Category: Junk Removal

Everyone has stuff. And between home offices, kids, hobbies and collections of favorite items, you know how stuff can build up. Is it normal or is it hoarding? What is the difference? Here are some of the telltale signs your loved one may be suffering from hoarding that may help you differentiate.

Accumulation of Clutter

One of the first signs of a hoarding disorder is a gradual buildup of clutter in living spaces of items for which there is no immediate need or space. Your loved one might think, “I could use this someday,” or “It’s on sale, so I had better grab several of them.” Recognizing these early signs is key when learning how to help a hoarder clean in a compassionate, supportive way.

They Can’t Throw Things Away

Another sign is their difficulty in discarding items. People suffering from hoarding may keep the packaging from items purchased, pile up newspapers, thinking they’ll read them later, or salvage found items that they can potentially fix—but never do. These problems develop gradually over time, and are often hidden until the buildup becomes significant.

What are some of the other telltale signs that your loved one may have hoarding tendencies or be suffering from hoarding?

Certain Parts of the Home are Off Limits

People with hoarding disorder may try to limit access to rooms in their home to hide the problem. Look for closed doors or excuses why you can’t enter a room. Your loved one might prevent you from entering the house altogether and may become uncomfortable having any visitors at all.

Decluttering is Stalled or Stopped

Your loved one may start decluttering a room, then get waylaid and never complete the task. Sometimes there are just too many decisions to be made and even the smallest organizational task can be overwhelming. They soon stop trying and the clutter builds up even more.

They Can’t Find Things

Is your loved one constantly misplacing their keys, their purse, or other needed items? When there is too much clutter and no organizational system, these items can easily get lost. The person may often be late because they can’t find what they need in order to get out the door.

They Don’t Want to Put Things Away

People with hoarding tendencies like to see their things, and may be resistant to putting them away in closets, cabinets or boxes. Their items are likely stacked everywhere, and cover most horizontal surfaces. If you try to help organize or put things away, or even move items in order to sit in a chair, you may be scolded. Your loved one does not like to have his or her things touched.

Storage Areas are Overflowing

Take a quick look at the closets and garage. Likely, they are filled to the brim. And often, your loved one may have one or more storage facilities outside of the home, like a shed, outbuilding or a paid storage unit.

They Continue to Buy

Your loved one may be in debt, even without your knowing it, because of their compulsive need to buy. They’ll have good reasons why they needed to make a purchase, like a need to buy gifts for upcoming birthday or holiday celebration. But look outside of these gift purchases. Are the pantry and refrigerator overflowing with out-of-date foods? Are there stacks of unread books? Or unopened packages? Debt can also accumulate from the fees paid to outside storage facilities.

Related: The ICD Clutter-Hoarding Scale

What is Hoarding?

“Hoarding disorder is a persistent difficulty discarding or parting with possessions because of a perceived need to save them,” reports the Mayo Clinic. “A person with hoarding disorder experiences distress at the thought of getting rid of the items and excessive accumulation of items, regardless of actual value, occurs.”

Cases may range from mild to severe, and can have from little to huge impact on someone’s life, or even affect day-to-day functioning. If you suspect that your loved one may be a hoarder, there may not be much you can do personally. Since hoarding disorder may stem from a mental or physiological condition, it could be time to get a trained behavioral or medical professional involved.

Let 123JUNK Help With Junk Removal

When it’s time to clear out a home or donate items, 123JUNK can help. We understand the difficulties you can have with loved ones suffering from a hoarding disorder and truly care about assisting you. Give us a call and let’s talk about how we can help create a healthy and happy home environment for your loved one. To schedule your junk removal or cleanout services in Maryland, Washington, DC or Northern Virginia, contact 123JUNK at 1-800-364-5778.

–photo from The Mayo Clinic

When 123JUNK schedules a junk removal pickup with a homeowner or business client, we prefer that the client is going to be on site when we arrive. However, “Do I need to be there for my junk removal” is one of the questions we sometimes get from prospective clients. Let’s look at why you need to be present.

Here are some reasons why you need to be there for your junk removal:

To Enable Interior Access

When you have junk, furniture or household goods that need to be removed from inside your home, garage or yard, our team members will require access. Someone needs to be there to let them in and walk them to the areas where our team will get to work. We’ll also need to see the floors, stairs, walls and any property we’ll need to work around so we can protect them during your junk removal.

To Identify Items for Removal

You know exactly which items need to be hauled, and you may have already gathered them into a pile. But if you have furniture, appliances or other large items, they cannot be piled. To ensure we take the correct items—and get everything you want removed, we ask that you be there to help to point them out to our team.

To Make Sure We Can Take It

There are certain items, like chemicals or hazardous waste, that are prohibited by law for 123JUNK to haul. And sometimes our clients have questions on whether we can take an item or not. You need to be there to show us the items, and it’s OK if you ask if we can haul or recycle things you’re not sure about. We do ask that you not put questionable items into boxes where they cannot be identified by sight. You can also check our FAQs for a listing of items we can and cannot take.

Related: EPA–Household Hazardous Waste

To Ensure the Job is Complete

When you are there for your junk removal, we want you to make sure that we complete the job to your full satisfaction—that we’ve taken all of the items you want us to and swept the area where they were located to leave it tidy.

To Set Expectations About What Can Be Donated.

In order to provide a better service experience to our clients, it is best that we have a discussion about your items and our professional opinion about what our charity partners will be interested in accepting from your property.

Are There Times When I Don’t Need to Be There for My Junk Removal?

We truly prefer that you are on site when we arrive for your junk removal, and in 99.9% of the time, we’ll require it. It helps us to avoid confusion, offer you a smoother and more enjoyable transaction, and ensure that the job is done right and to your satisfaction.

On rare occasions, we have scheduled a curbside pickup where the client does not have to be there. Whether we can provide that service to your situation is something we determine on a case-by-case basis.

Schedule Your Junk Removal in DC, MD and No. VA with 123JUNK

When you schedule your junk removal with 123JUNK, we’ll walk you through what to expect and provide you with convenient, all-inclusive pricing up front. If you need junk removal from your home—or commercial or office spaces—in Northern Virginia, Maryland or Washington, DC, contact 123JUNK at 1-800-364-5778.

One of the trends that came out of the pandemic was in people wanting to remodel and refresh their living spaces. They likely were working and studying from home and spending a lot more time thinking about how to improve their surroundings. This led to a surge in remodeling for additions to provide extra space, or home offices for work and study, for example. And with a fresh, new space, people also wanted new furniture. Therefore, they began to ask, “How do I donate my old furniture and household items?”

The 123JUNK Donation Process & Philosophy

That’s where 123JUNK comes in. When we created our business, we wanted it to be more than just a junk hauling provider. We had a mission to protect and environment and to serve our local community. That’s why we developed our 1-2-3 Process of Donate-Recycle-Dispose.

Since one of our company’s Core Values is “Deep Community Ties,” we reached out to local charitable organizations like Habitat for Humanity’s ReStore, A Wider Circle, the Montgomery County Humane Society, and Passion for Community, to name a few to see how we could donate furniture and household items to help their causes. We set up a system that works for everyone through our Northern Virginia, DC and Maryland service area.

You can learn more about some of our partners through the Partner Spotlights we feature on our 123JUNK blog. For example, read about Amy Javaid, interim president & CEO at A Wider Circle and its mission, and how your furniture donations can help them provide furnishings to those in need or assist in raising money for their causes.

Your Furniture Donation Helps You Too

When you donate your old furniture through our furniture removal and donation services, 123JUNK will provide you with a receipt and you can claim your donation as a tax deduction. Plus, you know that the furniture your family has enjoyed throughout the years will go to help another family in your own community rather than into the landfill. We also understand there is a certain sentimentality attached to your furniture and our team will treat your items with respect as we collect them and load them onto our big red truck.

Furniture Removal & Donation

Once you decide which furniture items you’d like to donate, just let our 123JUNK team members know where they are as they arrive to your home or office. We’ll remove them from the various rooms; there’s no need for you to gather them together. We take great effort to protect your floors, walls and other belongings as we remove furniture items. We don’t want scuffs or damage any more than you do!

When we load your furniture onto our truck, we have a process there too. We separate furniture and household donations from other hauls like recycling in order to deliver them in the best condition to our charitable partners.

How Can You Donate Your Old Furniture? Call 123JUNK.

There’s no need for you to load your old furniture into your own vehicle to haul it to one of the area’s donation centers. Or to bug your neighbors to help you drag out the sectional couch or massive office desk. Let 123JUNK do the heavy hauling for you.

123JUNK makes it easy to donate your old furniture, whether it’s home furniture or office furniture.  Simply contact us at 1-800-364-5778. You’ll reach one of our associates who can walk you through our process and schedule your pick-up date. For your convenience, we’ll contact you shortly before we arrive on that date to let you know we’re on the way.

Scott Cornblatt, President, OLS Office Liquidation Solutions

Meet Our Partner – Scott Cornblatt, President at OLS Office Liquidation Solutions

We love it when we make solid connections with other business owners who, like us, are interested in protecting our environment while helping others in need. In this post, we’d like to introduce you to Scott Cornblatt, president and owner of Office Liquidation Solutions, or OLS, a company providing office liquidation and decommission services.

What is your role at OLS?

I am the president and creative box maker. I work on business development and building strategic relationships, and serve as the creative branch of the company. The reason I am a creative box maker is this: in our business, we don’t get to make the rules. We have to work inside the box. I am good at making that box any shape it needs to be to get a client’s job done.

How did you get into this business?

I was born into the furniture business. This business was started by my father, Arnold Cornblatt, some 30+ years ago, and I’ve been involved since the beginning. I purchased the company in 2010.

What is your background?

I’ve always owned and run a business since I was 12. My first was a used book store. I put out flyers in the neighborhood to collect books and then I’d put out flyers asking people to buy used books.

I went to college as a sociology major at Adelphi University because I was too arrogant and thought I knew everything about business. I graduated with a BS in sociology on the 16^th and started working at OLS on the 17^th. However, I’ve learned along the way that life lessons sometimes cost more than college.

Who are your clients?

We have basically two groups of clients: 1) national Fortune 1000-and-above companies that we help with liquidation and decommissioning nationally as well as locally, and 2) our local clients who may also be in that same caliber, but most of which are local and regional businesses.  We are national liquidators and regional decommissioners. Most of the time we’re engage with our clients for their end of lease liquidation and decommission to prepare them for turning over the space per the lease agreement. We are a 100% one-stop shop. We’ll remove furniture, fixtures and equipment, personal property, generators, cabling and more. We’ll even patch and paint so our clients are ready to hand over the keys with no fear of hold-over rent.

Every office building you see turns over every 8-10 years. But we see only a small percentage of what goes on in this area. That means that up to 70-80% of what’s in these buildings is thrown away. I want to increase the percentage of product being diverted from landfills, but we need everyone’s help. We ask people that if they know anyone who is a mover, new furniture dealer or project/building manager to tell them that OLS is here and can help. It just takes a phone call and we might be able to divert 100 trucks from the landfill. We also pay substantial referral fees to show our appreciation!

How did you come to partner with 123JUNK?

I met 123JUNK through the Capital Chapter of IFMA, the International Facility Managers Association. I loved 123JUNK’s commitment to the environment and their willingness to step outside their comfort zone to look at what other opportunities might exist. Our goals are similar in that aspect.

One of our first jobs together was a logistically-challenging one with the USGBC, the US Green Building Council. It was surgical in its approach and had a zero-landfill requirement. We sat down with 123JUNK and created a strategy. Once the project started, they were easy to work with and willing to make whatever changes were necessary to make the job a success. It was all about planning in advance on the front end and flexibility on the back end. We liked that their mentality was all about getting it done.

How do you support the local community?

We have wonderful relationships with area school systems and groups like Habitat for Humanity and their ReStores, as well as computer refurbishers like the Phoenix Group. We donate school supplies, furniture, and things people might need on an ongoing basis. We also keep a check list of specific items charities need. We just donated, with one of our clients, 2,500 chairs to Habitat for Humanity, for example.

We also have in-house programs. For example, every six months, each employee gets $250 to give to any organization, as long as it’s not benefitting themselves. Two to three times a year, we do something out of the office as a group. In the past we have worked in a soup kitchen all day and built a jungle gym in a low-income community with other organizations.

Tell us about your Good to Go Green Program

The Good to Go Green Program is really the essence of OLS. It’s a way to make handling assets a priority by offering sustainable options. Our goal is (unless otherwise indicated by clients) to sell, donate, and give assets away. Then we’ll recycle. If we can’t recycle we go to waste to energy (where items are burned and the energy provides power, and gasses are scrubbed), and only as the last resort, do we utilize the landfill.

All of this is wrapped up in the OLS Sustainability Scorecard that demonstrates how many tons of carbon dioxide (CO₂) were diverted from the atmosphere by reuse, recycling and waste to energy. We then translate that data into easily-digestible information, such as the number of average American homes that create the equivalent amount of CO₂ for a year, and how many acres of forests were protected from having to absorb that CO₂. Our ultimate goals are to 1) minimize or mitigate landfill contribution through 90-95% repurposing of assets, and 2) provide our clients with a clear way to tell their environmental impact story.

Do you have favorite aspect of the business?

It may sound corny, but my favorite part of the business is when I see the people who work for me succeed. I feel personal pride when they can buy a new home because we were the conduit to give them that opportunity. I love seeing them take great vacations—and they are not allowed to work on vacation. We want the people who work here to be able to live an enjoyable and fruitful life.

What would you like people to remember?

I hope that when people are planning a move that will create a lot of unused assets that they will look around and wonder, “Is there somebody else who might like this even though I’m replacing it?” rather than just throwing items away. Learn more about OLS and its services and how you can help or make a referral.