10 cubic yards
10 Yard Dumpster Rental on Cape Cod
The smallest roll-off we run, sized for heavy debris and tight village driveways. Delivered anywhere in Barnstable County, usually same day or next day.
- Licensed & insured
- Same-day on the Upper Cape
- Flat-rate pricing
- All 15 Cape towns
- Dimensionstypically about 12 ft long × 8 ft wide × 3.5 ft high
- Holdsabout 3-4 pickup truck loads
- Weight included1-2 tons
- Space neededabout 22 ft of length and 10 ft of width including room for the truck to load and unload
The 10 yard container on Cape Cod
A 10 yard roll-off holds ten cubic yards of material in a box that measures typically about 12 ft long × 8 ft wide × 3.5 ft high. That is roughly about 3-4 pickup truck loads, and it comes with 1-2 tons of disposal included in the flat rate. Low walls are the whole point: you pitch debris in over the side instead of hauling it up a ramp, which matters when the load is brick, tile, plaster or wet shingles.
On the Cape this is the container that fits where nothing else will. Falmouth and Chatham lanes with stone walls on both sides, Provincetown driveways that barely hold one car, Osterville properties where the only clear ground sits between the house and a Title 5 leach field. Nate Souza has been placing roll-offs in those spots since 2011, and the 10 is the one that solves the awkward site. It is also the right call for dense material, where you would hit the weight allowance long before you filled anything larger. Call (774) 208-0570 for a flat quote, and see the full size lineup if you are still deciding.
What actually fits inside a 10 yard dumpster
Ten cubic yards sounds abstract until you load it. In practice a 10 yarder swallows the contents of a single-car garage, a packed attic, or one bathroom stripped to the studs. Fifty to seventy contractor bags fit comfortably. A small kitchen tear-out — cabinets, countertop, subfloor and the old appliances minus the fridge — lands inside it with room to spare.
Where the 10 earns its keep is dense material. Broken concrete walkway, brick from a chimney takedown, dirt from a footing, ceramic tile, plaster and lath off an antique Cape: all of that is heavy enough that a 10 yard box hits its 1-2 tons allowance with well under a foot of material in the bottom. That is normal and expected. For those loads the container is a weight bucket, not a volume bucket, and we plan the drop accordingly. Heavy loads have their own rules, which is why we run them through concrete and heavy debris service.
What does not fit is bulk. Sofas, mattresses, box springs and large sectional pieces eat air. Two couches and a mattress can take a third of the box before you have thrown away anything else. If your pile is mostly furniture, look at the 15 yard instead and save yourself a second haul.
Why a small can is about weight, not space
The mistake that costs people money is treating cubic yards as the only number that matters. Volume tells you whether the debris will physically go in. Tonnage tells you what you pay. Those two limits are hit by completely different materials, and on a 10 yard container they are wildly out of step.
Run the numbers. Asphalt shingles average around 250 to 300 pounds per roofing square. A 10 yard box with 1-2 tons included covers roughly 10 to 15 squares of a single layer before the scale ticket starts costing you more than the rental. Concrete is worse: a single cubic yard of broken slab runs roughly 3,000 to 4,000 pounds on its own. Wet plaster and lath from a 1790s Sandwich farmhouse weighs two to three times what modern drywall does, because the brown coat is sand and lime, not gypsum.
Household junk goes the other way. Cardboard, clothing, plastic toys, particleboard shelving and old bedding fill ten cubic yards to the rim and might come in under a ton. Nothing wrong with that, but you are paying for space you could have gotten cheaper per yard in a bigger box.
Tell us the material before you tell us the size. That one conversation prevents almost every overage charge we see.
Finding a spot for a 10 yarder on a Cape lot
Plan for about 22 ft of length and 10 ft of width including room for the truck to load and unload. The box itself is only twelve feet, but the roll-off truck has to back in straight, tip its rails and winch the container off. It cannot do that around a curve or against a bulkhead.
Overhead clearance is the constraint people forget. The hoist arm goes up roughly 23 to 25 feet during the drop. Pitch pine limbs over a Brewster driveway, a low service drop feeding an older cottage, a carport roof — any of those stop the delivery cold. Walk the approach and look up before you book.
Surface matters too. Crushed shell and pea stone give way under a loaded rail, and sandy shoulders in Eastham and Truro will let a corner sink after a hard rain. We set plywood cribbing under the rails as standard practice, which spreads the load and protects sealcoated asphalt from scarring.
Photograph the intended spot and text it over if you are unsure. A thirty-second look at the picture saves a wasted trip, and we would much rather sort it out beforehand. Placement detail applies to every size we drop, so the same walk-through helps if you move up to a 20 yard later.
The projects a 10 yard container was built for
Small and heavy is the profile. A patio demolition where forty year old pavers come up in chunks. A brick chimney taken down below the roofline. A bathroom gutted to the joists in a Yarmouth ranch. A concrete walkway that frost has finally beaten. In every one of those the pile is compact and dense, and a bigger box would just sit half empty while you paid for capacity you legally could not fill.
It is also the workhorse for staged cleanouts. Plenty of Cape homeowners are working through a family property one room at a time, and a 10 yarder dropped for a weekend is easier to fill honestly than a 30 that tempts everyone to throw the good furniture in. For a whole-house job we would point you at estate cleanout service and a larger container.
Landscapers use them for soil, sod and stump grindings. Roofers use them on small dormer and porch tear-offs. Property managers use them for the between-tenant purge on a summer rental, though a full turnover usually needs more room.
If the job is ordinary household clutter with nothing dense in it, our junk removal service or a larger container is generally the better value.
Signs you should have ordered a 15 or a 20
Three questions sort it out. First, is the debris heavy or bulky? Heavy points at the 10. Bulky points up the range immediately, because furniture and cabinetry are all volume and almost no weight.
Second, how many rooms? One room, one 10 yarder. Two or more, or a whole floor, and you want the 15 yard at minimum. The price gap between the two is far smaller than the cost of a second delivery and a second disposal run.
Third, are you mixing materials? A mixed load — old carpet, drywall, a couple of doors, some deck boards and the contents of a shed — fills space fast and weighs very little. That is a 20 yard job nine times out of ten.
One more honest test: walk the pile before it exists. Stack everything you plan to throw out in a rough heap in the yard and estimate its footprint. Ten cubic yards is a pile roughly ten feet long, eight feet wide and three and a half feet tall, packed. If your imagined heap is clearly bigger, size up. We would rather send the right box the first time than come back with a second one, and if you get it wrong we do run same-day delivery when the schedule allows.
Capacity
What actually fits in a 10 yard container
Rough working figures. Weight, not volume, is what stops most loads.
| Material | How much fits |
|---|---|
| Asphalt shingles | roughly 10-15 squares of a single layer, and weight is what stops you, not space |
| 33-gallon contractor bags | about 50 to 70 bags packed reasonably tight |
| Drywall sheets, 4 ft × 8 ft | roughly 50 to 70 sheets of standard half-inch board |
| Broken concrete or brick | about a fraction of the box, around 12 to 18 wheelbarrow loads, before the tonnage runs out |
| Carpet and pad | roughly 2,500 to 3,500 square feet pulled up and rolled |
| Furniture | about 4 to 6 large pieces such as a sofa, recliner and dresser, and little else |
Suitability
Is the 10 yard the right size for you?
Choose the 10 yard for
- Single bathroom gut down to the studs in a mid-century ranch
- Brick chimney takedown above the roofline on an older Cape
- Concrete walkway or small patio slab demolition
- Ceramic tile and thinset removal from a kitchen and entryway
- Two-car garage cleanout with tools, paint cans emptied and shelving
- Small dormer or porch roof tear-off, single layer of asphalt shingle
- Soil, sod and stump grindings from a front yard regrade
- Plaster and lath from one room of an antique Cape house
Pick a different size for
- A full kitchen remodel with cabinets, counters and flooring — cabinet boxes are bulky and you will run out of room. Order the 15 yard dumpster.
- A whole-house furniture cleanout before a sale — sofas and mattresses eat volume fast, so take the 20 yard dumpster.
- A complete roof tear-off on an average Cape home — 25 or more squares needs the tonnage of a 20 yard dumpster.
- Storm cleanup with downed pitch pine limbs and brush — branches trap air, so plan on the 30 yard dumpster.
- A cottage gut renovation or full interior demolition — the volume belongs in a 30 yard dumpster or larger.
Placing a 10 yard container on a Cape Cod property
Placement on Cape Cod is mostly about what is under the box and what is over it. Crushed shell and pea-stone driveways are common from Woods Hole to Wellfleet, and a loaded 10 yarder concentrates real weight on two narrow rails. We crib with plywood under the rails as a matter of course, which spreads the load and keeps the rails from cutting into stone, sand or sealcoated asphalt.
The rule we never bend: a loaded container does not sit over a septic tank, distribution box or leach field. Cape systems are shallow and sandy, and a cracked D-box is a five-figure repair. If you do not know where yours runs, your as-built is usually on file with the town health department, and the state's Title 5 septic system information explains the components worth protecting.
Narrow village lanes off Route 6A, low tree limbs and overhead service drops all affect the approach. If any digging or staking is involved, contact Dig Safe 811 before work starts.
Compare
Every size side by side
It is the smallest box we run, so there is nothing below it; the next step up is the 15 yard, which adds five cubic yards, six inches of wall height and enough room for a second room's worth of debris.
| Size | Dimensions | Capacity | Weight included | Best for |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 10 Yard Dumpster | typically about 12 ft long × 8 ft wide × 3.5 ft high | about 3-4 pickup truck loads | 1-2 tons | Heavy, dense debris and tight driveways: concrete, brick, tile, one-room gut. |
| 15 Yard Dumpster | typically about 16 ft long × 8 ft wide × 4 ft high | about 4-6 pickup truck loads | 2 tons | Two-room remodels, garage and shed cleanouts, small roof tear-offs. |
| 20 Yard Dumpster | typically about 22 ft long × 8 ft wide × 4.5 ft high | about 6-8 pickup truck loads | 2-3 tons | Full roof replacement, whole-floor renovation, three or four bedroom cleanout. |
| 30 Yard Dumpster | typically about 22 ft long × 8 ft wide × 6 ft high | about 9-12 pickup truck loads | 3-4 tons | Cottage gut renovation, whole-house estate cleanout, storm debris, demolition. |
| 40 Yard Dumpster | typically about 22 ft long × 8 ft wide × 8 ft high | about 12-16 pickup truck loads | 4-5 tons | Structural demolition, commercial and multi-unit work, high-volume bulky debris. |
Not quite right?
- 15 Yard Dumpster — the next size larger
- Compare all five sizes
- Read the full Cape Cod sizing guide
Talk to a real person
Book a 10 yard dumpster on Cape Cod
Call (774) 208-0570. Tell us the material and the town, and you will get a flat price and a delivery window on the same call.
Mon–Sat 7:00am – 6:00pm · Sun by appointment
Answers
10 Yard Dumpster — questions we get asked
How much weight comes with a 10 yard dumpster?
The flat rate includes 1-2 tons of disposal, and we confirm the exact allowance when we quote your job. Anything beyond it is billed per ton at the scale weight. For household debris you will rarely get close. For concrete, brick, tile, dirt or plaster you can reach the limit with only a few inches of material across the floor, which is normal for dense material. Tell us what is going in and we will tell you honestly where the line sits.
Will a 10 yard dumpster fit in a narrow Cape driveway?
Usually, yes. The box is typically about 12 ft long × 8 ft wide × 3.5 ft high, but the truck needs about 22 ft of length and 10 ft of width including room to load and unload. It also needs roughly 23 to 25 feet of overhead clearance while the container comes off the rails. Low limbs, service drops and carport roofs are the common problems on older village lots, so walk the approach first.
Can I put concrete or dirt in a 10 yard dumpster?
Yes, and it is the size we recommend for both. Massachusetts regulates asphalt pavement, brick and concrete as banned from ordinary disposal, so those loads go to a processor rather than a landfill and generally need to be kept clean and separate. Do not mix concrete with household trash if you can avoid it. Call us before you start loading and we will set the job up correctly from the first bucket.
How long can I keep the dumpster?
Standard rental periods run about a week to ten days, included in the flat rate, and we can extend if a project runs long. Shoulder season on the Cape is busy with renovation work, so booking a few days ahead helps. If you finish early, call and we will pull it sooner, which frees your driveway and gets the container back into rotation.
Do I need a permit to put one in my driveway?
On your own private driveway, generally no. If the container has to sit on a public street, in a right of way or on a town sidewalk, most Cape towns require a permit from the DPW or police department, and rules vary by town. Historic district properties may have additional review. Ask us where you are located and we will tell you what we have seen work in that town.
Service area
10 Yard Dumpster delivered across Cape Cod
We run roll-off containers out of our 19 Tradesman Cir yard in East Falmouth to all fifteen Cape Cod towns and the villages inside them — from Woods Hole and the Bourne bridges through the Mid Cape and Route 6A, out past the Orleans rotary and up the Outer Cape to Provincetown. Outer Cape runs are scheduled rather than same-day, and in July and August everything books up early. If your village is not listed, call anyway. We almost certainly get there.