01. The metals that actually pay
Scrap yards price by category, and the spread between the best and worst metal is huge. Copper is the standout — insulated wire, old plumbing pipe, and AC coils all carry real weight in price per pound, sometimes ten times what plain steel brings. Aluminum sits in the middle: window frames, ladders, patio furniture, and car wheels all qualify and pay a decent rate once cleaned of screws and rubber.
Steel is the most common metal by volume but the lowest by price per pound — old appliance shells, bed frames, filing cabinets, and rebar all fall here. It still adds up on a full trailer load from a garage cleanout, but nobody's getting rich off a stack of steel shelving alone.
- Copper wire and pipe — highest value per pound, strip insulation for a better rate.
- Aluminum — ladders, wheels, window frames, patio furniture frames.
- Brass fixtures — faucets, old hardware, some plumbing fittings.
- Stainless steel — appliance panels, some sink basins.
- Mild steel — appliance shells, bed frames, filing cabinets, rebar.
- Cast iron — old tubs, engine blocks, radiators (heavy but low per-pound value).
02. What has no scrap value
Not everything metal-looking pays. Galvanized sheet metal, thin aluminum foil trays, and anything heavily coated in paint or rust past a certain point often gets weighed as low-grade or rejected outright depending on the yard's current buying policy. Mixed-metal items — a lamp with a plastic base and a steel rod, for instance — usually need to be broken down before a yard will take the metal portion.
Appliances with Freon (refrigerators, freezers, some window AC units) can't just be dropped at a scrap yard as-is in most cases — the refrigerant has to be evacuated first by someone certified to handle it. That's one reason we keep those separate from a standard scrap run and route them to the right processor.
03. How the pricing actually works
Scrap prices move with commodity markets, so what copper paid last month isn't guaranteed this month. Yards post their current per-pound rates by category, and most require the metal to be sorted before you unload — mixed loads either get sorted on-site by yard staff for a fee or get weighed at the lowest applicable rate.
This is the part most homeowners underestimate: sorting takes real time. Stripping insulation off wire, pulling steel screws out of aluminum frames, and separating brass fittings from a box of mixed hardware is tedious work that eats into whatever payout you'd get. For a garage's worth of scrap, the math often doesn't favor a solo trip unless you enjoy the process.
04. How we handle scrap during a cleanout
When we clear a garage, shed, or construction site, metal gets pulled and sorted into its own section of the trailer before anything goes to a transfer station. We're not running a scrap brokerage — we don't cut you a check for the copper in your walls — but keeping metal separated means it gets recycled properly instead of buried with drywall and carpet padding.
For customers doing a partial DIY project, our advice is simple: if you've got a genuinely large volume of clean copper or aluminum — an old AC condenser, a stack of wire from a remodel — it's worth a solo trip to a yard yourself. For everything else mixed into a bigger cleanout, let the crew sort it as part of the job.
05. Construction and remodel scrap
Remodels generate more scrap metal than people expect — old ductwork, cabinet hardware, plumbing fittings, electrical boxes, and the occasional water heater. On a kitchen or bathroom remodel in Gilbert or Chandler, that pile can be a few hundred pounds by the time demo wraps.
We see this constantly on post-construction debris jobs: contractors toss metal in with drywall scraps because separating it mid-project slows the crew down. If you flag it ahead of time, we'll keep a dedicated bin for metal on-site so it doesn't get buried and lost in the general debris pile.
06. Preparing metal for the best outcome
A little prep goes a long way if you're hauling scrap yourself. Strip visible insulation off copper wire where you can — bare copper often pays a noticeably better rate than insulated. Remove non-metal attachments like plastic housings, rubber gaskets, and wood handles. Keep different metal types in separate containers rather than one mixed pile.
- Strip insulation off copper wire before weighing.
- Separate steel, aluminum, copper, and brass into different bins.
- Remove plastic, rubber, and wood attachments where possible.
- Drain fluids from anything that held oil, coolant, or gas.
- Call ahead — some yards won't take Freon appliances without proof of evacuation.
- Copper and aluminum pay far more per pound than steel — sorting matters more than volume alone.
- Freon appliances need refrigerant evacuated before a scrap yard can legally take them.
- Mixed-metal items often get weighed at the lowest applicable rate unless broken down.
- A large, clean batch of one metal type is worth a solo trip; small mixed piles usually aren't.
- We sort metal out of every cleanout load before it heads to a transfer station.
Common questions
No — we're a junk removal service, not a scrap buyer. We separate and route metal responsibly as part of the cleanout, but we don't offer a payout for what we haul.
Copper wire and pipe, followed by aluminum items like ladders and window frames. Steel appliances and furniture add up in bulk but pay far less per pound.
Not without the Freon being evacuated first by someone qualified to handle refrigerant. We route Freon appliances separately rather than mixing them into a standard scrap load.
Only if you have a large volume of one clean metal type, like a stack of copper wire from a remodel. For a mixed garage cleanout, it's usually faster to let the crew sort it during the job.
Yes, scrap metal prices track commodity markets and shift month to month. What a yard pays for copper or aluminum today may not match what it paid last quarter.
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