Old TV Disposal in Lexington: Removal and Recycling

Part of our complete guide: How to Mount a TV on Any Wall.

Almost every install we do has a second television in the story. The new set goes on the wall, and the old one comes off it — or comes off a stand, or gets carried up from the basement — and then it stands in the hallway for three weeks because nobody is sure what you are allowed to do with it.

Here is the short version. We will take it away for $30 when we are there. If you would rather handle it yourself, Lexington runs a drop-off for Fayette County residents, and the one thing you cannot do is put it in your waste cart. The rest of this is the detail, including what is worth checking before the set leaves the house at all.

Old TV Removal Is $30 With Any Install

It is one of the published add-ons, alongside soundbar mounting at $40, in-wall cable concealment at $99, a powerline adapter setup at $99 and smart TV setup at $35. It is charged per set, so two old screens going out of the house is $60.

Say so when you book rather than on the day. It takes thirty seconds on the form, it goes on the work order, and it means there is room in the van before anyone arrives. Our appointment preparation guide has that on its checklist for the same reason, and the cost guide lists every add-on with its price.

Two things worth saying plainly. Removal is for the set, not for the furniture it sat on, so if a cabinet or a stand is also going, mention it when you book and we will tell you what we can do. And if the old TV is coming off a wall rather than a stand, the mount usually comes down with it — whether the bracket on the wall is worth keeping for the new set is covered in our guide to reusing an old TV wall mount.

First: Does It Still Work?

This is the question most people skip, and it is the one that saves the trip. A television that still works is not waste, and a house that has just bought a bigger one usually has somewhere the old one earns its keep.

The commonest second homes we see are a bedroom, a garage or home gym, a basement and a kids' room. Each has its own considerations rather than being a smaller version of the living room:

• A bedroom wants height measured from the bed rather than from a sofa — see mounting a TV in the bedroom.
• A garage or home gym is usually block or exposed framing, with dust and vibration to think about: garage and home gym mounting.
• A basement brings block walls and low ceilings, which our basement and home theater guide goes through.
• A kids' room is the one where a set left on a dresser is a real hazard rather than a tidiness problem: tip-over safety.

If the set is going up somewhere else in the same house, tell us when you book and it is a second screen on the same visit, which shares the trip rather than paying for it twice — that is how mounting several TVs in one visit is priced.

If it works but nobody in the house wants it, a resale or thrift shop may take it. Call before you load it: many will not accept an older tube set at all, and most will not take anything that does not switch on.

It Cannot Go in Your Waste Cart

Not as a preference, and not as a weight thing. The city's own guidance is that electronic waste should never go in your waste carts, and a television is squarely electronic waste. The components are not landfill material: an older tube set has leaded glass in the picture tube, and older flat panels have backlight lamps that are not meant to be crushed in a truck.

The practical consequence is that a set left at the curb on a normal collection day tends to still be there afterwards, which is how a television ends up living on a porch for a season.

The Lexington Drop-Off, If You Do It Yourself

Lexington runs an Electronics Recycling Center at 1306 Versailles Road, in a building toward the back of the property. Televisions and monitors are on its accepted list, you pull up at the side of the building, and staff help unload.

The details that decide whether a trip is worth making:

• Hours, as the city lists them: Monday and Tuesday 8 a.m. to 4 p.m., Wednesday noon to 4 p.m., Thursday and Friday 8 a.m. to 4 p.m., Saturday 8 a.m. to noon, and closed on the public holidays.
• Fayette County residents only. It is a residential service and does not take items from businesses, including home businesses, churches or schools.
• The screen has to be intact. A set that is not structurally intact — a cracked or smashed screen — is not accepted there and goes to the Bluegrass Regional Transfer Station at 1505 Old Frankfort Pike instead.

Hours and accepted-item lists do change, so check the city's electronics recycling page at lexingtonky.gov before you load a heavy set into a car. If you are outside Fayette County — Richmond and the rest of Madison County, Nicholasville, Georgetown, Versailles, Winchester — the Lexington drop-off is not your programme; your county's solid waste office is the one to ask, and most of them run something comparable on their own schedule.

Carrying It Without Breaking It or Yourself

Flat panels are far less robust than they look. The glass is the structure, so a panel carried flat, leaned against a wall or set face-down on a table is the panel that cracks, and a cracked screen is both unrepairable in practice and the thing that stops a recycling centre accepting it.

Carry it upright, the way it hangs, with a hand underneath rather than a grip on the frame, and two people on anything from 55" up. The original box is ideal; a moving blanket and the back seat is the usual reality. Older tube televisions are the opposite problem — no fragility, a great deal of weight in an awkward shape, and a back injury waiting for anyone who lifts one alone. Our guide to taking a TV down and putting it back up covers getting one off a wall safely in the first place.

If It Is Several Screens, or a Business

A household swapping one set is a different job from an office, a bar or a waiting room replacing four, and the residential drop-off is explicitly not for businesses. Multiple screens coming down at once also wants planning rather than improvising on the day — what goes where, what gets stored, what leaves. That is commercial TV mounting territory, and the old-screen side of it is worth talking through when the job is booked rather than at the end of it.

The honest summary: if we are already coming, $30 is the easy answer and the set is gone the same afternoon. If you would rather do it yourself, it is a free trip to Versailles Road inside the city with an intact screen, and a call to your own county office outside it. Either way it does not belong in the cart, and it does not need to spend the winter in the hallway.