Fire Damage Restoration Services in Arlington, TN

After the fire trucks leave a Arlington home, what remains is a structure that is wet from suppression water, coated in acidic soot and saturated with smoke odor, often with openings to the weather. Water Restoration connects you with local fire damage restoration crews that secure the property, remove the water, clean the soot, eliminate the odor and rebuild.

Properties in Arlington (Shelby County) range over older homes along the original streets, newer subdivisions, rural properties on the outskirts and small businesses downtown. Home fires peak in winter, when space heaters, fireplaces and furnaces are running and holiday cooking and decorating add risk.

Types of fire losses in Arlington, TN

The risks in Arlington in Shelby County are shaped by Tennessee's climate and housing. Tennessee sees some of the most intense rainfall and flash flooding in the Southeast, along with tornado outbreaks, ice storms and humid summers that keep crawlspaces damp. Much of the state's housing sits over crawlspaces or partial basements where moisture problems start. Problems tend to peak during spring storm season and winter ice, but plumbing failures and appliance leaks happen in every month of the year.

• Kitchen and cooking fires, the leading cause of home fires
• Space heater, fireplace and chimney fires during cold weather
• Grill and outdoor cooking fires that spread to siding and decks
• Furnace malfunctions at the start of heating season
• Electrical shorts in humid attics and crawlspaces
• Candle and holiday decoration fires
• Lightning-caused attic and roof fires
• Lightning strikes and downed power lines during severe storms

Soot, odor and water: three clocks running at once

Three forms of damage continue after the flames are out. Soot residue corrodes and stains surfaces progressively. Odor molecules migrate deeper into porous materials. And suppression water, often hundreds of gallons, swells, delaminates and eventually grows mold in everything it touched. Early stabilization changes what can be saved.

That is why restoration companies in Arlington aim to be on site within a day or two of the fire even when reconstruction will take months. Board-up protects the property; extraction and drying stop the water damage; and the first cleaning pass removes the most corrosive residue.

From board-up to rebuild

1. Emergency contact and safety check. Once the fire department releases the property, the crew evaluates structural stability, utilities and air quality.
2. Securing the structure. Broken openings are boarded, damaged roofing tarped and the site secured.
3. Water removal and drying. Suppression water is extracted and the structure dried to prevent secondary damage and mold.
4. Structural cleaning. Walls, ceilings, cabinets, fixtures and the HVAC system are cleaned using methods chosen for wet, dry or protein smoke.
5. Contents processing. Furniture, clothing, electronics and documents are inventoried, cleaned where possible and stored until the home is ready.
6. Deodorization at the source, sealing of framing and subfloor, and reconstruction of damaged areas to code.

Contents: what is cleanable and what is not

More than most people expect. Glass, ceramics, metal and sealed wood clean well. Many textiles are restorable with specialty laundering and ozone. Electronics that were not exposed to heat can often be cleaned and tested, and documents and photos can be freeze-dried. Items generally not salvageable include food and medicine exposed to heat or smoke, melted plastics, mattresses, particleboard furniture and heavily sooted drywall and insulation.

What fire damage restoration costs in Arlington and what insurance covers

Fire restoration costs in Arlington vary enormously, from a few days of cleaning after a contained kitchen fire to months of reconstruction after a structural fire.

Fire and smoke are covered perils in essentially every homeowners and commercial property policy, and most policies include additional living expenses if the property cannot be occupied during repairs.

Ask the crew to walk you through the estimate and the claim process; good documentation from day one is the best way to get a claim paid.

Service area: Arlington and Shelby County

Coverage in Arlington includes ZIP code 38002, along with the rest of Shelby County.

The same crews also serve nearby communities including Brunswick (2 mi), Ellendale (6 mi), Gallaway (7 mi), Cordova (9 mi), Eads (9 mi), Millington (10 mi), Tipton (11 mi), Atoka (12 mi), Germantown (12 mi) and Oakland (13 mi). If you are just outside Arlington, call anyway; coverage areas overlap.

Why call Water Restoration

• We route you to a local company that already works in Arlington and Shelby County
• The companies we work with deal with insurance adjusters daily and can bill covered mitigation directly to your carrier
• There is no cost or obligation to call and talk through what you are seeing
• A live person answers around the clock, because water and fire do not keep business hours
• You can ask about licensing, insurance and IICRC certification before any work begins, and you should