

Donation. Be realistic. Most reuse organizations in the Baltimore region will not take a used mattress at all, and the ones that do have strict condition rules. Any staining, any smell from a damp basement, any evidence of bed bugs, and the answer is no everywhere.

Municipal bulk pickup. Baltimore City residents do have a bulk collection option, and the scheduling and item rules live on the city's bulk-trash page. Two things to check before you rely on it: whether mattresses are handled under the general bulk rules or separately, and how far out the next available date is. It is curbside either way, so the third-floor-to-sidewalk part is still yours.

Retailer haul-away. If you are buying a replacement, ask. Many delivery services will take the old set when they bring the new one. Ask specifically whether it includes the box spring and whether it includes carrying it down from a third floor, because those are two separate promises.

Book the carry-out. $103 for a queen, $143 for the set, done in a two-hour window.

The bed-bug question, answered plainly

Say so when you book. It changes how the crew wraps and handles the mattress, and it changes where it goes afterwards. It does not change the price.

What it does change is what you should do first: bag or wrap the mattress in place before it leaves the room. Dragging an unwrapped infested mattress down three flights of a rowhouse staircase distributes the problem across every floor it touches. If you are treating the unit, coordinate the removal with the treatment schedule rather than doing it in whichever order is convenient.

Whole-bedroom pricing

Mattresses rarely leave alone. Common Baltimore combinations, with the addition shown:

Guest room in a Roland Park house. Queen mattress and box spring set $143, standard bed frame $68, nightstand $57. That is 143 + 68 + 57 = $268.

Kid's room in a Hamilton or Lauraville bungalow. Bunk bed $123, two twin mattresses at $82 each. 123 + 82 + 82 = $287.

Primary bedroom after a downsizing move in Guilford. King mattress $114, box spring $92, king solid bed frame $152, large dresser $148. 114 + 92 + 152 + 148 = $506.

If it is easier to think in volume, a quarter truck is $241 and a half truck is $431.

Timing it around Baltimore's calendar

Two weeks a year are genuinely busy for mattress removal in this city: the end of May, when leases turn over around the Homewood campus, MICA and Towson, and late August, when the same neighborhoods refill. Charles Village, Waverly, Remington and Mount Vernon all book out fastest in those windows.

The other predictable spike is the humid end of summer, when people finally deal with the mattress that has been sitting in a basement in Brewers Hill absorbing harbor air since March. That one is not seasonal so much as a limit of patience.

What happens to it

Mattresses are routed for recycling where a facility will take them. The components separate reasonably well: steel springs, foam, and the wood frame inside a box spring all have destinations. Condition decides. Soaked, mildewed, or infested units go to disposal instead.

Either way that cost is already inside the $103 or the $143. Nothing is added afterwards.

Booking it

Pick the sizes, see the total, pick a window. Mention the floor, whether there is a usable rear alley, and whether the box spring came up in pieces. None of those change your price, and all of them change how fast the crew is in and out of your block.

Frequently asked questions