For Demolition Contractors
Every building you take down has an electrical room, and most demo estimates price that room as scrap weight. That's money left on the table — often a lot of it. Reusable switchgear, transformers, and breakers pay multiples of shear price, and we extract them on your schedule so the wrecking sequence never waits.
Walk the electrical rooms with your phone before mobilization and text the photos to (951) 903-9804. Ten minutes of photos can add four or five figures to the job's recovery.
What's worth pulling before the excavator arrives
Main switchgear lineups, padmount and dry type transformers, busway runs, loaded distribution panels, MCC rooms in industrial teardowns, and generator transfer gear. In pre-1980 buildings, the vintage gear — Westinghouse DB breakers, old GE and ITE iron — is scarce service stock that legacy plants pay real money for.
The rule of thumb: anything with a nameplate is worth a photo before it's worth a shear. We'll tell you fast which items ride our truck and which belong in your scrap stream.
- Switchgear lineups — LV and MV
- Transformers: padmount, dry type, substation
- Busway and bus plugs off the ceiling
- Loaded panels by the floor-full
- Vintage gear (pre-1980) — the sleeper value
We work inside your sequence
Demo schedules don't flex, so we do. Once the utility cut is confirmed, our crew mobilizes fast — 24 hours' notice is often workable — unbolts and rigs the gear, and is off your site before abatement or structural crews need the floor. We carry our own insurance, sign your site paperwork, and coordinate directly with your superintendent so you don't babysit us.
On bigger projects we'll walk the building with your estimator pre-bid, so the salvage value is in your number before you even win the job. That's a competitive edge most demo outfits never use.
Paid before the building drops
We pay at removal — check or cash — not after some future resale. The gear leaves, the money stays, and your project accounting closes clean. For repeat demo clients we'll standing-order entire categories: every loaded panel, every transformer, every job, one text per building.
What to pull before the container arrives
On a demolition job, electrical gear has a short window between de-energization and the container, and almost everything valuable is lost in that window. The instruction that saves the most money is simple: photograph the electrical rooms before anyone starts cutting.
The items that get destroyed most often are the ones worth the most. Old air power breakers look like rusted steel and get torched. Loaded panels get pried apart for the copper. Switchgear lineups get cut into sections that can no longer be reused. In each case the reusable value was multiples of the scrap value, and it took ten minutes of cutting to erase it.
- Photograph electrical rooms before demolition starts
- Leave panels loaded — do not strip breakers out
- Do not torch or cut switchgear lineups
- Old and obsolete gear is usually the highest-value material
- Keep trip units, plugs, and hardware with their breakers
Working inside a demolition schedule
Demolition runs on dates, and a buyer who cannot hit them is worthless. Tell us the window and we work inside it, including nights and weekends, and we bring our own rigging and trucks so your crew is not doing our work.
For larger jobs, one walkthrough — or a set of photos covering each electrical room — is usually enough to price the whole electrical scope at once. That lets you treat the gear as a line item with a known value rather than an unknown disposal cost.
Site requirements are normal for us: insurance certificates, badging, GC coordination, and dock or gate scheduling. Tell us what your site requires and we will provide it before the truck shows up.
Common questions
How much notice do you need before demo day?
More is better, but we've mobilized in 24 hours. Send photos during your walkthrough and we'll lock the schedule with your super.
Do you handle the disconnect?
No — the utility and your electrician make it cold. From that point everything (unbolting, rigging, hauling) is ours.
What if the gear turns out to be scrap grade?
We tell you straight, and you keep it in your scrap stream. No games — the photos usually settle it before anyone mobilizes.
Are you insured for occupied sites?
Yes — we carry liability coverage and comply with your site safety program. COIs go out before our crew does.
We are on a tight demolition deadline — can you move that fast?
Usually yes. Give us the date up front; we schedule off-hours and weekends routinely because that is how demolition work runs.
Do you provide insurance certificates and site paperwork?
Yes. COIs, badging, and GC coordination are standard parts of the job on commercial sites.
Related pages
Ready to sell? Call or text (951) 903-9804 or email photos to sellelectricalequipment@gmail.com.
Got equipment to sell?
Call or text us photos. We'll give you a price and take it from there.