Looking for a cheaper, tariff-free way to remodel? Try salvage.

Olivia Cashman hopes residents planning some home improvements will consider some “wood from the hood” or even a sink from a recently deconstructed library.

As household budgets are increasingly stretched thin, salvaging used materials from a recent demolition is a good way to keep renovation costs down.

Cashman is the construction and demolition waste specialist in Hennepin County’s environment and energy division, which is hosting a Salvage Crawl in May to highlight local businesses that sell reusable building materials.

“The great part of the Salvage Crawl is all of the retailers offer something that is a little bit different,” Cashman said. “So there is quite the variety in the shops that are participating.”

A dozen businesses in and around Minneapolis deal in salvaged building materials. They range from Wood from the Hood, which sells lumber and makes furniture from urban trees that needed to be removed, to Better Futures Minnesota, which deconstructs buildings to salvage everything from flooring and lighting to molding and bathroom fixtures.

“We are trying to make salvage cool,” said Melissa Wenzel, the built environment sustainability administrator for the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency (PCA). “A lot of people are realizing they can make money reselling stuff that’s already been sold. And it is tariff-free.”

Salvaging retro materials isn’t just cool, it’s preferable for Minneapolis resident Makai Catudio, who was among more than two dozen cyclists to participate in a Reuse Ride on Saturday, touring retailers to kick off the Salvage Crawl. Catudio plans to buy an older home and restore it.

“All of the places we visited were new to us. That’s why we went, to get ideas,” said Catudio, who rode with his girlfriend.

There’s plenty out there to salvage. The U.S. produces twice as much construction waste as household trash, according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

In Minnesota, about 1.6 million tons of construction debris were sent to landfills in 2019, the latest data available from the PCA. Nearly all of that waste comes from demolition projects, rather than new construction.

Wenzel says Minnesota has made big improvements in recent years diverting waste from the state’s 90 construction and demolition landfills. The amount diverted grew nearly 25 times since 2021 to more than 15,000 tons, according to reports to the PCA from Minnesota counties.

“We treat buildings as if they are disposable,” said Wenzel, who noted rural counties are outpacing the metro in diverting construction waste. “We don’t have unlimited space, and we don’t have unlimited materials.”

Several metro counties now offer incentives to residents and businesses to deconstruct buildings slated for demolition with salvage in mind. But planning ahead is key.

Salvaging is part of Hennepin County’s larger solid waste plan, which aims to dramatically reduce the amount of trash residents produce that is sent to landfills or the controversial incinerator in Minneapolis.

County officials adopted a policy that renovations of county-owned buildings would prioritize salvaging materials. Better Futures, which employs men recently released from incarceration, salvaged 28 tons of material from Edina’s Southdale Library, which is going to be razed for a new facility.

Jason Allen, director of enterprise services and waste diversion, says all of the furniture, flooring, plumbing fixtures and other materials from the library will be sold at Better Futures’ Minnehaha Avenue store, which he describes as a “big-box home improvement store meets thrift.”

“It really is a great opportunity to get quality items at a discounted price,” Allen said. “We have people who come in every week to see what’s new.”

Yet, some local regulations haven’t kept up with the growing salvage trend.

Last year, Jeremy Marshik learned his salvage business LumberStash, which he operates out of his garage in the Kingfield neighborhood, violates several city ordinances. Marshik salvages lumber from construction dumpsters but also deconstructs decks and homes that are going to be demolished.

“I was hell-bent on keeping stuff out of landfills,” Marshik said. “There’s opportunities like this everywhere. There could be an army of people doing it.”

Salvage businesses might be becoming cool, as Wenzel hopes, but they are far from a new idea. Habitat for Humanity opened its first ReStore in Winnipeg in 1991. It will open a third Twin Cities location in Brooklyn Park this summer.

Hennepin County’s Salvage Crawl runs through the end of the month. Shoppers who scan a QR code at one of the featured salvage businesses could win a prize.