Multi-family trash cart set out to curb side for collection

[Sam Leon]

For a small multi-family property such as a fourplex, how do other landlords who do your own property management handle the city trash collection services?

Here the tenants share the waste carts.  Two carts for regular trash, two for recycled, two for yard waste.  All are plastic wheeled carts, and you have to roll them like 15 feet to the curb by 6am on collection day, and take them back at the end of the day.

I have tried various approaches with mixed results.

Allowing it to overflow results in trash being thrown into the wrong cart, or stacked outside, attracting possums, raccoons, squirrels, lizards, stray cats to rip them apart and cause a mess.

Do you leave it to the tenants to work it out on some rotation schedule?  That seems to result in everyone doing the "I didn't know its my turn..."

Do you designate one particular tenant with that responsibility?  Possibly with a small rent reduction as motivation?

Do you bite the bullet and drive there yourself twice a week just to roll the carts out?

Do you find a local service to come do it?

Now the tenants as individuals are clean and keep their individual units neat and presentable, but when it comes to common area hygiene and order they can be petty.  One even suggested the person who produced the most trash that day should roll them out, another thinks unless the carts is completely filled, you can skip it until it piles up...urging

So what to do?

[Robert Bacher]

My Duplex has a separate can for each unit, for both trash and yard waste.