In the following cost guide, we’ll break down the prices for various types of garden waste removal, including soil waste removal and green waste removal.
If you’re planning extensive garden maintenance or currently have some garden waste in need of removal, there are several ways this can be achieved.
This article will prove very useful if you plan to have garden waste removed by a professional, or to do so yourself in the near future. Garden waste removal is the process of tidying up a garden by removing excess growth, soil, and garden debris (i.e. fallen leaves, etc.).
Removing garden rubbish is common because it makes for a safer and neater looking garden, with environmental benefits and because it can reduce the risk of pests.
On average, it will cost somewhere in the range of £70 to £200 to have garden waste removed. However, the cost will depend, for instance, on the type of garden waste removal, and the amount of garden waste being removed.
Green waste removal will likely cost about £100. The same is true for brown waste removal. Should you wish to have soil waste removed, it will cost roughly £0.15 per kg.
As for the practical soil garden waste removal prices, to remove 50kg of waste would cost around £7.50.
It would set you back roughly £15 to get rid of 100kg of waste, £37.50 to remove 250kg of soil waste, £75 to have 500kg removed, £150 should you need to have a tonne of waste removed, or £225 for the removal of 1.5 tonnes of waste.
In the case of leaf blowing, a professional will probably charge around £60 to perform this task. The cost of rubbish removal will depend on the method used. You will likely pay around £25 to £60 an hour for a man and van service, for instance.
Skip hire typically costs about £80 to £100 for a 2-yard skip, £80 to £110 for a 3-yard skip, £100 to £250 for a 4-yard skip and £150 to £250 for a 6-yard skip.
While larger sizes such as an 8-yard skip will be priced at £200 to £350, £200 to £400 for a 10-yard skip, £250 to £440 for a 12-yard skip and £250 to £450 for a 14-yard skip.
As for the contractor rates, you can expect to pay around £25 to £30 an hour, or approximately £200 to £250 a day.
If we leave out the labour cost, then you might save somewhere in the range of £30 to £200, depending on the work at hand.
The cost of doing the work yourself will depend on whether you’d need to buy anything. Though presumably, you’re going to need to hire a skip if there are substantial amounts of garden waste to remove, in which case, the costs are the same as listed above.
Buying a leaf blower might cost around £50 to £100. Should you need to purchase a new lawnmower, you will likely pay between £50 and £500, though they can cost upwards of £1000.
A hand trowel would probably cost between £5 and £10, a pruner, about £10 to £230, and a hedge trimmer, roughly £30 to £60.
The overall cost of garden waste removal, whether performed DIY or by professionals, will depend not only on the type of waste removal but also on how big the garden is and ease of access.
Further, where exactly in the UK you live will also shape the overall cost. This is because gardeners and other contractors charge different hourly rates depending on the region, with London and the southeast of England having higher rates than most of the country, for example.
| TYPE OF GARDEN RUBBISH REMOVAL | AVERAGE COST |
|---|---|
| General Waste Removal | £70 to £200 |
| Green Waste Removal | £100 |
| Brown Waste Removal | £200 |
| Soil Waste Removal | £15 to £225 |
| Leaf Blowing | £60 |
| RUBBISH WEIGHT | AVERAGE COST |
|---|---|
| 50kg of Waste | £7.50 |
| 100kg of Waste | £15 |
| 250kg of Waste | £37.50 |
| 500kg of Waste | £75 |
| 1 Tonne of Waste | £150 |
| 1.5 Tonnes of Waste | £225 |
| SIZE OF COST | AVERAGE HIRING COST |
|---|---|
| 2 Yard Skip | £80 to £100 |
| 3 Yard Skip | £80 to £110 |
| 4 Yard Skip | £100 to £250 |
| 6 Yard Skip | £150 to £250 |
| 8 Yard Skip | £200 to £350 |
| 10 Yard Skip | £200 to £400 |
| 12 Yard Skip | £250 to £440 |
| 14 Yard Skip | £250 to £440 |
There are various approaches when it comes to removing garden waste. In this section, we’ll break down these types, look at their pros & cons and which options are the cheapest and most expensive.
This is the process of removing compostable organic material, such as flowers, grass, compost, etc. and tidying up the garden to create a neater, more orderly look. It contrasts brown waste removal which might involve the removal of woodchip, straw, or fallen leaves.
Green waste removal involves taking compostable waste/matter and usually first putting it into rubbish bags for organisation reasons. This will make it easier to load the rubbish into a skip or a van, depending on the method of waste removal.
On average, the green waste removal cost will land around £100, though if you hire a skip, it will depend on the size of the skip, which in turn will depend on the amount of garden waste. This is one of the most popular forms of garden waste removal.
✔ Tidies up garden.
✔ Reduces risk of pests.
✔ Possible without a skip or van service for small amounts of waste removal.
✖ Can spark allergic reactions during or after clean-up (e.g. hay fever).
Whether you want to remove a small area of unwanted soil, or require large quantities of soil to be removed, such as ahead of work to install artificial grass, soil waste removal can be performed by professionals or as a DIY job.
It will generally cost about £0.15 per kg, and for a small quantity of soil, it would be one of the least expensive garden waste removal jobs possible. In some cases, homeowners will choose to hire professionals to remove contaminated soil.
✔ Helps to clear up your garden before the soil is removed.
✔ Soil waste removal cost is usually low.
✖ If mistakes are made in areas where the soil is removed, it could be costly to fix.
Unlike green waste removal, this involves removing organic material such as straw, dead leaves, woodchip, plant stems, sawdust, hedge trimmings, or pine cones. Brown waste is mostly carbon-based.
Brown waste removal typically costs around £100, but again, this will depend on the method of waste removal, and how much needs to be thrown out.
✔ Way of getting rid of more than just green waste.
✔ Perfect for cleaning up after hedge trimming.
✖ Does not necessarily cover compostable waste removal.
✖ You may not have very much to throw out, but the hourly rate of any hired contractors will still apply.
The purpose of leaf blowing is to remove dead leaves and similar organic debris from a surface by pushing it toward the edges of the area, or outside of it.
So, for instance, if you have leaves clogging your driveway, a gardener may push them away from the centre and toward the walls, giving your driveway a neater, fresher look.
The average cost is about £60 if you’d like to hire a professional to undertake this work for you. Though, it would be a worthy investment to buy a leaf blower. Leaf blowers can be powered either by gas or electricity and usually cost around £50 to £100.
Leaf blowing is one of the cheapest types of garden waste removal. In most cases, this work will involve redistributing the leaves rather than actually removing them from the property (e.g. with a skip).
There are some downsides to leaf blowers, however, including that they are a fire hazard and release harmful pollutants into the air. To find suitable leaf-blowing services, try Googling ‘Leaf blowing service near me’.
✔ An inexpensive form of waste removal (if you hire a professional).
✔ Easy and fast.
✖ Leaves may just spread back out again if the wind picks up.
✖ Gas-powered leaf blowers release pollutants and are not good for your health.
✖ Gas-powered leaf blowers come with a fire risk.
✖ Can lead to unhealthy soil.
General garden rubbish removal involves either having garden waste removed with a man and van service, or a skip.
This form of garden waste removal is particularly commonplace and can encompass other types of waste removal, such as green and brown rubbish removal.
A man and van service usually costs about £25 to £60 an hour, while hiring a skip could set you back anywhere from £80 to £450, depending on the size of the skip.
Should you go with the latter option, you’ll want to make sure not too to choose a skip that is too large or too small, as this would lead to either wasting money or not having sufficient space to remove all of the rubbish.
If there is a lot of garden waste to remove, it could end up being fairly expensive, and on average, this is going to be the most expensive type of garden waste removal.
✔ Clears up the garden.
✔ A fast and effective way of removing bags of garden rubbish.
✖ You could end up with the wrong sized skip (if chosen method of waste removal).
Firstly, you’ll need to decide what, if any of the work you’d like to do yourself between garden maintenance and the waste removal process.
You may choose to cut the grass, trim hedges, etc. by yourself, and then hire a contractor to gather the garden waste and remove it for you.
Alternatively, you may decide to do it all yourself, such as by hiring a skip. For the waste removal itself, you could put it into bin bags and then have a contractor take these away, or you could hire someone to undertake both of these steps.
It will ultimately depend on your budget and preferences. Unless you plan to do all of the work yourself, you’ll want to hire professionals/companies that have a good track record and ideally, with positive online reviews, if applicable.
Alternatively, you could ask a friend or family member for a good recommendation.
This job would usually take place after garden maintenance or other garden work (e.g. removing grass and soil for the instalment of new decking).
Whether it is green waste, brown waste, or otherwise, the first part of the job will involve organising the waste, such as by putting it to bin liners.
Once this is complete, the full bin bags can be added to a skip or removed via another service such as a man and van service.
For a small garden waste removal job, you may only need to put the bin liner(s) into your own bins.
For a garden waste skip hire, the loaded skip will be collected on a given date, as agreed to with or set by the provider.
If it is only leaf blowing that is required, this simply involves using a leaf blower to push leaves away from one area to the outskirts/sides with air power alone.
In most cases, garden waste is the result of garden maintenance. The cost of garden maintenance can vary significantly depending on the job or several jobs you would like to have performed.
For fairly comprehensive garden maintenance, you’d likely pay between £150 and £250, though, for a large garden, it could cost up to £800 or more.
On average, to hire a gardener for grass cutting costs around £20 to £30 an hour. You’ll pay about £50 an hour to have a gardener cut your garden’s hedges, £60 to £70 an hour for pruning or £25 per hour for weeding.
Gardeners tend to charge about £15 to £25 an hour in general.
The average gutter cleaning cost is about £100 to £150 for a semi-detached house where scaffolding is not needed. With scaffolding, expect a fee of around £400.
While it is unlikely that garden waste removal will require planning permission or building regulations approval, should it prove necessary, the associated fees would cost around £150-£250 and anywhere from £200-£500 respectively.
Of course, removing garden rubbish can easily be done DIY. It is more likely that difficulties would arise with some garden maintenance work, such as pruning certain plants, and you may prefer to hire a professional in these cases.
Though for garden waste removal, it is usually as straightforward as gathering the waste in bin liners and adding it to a skip or having it prepared for someone to come by and collect the waste with a van.
Leaf blowers usually cost around £50 to £100, so in the short-term, it may cost you a bit less to hire a professional. Though, as mentioned earlier, buying a leaf blower can be a good investment if you plan to use one in the future.
Undertaking this sort of work DIY can make for cheap garden waste removal.
It is unlikely that any planning permission approval or building checks will apply to the garden waste removal process itself. The work that produces the garden waste is another matter altogether. If you have any doubts, you can always contact your local council.
It is very unlikely that anyone will need to sign off on your garden waste removal work.
However, as with any work, there is a range of hazards and dangers that you should be conscious of. When adding the garden waste to bin liners, you need to be sure that you are not dealing with particularly poisonous plants like Foxglove or Deadly nightshade.
Also, watch out for any thorns or otherwise sharp bits of organic matter that could cause hand cuts. As mentioned earlier, gas-powered leaf blowers release harmful pollutants which pose a health risk. Further, these types of leaf blowers also come with a small risk of fire or even exploding.
Like with any job, garden waste removal can come with headaches. For one, if you hire a skip, you may accidentally choose the wrong size, and end up either spending more than you need to, or worse, a skip that isn’t large enough.
Garden waste removal could prove more expensive than expected too if there are plenty of areas in your garden without easy access. Also, if you do it as a DIY job, it can be time-consuming.
If any planning permission or building control approval is needed and your application(s) are rejected, you can apply again with the appropriate changes to your plans.
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Most types of organic garden matter can go in a garden waste bin prior to garden waste collection, including, but not limited to flowers, branches, grass cuttings, hedge trimmings, leaves, straw, and woodchips.
This is going to heavily depend on how much garden rubbish you’d like to remove. On average, for every cubic yard available with a skip, it should be able to hold around ten bin bags or approximately one tonne of material.
Of course, you’ll want some extra capacity remaining. So if you have exactly two tonnes of waste (or around 20 bin bags), you might need a 3-yard skip, rather than a 2-yard skip. But if you have 1.8 tonnes of waste (17-18 big bags), then a 2-yard skip should do. If in doubt, you should go one size bigger than you think you’ll need.
In some cases, yes, a company will provide this option, though there are no guarantees they’ll be able to get it you in time. It’s worth a try, but if you definitely need a skip for tomorrow, I’m afraid you can’t be 100% sure that it will be possible. Try contacting various providers near you and see who is the most confident that they can get a skip to you tomorrow.
On average, it will cost around £150 to £250, though it will depend on the company.
For the labour cost alone, a gardener will charge about £15 to £25 an hour. Garden maintenance companies tend to charge a little more, with an hourly rate of around £30.
