Garbage Disposal Repair, and Who the Machine Belongs To

First, whose disposal is it

In an owner-occupied house the disposal is your appliance on your drain line. In a rented apartment it is usually the building's fixture, the landlord's to repair, and the drain it empties into is shared with other kitchens. Calling a contractor yourself in the second case can leave you with a bill you did not owe.

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Then the symptom, which is unusually decisive

Complete silence is a power fault: the reset button, the breaker, or the switch. A hum with no rotation is a jam, and it is the most common call there is. Water in the cabinet depends entirely on where it starts. A smell is residue, not a fault at all.

And the thing that prevents most of these

Grease, fibrous vegetables, coffee grounds and bones cause more disposal failures than age does. EPA is blunt about the first one: never pour cooking oil or grease down the drain. The full list explains what each one actually does.

Source: US EPA, How to Care for Your Septic System.

When not to call at all

A tripped reset costs nothing to push. A jam is often freed in ten minutes with a hex key. A smell is a cleaning job. Routing those to a contractor wastes your money and their time, so we say so rather than take the call.