Recycle Those House Parts!

Home renovations and tear-downs are all around us these days, and you hear a lot about builders and renovators building “greener,” more energy-efficient homes. What you don’t hear about as much is what’s done with the old house parts. These missed opportunities for recycling really get me going.

You see, many house parts, including bathroom fixtures, appliances, cabinets, doors, and much more can be sold or donated for re-use elsewhere. Earn extra cash to help with your renovation by selling your house parts on sites like Craigslist. Or if you have enough items, it may be worth having a yard sale. One client took the latter approach and never actually had to hold the sale: A lady who saw an ad for the sale bought his entire inventory for use in her rental properties.

Now, if you just want to get rid of these things, and don’t care about the money or don’t have the time to fuss with a sale, there are sites that only list free items, such as Freecycle. I have had great luck using this, as well as the “free” section of Craigslist.

Also consider donating unwanted house parts to a worthy organization, such as Habitat For Humanity’s ReStore, which sells them to the general public at a fraction of the retail price. Proceeds help local Habitat affiliates fund the construction of Habitat homes within their communities. It’s a great way to recycle and directly benefit your community.

You can either take your items directly to one of Habitat’s outlets, or they will even come pick them up. You may want to go to the ReStore yourself – you never know what you may find. It’s a great place to get vintage parts that will keep your renovation both cost-effective and true to the era of the home.

One of the things that got me going about this was observing the recent renovation of a home around the corner from me. In unincorporated Dekalb county, a home cannot have water turned on in a new owner’s name unless the plumbing fixtures, including toilets and faucets, have been changed out for the low-flow type that were manufactured since 1994. This particular home had four bathrooms, so the sellers had to put in four new toilets (it is not a requirement that a seller pay for this – it is totally negotiable with a potential buyer). As one might expect, the sellers installed four basic white toilets in the bathrooms.

Well, as soon as the new owners began renovating, I went by one day and saw all four brand-new toilets thrown in the dumpster out front. I’ve seen the same thing happen with tear-downs, where the entire home is bulldozed without attempting to save any of the valuable parts. That’s wasteful and unnecessary.

So, if you’re going to renovate – large or small – or tear down and build, consider these options to help save resources and potentially help others in need. If you have a contractor handling the renovation or build, discuss the options with them.