17% of Texas Dumpster Rental Companies Are Ghost Listings. Here's the Data.

17% of Texas Dumpster Rental Companies Are Ghost Listings. Here's the Data.

We scored every dumpster rental operator in America. All of them. 6,304 companies. 50 states. Real Google data, real reviews, real scores.

Texas doesn't have the highest ghost listing rate — but it has the highest ghost listing volume of any state in the country. And that volume means more Texas homeowners are getting burned than anywhere else.

The Headline Number

16.9% of Texas dumpster rental companies are ghost listings — Google Maps entries with zero reviews, a sub-3.0 star rating, or both. That's 78% higher than the 9.5% national average.

But here's the number that matters more: Texas has 123 ghost listings out of 728 total operators. That's the most ghost listings of any state by raw count — more than Arizona (57), more than California (128 when including all criteria), more than any other state we've investigated.

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What Is a Ghost Listing?

A ghost listing is a business listed on Google Maps that shows one or more of these red flags:

• Zero reviews — nobody has ever reviewed them publicly
• No star rating — Google has no rating data at all
• Sub-3.0 star rating — enough bad experiences to drag the average below 3 stars

In a state as large as Texas, ghost listings are everywhere — in the DFW Metroplex, in Houston, in San Antonio, and in every smaller city in between. The sheer scale means more homeowners encounter ghost listings here than in any other state.

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The Data: Texas by the Numbers

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Worst Cities for Ghost Listings in Texas

Conroe is the worst city in Texas for ghost listings — 4 of its 7 operators are ghosts. Conroe sits north of Houston in one of the fastest-growing corridors in the state, and that growth has attracted a wave of fly-by-night operators.

Arlington — the heart of DFW — has a 50% ghost rate. 6 of 12 operators are ghosts. Half of all dumpster rental listings in Arlington will lead you to a company with no verified track record. In a city of 400,000+ people between Dallas and Fort Worth, that's a staggering number.

Lewisville and Missouri City round out the top 5 at 50% each, though with smaller total operator counts.

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Why Texas?

1. Sheer market size. Texas has 728 dumpster rental operators — the most of any state. In a market that large, ghost listings have more places to hide. The volume of legitimate operators makes it harder for consumers to distinguish real from fake.

2. Explosive metro growth. DFW, Houston, Austin, and San Antonio have been among the fastest-growing metros in the country for over a decade. That growth creates demand, and demand attracts ghost listings. The suburbs and exurbs — Conroe, Arlington, Lewisville, Missouri City — are exactly where growth is hottest and where ghost listings concentrate.

3. Low barriers to entry. Texas requires minimal licensing to operate as a waste hauler. A Google Business Profile and an LLC filing are enough to appear in search results next to operators with decades of history.

4. DFW's fragmented market. The Dallas-Fort Worth metro has dozens of individual cities, each with their own set of listings. Arlington, Carrollton, Lewisville, Garland, Plano — ghost listings scatter across all of them, making it hard to build the kind of market transparency that Portland or other single-city markets have.

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The Best-Rated Operators in Texas

These are the top 5 Texas operators by DCS Score. Every one has been independently scored on public data — none paid to be here.

Texas has the strongest top-tier operator base in the country. Five operators score a perfect 100 DCS, led by Junk King Austin with 2,487 reviews at 4.9 stars. The depth of legitimate, high-scoring operators in Texas is the good news — the problem is that 123 ghost listings sit between you and these top operators in search results.

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How to Avoid Ghost Listings in Texas

1. Never hire a company with fewer than 10 Google reviews. In a market with 728 operators, there's no reason to gamble on one with zero track record. 2. Check the DCS Score. Operators scoring below 40 are in the "Listed" tier — the ghost listings live there. 3. Be extra cautious in DFW suburbs. Arlington, Lewisville, Carrollton, and Conroe have the worst ghost rates. Always verify reviews and addresses before calling. 4. Look for fleet photos. Texas operators with real trucks show them off. If the Google listing has no photos or only stock images, that's a red flag. 5. Get the weight allowance in writing. Every legitimate Texas hauler will email you a clear, all-inclusive quote. Ghost operators give vague verbal numbers. 6. Use the [size estimator](/tools/size-estimator) to know what you need, and the [cost calculator](/calculator) to benchmark quotes.

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Our Methodology

• Data source: Google Places API, pulled April 2026, across 50 US states and 200+ metros.
• Universe: 6,304 unique operators with at least one business detail field populated.
• Ghost listing definition: A Google Maps business listing with either (a) zero reviews, (b) no star rating, or (c) a rating below 3.0 stars.
• DCS Score: Our 100-point rubric measuring Rating Quality (25 pts), Review Volume (25 pts), Consistency (15 pts), Trust Signals (20 pts), and Data Completeness (15 pts).
• Independence: No operator paid for placement. No operator can pay to improve their DCS Score.

Data last updated April 2026. We re-score monthly.

[Browse the full Texas operator directory](/dumpster-rental/texas) | [Try the size estimator](/tools/size-estimator) | [Use the cost calculator](/calculator)