Water, Fire and Smoke Damage Restoration in Calabasas

Calabasas has burned from more than one direction. In November 1993 the Old Topanga Fire broke out near the city's southern limits and burned about 18,000 acres through Old Topanga Canyon toward the coast. On November 8, 2018, the Woolsey Fire started in the Simi Hills and crossed the 101 near Calabasas overnight. The next day a wall of flame came off the ridgeline above Parkmor Road, north of the freeway, and several homes there burned while one neighbor across the street stood on his roof with a garden hose. By Sunday, November 11, the whole city was under a mandatory evacuation order, and Grape Arbor Park was damaged; the city finished renovating it in 2020.

Most Calabasas homes came through those fires standing, and that is where our work usually begins. Smoke driven by wind gets into attic insulation, return-air ducts, closets and the backs of upholstered furniture. A house can look clean and still smell on the first warm afternoon. Photograph each room and the furnace filter before anyone wipes a surface, and have the home assessed before cleaning so its condition is on record. Our technicians hold IICRC fire and smoke restoration certification, and we remove residue and treat odor at the source instead of covering it.

Rain on the hills brings a different call. During a storm on the morning of December 30, 2021, the CHP responded to rocks and mud in the road at Mulholland Highway and Old Topanga Canyon Road, and city crews cleared a fallen tree on Park Miramar in Vista Point. Homes along the canyon roads and the upper streets sit below slopes that drain quickly, and runoff that comes under a garage door or through a slider carries soil with it. We treat that water as contaminated: extraction first, then cleaning and disinfection of everything it touched, and only then drying.

Calabasas incorporated on April 5, 1991, when it became the newest city in Los Angeles County, but its houses are older and more varied than that date suggests. Park Moderne, the former artists' colony on the Bird Streets, holds some of the oldest homes. Planned neighborhoods such as The Oaks, Calabasas Hills and Mulholland Heights came later. The age of the plumbing, the kind of foundation and who answers for a shared wall all change from one neighborhood to the next, so the first thing we work out on a Calabasas job is what kind of house we are standing in.

In association neighborhoods a leak can cross a property line or reach a common wall, and getting in may mean a gate or a management office. Tell us on the call whether there is a gate and who to contact there. We coordinate with the association manager and the owner and give both the same photos, moisture readings and drying logs, so the conversation about who handles which part starts from one record.

The everyday calls are the ones any Calabasas house can have: a water heater in the garage, a toilet supply line upstairs, a refrigerator icemaker line, an air conditioning drain pan that overflows into a ceiling. Two-story plans are common, and water from an upstairs bathroom runs down inside the walls and appears in the room below a day later. We map the wet area with moisture meters and thermal imaging before we set equipment, then record readings every day until the materials reach their dry standard.

Hot, dry summers hide slow leaks instead of drying them. Water behind a vanity or under a sink cabinet stays dark and still, and mold can start within a day or two. When we find growth, we set containment, run HEPA air filtration, remove what cannot be cleaned, and tell you in writing what we found and where it was.

Businesses in Old Town, home of the 1844 Leonis Adobe, and at The Commons lose money for every hour a dining room or a shop floor is wet. We contain the wet section so the rest can stay open where that is safe, schedule the loud work around your hours when you ask, and hand you daily logs and photos for the landlord and the carrier.

Before we arrive, close the shutoff at the fixture or the main, switch off the breakers for any room where water reached outlets, lift rugs and anything stored on the floor, and take photos and video of every wet room. On insurance, we document the loss, estimate our own scope of work, and can bill your carrier directly for our services; whether a policy pays is a question for your carrier, your agent or a public adjuster you hire. We respond anywhere in Los Angeles, Orange County and Riverside around the clock, we carry general liability and workers' compensation insurance, we work in English and Spanish, and the first inspection is free.