The conversation this trade has after the invoice instead of before it
What can and cannot be saved
Everything gets billed whether or not it works. That single fact explains most of what goes wrong with contents after a loss, and it is the reason we put the triage in writing on day one rather than in a conversation at the end.
Some of it will not be saved. Some of it will not be saved, and you deserve to hear that on day one rather than after the cleaning bill. Water and smoke both sort belongings into three piles: things that clean up completely, things that can be restored for less than replacing them, and things where the cleaning costs more than the object is worth or where nothing will make them safe again — porous items soaked in category-three water, most soaked mattresses and upholstered foam, some heat-warped electronics. Anyone who tells you everything is recoverable is describing their invoice, not your possessions. We will tell you which pile a thing is in before we spend your money on it, and we will tell you when the honest answer is to replace it.
Why "we can save everything" is a billing strategy
Cleaning is charged by the hour and by the item. A company that attempts everything is paid for attempting everything, including the attempts that fail, and at the end of it the customer has a bill for the failures and a replacement cost as well. There is no penalty anywhere in that arrangement for being wrong, which is why the promise is so common.
The honest version costs us money and we do it anyway: an assessment, in writing, before anything is cleaned, sorting your belongings into three groups and saying which group each significant item is in.
The three piles
Cleans up completely. Hard, non-porous and semi-porous items: crockery, glass, metal, sealed and finished timber, most furniture with sound frames, ceramics, tools, most jewellery. Smoke and clean water both come off these, and the results are usually indistinguishable from before.
Restorable, if the arithmetic works. Rugs and textiles, upholstered furniture that took smoke but not saturation, paper and photographs, some electronics, leather. These can be brought back, but the cost is real, and for each one there is a point at which restoration exceeds replacement. That is a decision about your money, so it is yours to make, and we will give you both numbers rather than one.
Not worth it, or not safe. Porous items soaked in contaminated water. Most soaked mattresses and upholstered foam. Particle-board and MDF furniture that has swollen. Opened food, and anything sealed that sat in category-three water. Cosmetics and medicines exposed to smoke or heat. Insulation. These get listed with a reason attached, because "it has to go" is not an argument.
Time is a bigger factor than damage
For a great many items the question is not how badly they were affected but how quickly somebody got to them. Wet paper and photographs will support growth within days in a warm building, but they respond extremely well to prompt freezing, which stops the clock and buys weeks. Soot is acidic and continues to etch metal, glazed ceramic and finished surfaces for as long as it sits there, so a bronze that would have cleaned perfectly in week one may be permanently pitted by week four.
This is why the first conversation includes the question of which items matter most to you. Not so we can price them higher, but so that the ones you would grieve go into the queue ahead of the ones you would merely replace.
The things people regret
In our experience it is almost never the expensive items. It is the box of photographs in the basement that nobody mentioned on the first day, the recipe book in the kitchen, the letters in the wardrobe. Those are usually recoverable if they are reached early and frequently not if they are reached late.
So when we ask on the first visit whether there is anything irreplaceable, it is a real question and it is worth answering carefully, even while everything else is still going wrong.
What the assessment contains
Written, itemised, and before any money is spent
An inventory with photographs
Everything significant, listed and photographed where it stood, before anything is moved or packed.
A pile, and a reason
Cleanable, restorable or replace — with the reason written next to it, because a verdict without a reason is just an instruction.
Both numbers where it is close
What restoration would cost and what replacement would cost, so the decision is arithmetic rather than persuasion.
A priority list you set
Anything irreplaceable goes to the front, and time-critical items — paper, photographs, anything soot-covered and metal — are flagged as such.
Nothing significant leaves on our say-so
You approve the list. Where an item genuinely has to go for a contamination reason, that is explained rather than assumed.
Questions people actually ask
Salvage — frequently asked
Who decides what gets thrown away?
You do. We assess, we write down what we think and why, and we tell you what each option costs — but nothing significant leaves your house on our opinion alone. Where an item has to go for a health or contamination reason we will explain that clearly rather than quietly adding it to a skip.
Why can't smoke-damaged upholstery be cleaned?
Sometimes it can. The problem is that smoke residue penetrates foam and padding rather than sitting on the fabric, so surface cleaning treats the part you can see and leaves the part that holds the odour. Where the foam took it, the honest arithmetic is usually that cleaning costs more than replacing and produces a worse result.
What about things with no financial value?
They get the same care and often more of it. Photographs, letters, a child's drawing and a grandparent's book are the items people actually grieve, and they are frequently more recoverable than expensive things — paper and photographs respond well to prompt freezing and drying. Tell us on day one which items those are and they go to the front of the queue.
Is it worth cleaning electronics?
Usually not the device, often the data. Corrosion continues after water leaves and it does not announce itself, so an item that works today can fail in six weeks. The rule that matters is: do not switch it on to test it. For most consumer equipment the economics favour replacement, and the genuinely valuable service is recovering what was on the drive.
Can you clean a soaked mattress?
No, and we will not take money to try. A mattress is a large volume of foam and fibre that absorbs the full contamination of whatever wet it and cannot be reached through the ticking. Where it took clean water and is dried quickly there is sometimes a case; where it took anything else, replacement is the only honest answer.
What does the assessment cost?
Nothing, and it comes before any cleaning is priced. That order matters: a salvage assessment produced after the cleaning has been quoted is a sales document, and a salvage assessment produced after the cleaning has been done is an invoice.
Tell us what matters most
Get the triage before the cleaning
The assessment is free and it comes first. Ring us, and on the first visit tell us which items you would grieve — those go to the front of the queue, and for paper and photographs the first few days are most of the outcome.