Burnaby tandem garage — one side onlyShelving down one side, walking channel preserved, full clearance held around the furnace and hot water tank. Two facing runs would have made the space unusable.
Burnaby has more townhouse tandem garages than anywhere else in Metro Vancouver — long, narrow, one door, furnace and hot water tank taking up the middle, and a strata bylaw governing what you're allowed to keep in there. That's a specific problem, and it's most of what we do here.
Burnaby tandem garage — one side onlyShelving down one side, walking channel preserved, full clearance held around the furnace and hot water tank. Two facing runs would have made the space unusable.
Burnaby's housing stock splits cleanly in two, and the two halves need completely different work.
The first half is post-war detached housing — Burnaby Heights, Capitol Hill, Willingdon Heights, the older parts of Deer Lake. Detached or attached single and double garages, many built between the 1940s and 1970s, with original slabs and the moisture problems that come with concrete poured before vapour barriers were standard practice.
The second half, and it's the one that defines Burnaby, is townhouse. The density push around Brentwood, Metrotown, Edmonds and Lougheed brought thousands of townhouse units, and almost all of them have a tandem garage: one bay deep, two cars long, a single door at one end.
Our answer is narrow-depth shelving down one side only, never both. Two facing runs of shelving in a tandem garage look efficient on paper and make the space unusable in practice — you lose the walking channel and you can no longer get a car in, which was the point.
Properties up toward SFU, Forest Grove and the Burnaby Mountain slopes get measurably more rain than the valley floor, plus heavy conifer cover that holds moisture against structures and drops debris year-round. Moss on the garage apron and along the door line is significantly worse up there than in south Burnaby, and it's the single most common thing we're asked to deal with on the mountain.
If you're in a Burnaby strata townhouse, your bylaws and the Form B Information Certificate govern what you can do with that garage — including, in some buildings, whether you can fix anything to the walls. We've had clients spec a full storage system only to find the strata required approval first. It's a five-minute check and it's worth doing before you spend anything.
Brentwood, Metrotown, Edmonds, Lougheed, Highgate and the newer Burquitlam-adjacent developments. Long and narrow, mechanical equipment inside, strata rules in play. Narrow-depth shelving down one side, clearances maintained, nothing obstructing sprinkler coverage or egress.
Burnaby Heights, Capitol Hill, Willingdon Heights, Vancouver Heights. Often 1940s–1960s, frequently off a lane, original porous slabs. These get the low-pressure treatment more often than not — the concrete won't take a full-pressure wash without losing surface paste.
Common on Burnaby's many sloped lots. The garage shares air with the house, so mould in the garage is not a sealed problem — sanitisation matters more here, and drainage against the uphill wall is a recurring source of water entry.
Scattered through the older neighbourhoods and around Deer Lake. Unheated, often unpowered, worst moisture and rodent exposure. We bring our own water and generator to these.
| Problem | Why it happens here | What it needs |
|---|---|---|
| Tandem garage dead zone | The back third is unreachable without moving everything in front | Zone redesign — low-turnover items only at the back, on wheels where possible |
| Blocked furnace / hot water tank | Storage creeps into the clearance space around mechanical equipment | Clear and hold code clearances; flag it before a strata inspection does |
| Moss on apron and door line | Burnaby Mountain elevation, conifer cover, sustained damp | Removal plus residual treatment so it doesn't return in one wet season |
| Efflorescence on the slab | Older slabs wicking groundwater; worse on lower-lying south Burnaby lots | Mechanical and acid removal, full neutralisation, moisture source identified |
| Mould on lower drywall | Unheated garage, no ventilation, contents stacked flat against exterior walls | Substrate-matched treatment, porous material removed, forced dry-down |
| Strata bylaw notice | Combustibles, furniture or blocked egress in a parking structure | We flag anything likely to draw a notice before it does |
| Oil staining on original slabs | Decades of parking on porous pre-1970 concrete | Commercial degreaser plus poultice draw-out for set-in stains |
| Rodent activity | Clutter provides harbourage; roof rats favour garages regionally | Nesting removal, contaminated material disposal, sanitisation |
Burnaby is well positioned for disposal, which keeps drive time off your bill. The Burnaby Eco-Centre handles a broad range of residential recycling and household hazardous material, and the Coquitlam Transfer Station on United Boulevard is a short run east for larger loads. The Vancouver Landfill in Delta takes what genuinely can't be diverted.
Practically, that means a Burnaby cleanout usually needs fewer and shorter disposal runs than the same job in West Vancouver or Maple Ridge. We pass disposal through at cost with receipts either way, so shorter runs show up directly in what you pay.
Confirm current hours and rates with the facility before hauling your own load — Metro Vancouver rates changed again in January 2026 and change annually. Full 2026 fee detail is on our Vancouver garage cleanout page.
A single-car or tandem garage clean starts at $249 and a standard double at $349. A full tandem garage declutter and organise typically runs $749 to $1,100. Cleanouts start at $399 plus disposal at cost. Burnaby's proximity to disposal facilities keeps drive time lower than most of Metro Vancouver, and because we pass disposal through at cost rather than marking it up, that shows up in your price.
Yes — it's the majority of our Burnaby work. Tandem garages have a specific set of constraints: single point of access, mechanical equipment inside the room, a dead zone at the back, and strata bylaws governing storage. We design narrow-depth shelving down one side only, preserve the walking channel, and maintain code clearance around the furnace and hot water tank.
Usually, but check your bylaws and Form B first. Some Burnaby stratas require approval before anything is fixed to a garage wall, and fire-rated drywall shouldn't be breached beyond code allowance. We identify wall construction and flag anything likely to cause a problem before we install.
Elevation and tree cover. Properties toward SFU, Forest Grove and the mountain slopes get more rainfall than the valley floor, and heavy conifer canopy holds moisture against structures while dropping debris year-round. Moss along the apron and door line is noticeably worse up there, and it rots the bottom rail of a wooden garage door if it's left.
Yes — Brentwood, Metrotown, Edmonds, Lougheed, Burnaby Heights, Capitol Hill, Deer Lake, Burnaby Mountain, Big Bend and everywhere between. We also cover neighbouring New Westminster, Coquitlam and East Vancouver, so if you're near a boundary just ask.
Yes, and we maintain the required clearances rather than working around them temporarily. Storage creeping into the space around mechanical equipment is one of the most common issues we find in Burnaby tandem garages, and it's both a safety problem and a likely strata notice. We clear it and design so it stays clear.
Free on-site quote. Fixed price before we start. Disposal charged at cost with receipts.
Serving Brentwood, Metrotown, Edmonds, Lougheed, Burnaby Heights, Capitol Hill, Deer Lake and Burnaby Mountain.