Sheeeet.... That looks like a perfectly good deck to me I don't know why you throwing that out. You should see mine..... It really went downhill in the last couple of years to where it's now unsafe. Good thing it's only about 12-18 in off ground. I spent a few hundred dollars replacing some boards to extend it to life a couple of years ago, but it's past the point now of putting any more dollars into. It needs to be replaced and it won't be cheap. Probably $15-20k. Yup...28. yrs old..... I would have sworn that damn pressure treated lumber had a 40-year warranty. I got half a mind to rebuild it myself and save much of cost.... But I just don't have the time. And I don't want the exact same thing I want to change it. Replacing that is actually stopping me from making a slab to put some barbecue equipment on... Cuz I want them to be kind of linked together. I'm just putting it off cuz I don't want to spend the money. I may start demoing what I got ... A little each week. Our garbage man will pick it up. I cut into manageable size pieces and duct tape them into bundles and they pick it up. Half my backyard fence was disposed of that way after hurricanes. They were very appreciative that I packaged it so neatly for them.... They could just grab it and throw a bundle in instead of picking up loose boards etc. If you just throw crap out there by the road like that they pick it up eventually but it might take weeks until the proper pickup comes around....but package it neatly and the garbage man will take it. They only take stuff from the homeowner though they will not pick up if you have a commercial company demo it then they have to pay to have that hauled away
I did learn a few things from our current deck..... The built-in benches were a complete waste. So was a giant octagonal table that could seat probably 10. The table was only used by the dog to stand on so he could see over the fence..... And the built-in benches that were two of them 8 ft long.... We're never used, except by wasps to build nests underneath. And they started to look really bad and get rough as they aged. After maybe 8 or so years I cut the table up and threw it away . I think we were charged about $600 to make that table in 1995.. There was a built-in storage box as well that was never used.... It wasn't rained tight so there was limited stuff you wanted to put in there.... Except maybe some kids water toys. . the other lessons were no nails.... Particularly on railings... They all work their way out over time. The tops of 4x4 posts for railings need something done to them to prevent absorbing water. They were beveled off and started to rot from the top down earliest of all..got real rough. . They're originally was about a 4 ft wide swinging gate on The descent of steps to the yard that was intended to keep the dog in the yard where it belonged.... Yeah that never worked the dog just jumped over it. And when climbing over at his claws destroyed the top of it so bad you would have thought he'd been chewing on it. There was another gate on a side of the yard between the deck and the fence that was supposed to be like a dog run you could lock the dog up in if kids were playing in the yard or something.... Of course the dog could jump over and would never want to stay in there so that was useless as well... Not to mention that area stayed shady and damp so grass never grew well and it would turn into a mud hole if you put the dog in there and he stayed. . Our deck was nice for a couple of birthday parties when my kids were very small like 1 to 2 years old..... After that never got a whole lot of use. But because the yard slopes down away from the house gradually.... It's kind of necessary to have a flat patio area. The drawback is the fence slopes downhill with the ground and so the deck raises you up where you can see over your own fence.... Really never liked that either.
