UC student move-out: getting rid of furniture in Clifton Heights, Corryville and the Heights

The short answer

Price what you are leaving per item: a full mattress is $94, a standard desk $83, a futon $111, a dresser $126 and a mini fridge $115. Book one pickup for the whole apartment, split it with your roommates, and schedule it before your landlord's walk-through. Carry-out from a third-floor Clifton Heights walk-up is included, with no stairs fee.

Why UC move-out is its own thing

The University of Cincinnati has more than 53,000 students, and only about 6,500 of them live on campus. Everyone else rents, mostly in the neighborhoods around the Heights: Clifton Heights, Corryville, University Heights, Clifton and nearby streets, which people often lump together as 'Clifton'. Many of those rentals are in older houses converted to apartments, with units on the second and third floors and narrow stairs between them. When leases end, a lot of furniture comes out at once. Mattresses, futons, desks, cheap bookcases and mini fridges that were never worth moving home pile up on porches and sidewalks. The same thing happens around NKU in Highland Heights, Xavier in Evanston and Miami in Oxford. Spring and August are the usual peaks.

Prices for typical student stuff

The order minimum is $100, so a single twin mattress at $82 is billed at $100. Most students have more than one thing going, and that is where per-item pricing works out well.

Splitting it with roommates

One booking for the whole apartment is simpler than four separate ones, and it puts everyone well above the minimum. Here is how a typical four-bedroom works out. Four full mattresses: $94 + $94 + $94 + $94 = $376. Add two desks and a shared sofa: $376 + $83 + $83 + $126 = $668. Divide however you agree, by what each person is leaving or evenly. If the apartment has a lot of loose stuff too, like bags, boxes and broken lamps, the quote tool may suggest a truck tier instead: a half truck, about 8 cubic yards, is $431 and a five-eighths truck is $513. Pick whichever comes out lower. One person books and pays, and the crew does not care how you split it.

Why the curb is a bad plan near campus

The City of Cincinnati's bulk pickup is free, but it runs by appointment only, with up to five items per appointment, set out the night before at the curb where the claw truck can reach them. Around UC, that is hard. Streets in Clifton Heights and Corryville are lined with parked cars, which can block the claw. Five items do not cover a four-bedroom apartment. The appointment date may not match your lease end. And if you leave things out early, or without an appointment, they sit on the sidewalk, get rained on and become your landlord's problem, which often becomes a charge against your deposit. Dumping furniture beside a building's dumpster has the same result.

Timing your pickup

Book as soon as you know your move-out date. In spring and August, everyone near campus is moving in the same couple of weeks. Schedule the pickup after you have packed what you are keeping but before the walk-through, so the landlord sees an empty unit. Choose a two-hour arrival window; crews work seven days a week, 8am to midnight, which helps when finals or a late U-Haul get in the way. Same-day pickup is available when you book by 4 PM. If your parents are driving in to help, book the pickup for the same day so nobody has to carry a mattress down three flights.

Sell or give away first

Anything decent can probably go to an incoming student. August is the best time to sell, because people moving in need furniture right away. Post desks, dressers, bookshelves and mini fridges with photos and dimensions a few weeks before your lease ends. Make buyers carry it themselves. Mattresses are hard to sell or give away and usually are not worth the effort. Whatever is left goes in the pickup. At JunkRabbit we try to donate usable items when local charities accept them and recycle whatever we can, so a good desk still has a chance at a second life.

NKU, Xavier and Miami

The same approach works across the river and out in Oxford. NKU in Highland Heights has about 15,370 students, with only around 2,000 on campus, so a lot of Northern Kentucky rentals turn over at the same time. In NKY Rumpke areas, mattresses have to be wrapped and sealed in plastic for curbside pickup; with a JunkRabbit pickup, they do not. Xavier is in Evanston, close to the city's core neighborhoods. Miami University in Oxford has around 20,000 students. Prices are the same in all of them: a full mattress is $94 in Oxford, Highland Heights or Clifton Heights.

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