Before you hire
How to choose a restoration company
Ten checks you can make in one phone call, the paperwork to ask for, and the signs that mean slow down before you sign.
Get Help With Your Restoration Project What drives the cost
Written by HyreRestore Research Desk Primary-source research and fact checking
The short answer
Choose a restoration company on checks you run yourself. Ask which technicians hold IICRC certification, look up any state license by number, get insurance certificates from the insurer, and get a written scope and daily moisture log before work beyond emergency drying.
Know whether you are signing a work authorization or an assignment of benefits. HyreRestore does not vet companies.
If this is happening right now
If water is still running, read the first 24 hours first: make it safe, stop the source and photograph everything. Emergency drying can start on a limited written authorization. The full hiring decision does not have to be made at the curb.
What protects you when you hire a restoration company?
HyreRestore vets, rates and recommends no company, and none is signed up yet. See how companies will be checked.
IICRC certifies individual technicians. Ask who will be in your house, not what the company logo says.
Urgency about the house is real. Urgency about your signature is not: emergency drying can start on a limited authorization.
Get help with your restoration project, then run these checks
Free, with no obligation. A person at HyreRestore replies by email. Not an emergency line: matching is not live yet, and nobody is sent to the property.
What are the ten checks?
Each is a question you can ask on the phone, with a check you can make afterwards.
Names and certifications, written on the scope. Not whether “the company” is certified.
Look the number up on the state board’s own site. The table below shows which work tends to need one.
Certificates sent by the insurer or broker, with dates that cover your job.
Before anything beyond emergency drying starts.
Daily readings at marked points, handed to you.
A work authorization, or an assignment of benefits.
A deadline on your signature is a reason to slow down.
A legal name, a physical address and someone to call in a year.
Handled in-house under a license, or referred out, and whether you are committed to it.
One named contact, changes in writing, and photos at each stage.
Which license covers which part of the work?
There is no single national restoration license. What applies depends on your state and on the work.
| The work | What licensing can look like |
|---|---|
| Mitigation and drying | Not licensed as its own trade in many states. Governed by the IICRC standards and business registration. |
| Reconstruction | Can need a general contractor or trade license, with thresholds that differ by state and job value. |
| Mold assessment and remediation | Licensed separately in some states, some of which bar the same firm from assessing and remediating one property. |
| Electrical, plumbing, gas and roofing | Licensed trades. Check each one doing work in the rebuild. |
| Asbestos and lead | Regulated separately, with federal as well as state rules. |
Where a state separates mold assessment from remediation, the reason is a conflict of interest: the company paid to remediate profits from finding that remediation is needed. Where no rule applies, the conflict is still there. The assessor or remediator tool explains the split, and mold remediation covers the work.
What insurance should a restoration company carry?
People will cut into your house, run equipment in it for days and possibly take your belongings away. Ask for certificates sent by the insurer or broker, and check the named insured matches the company on your contract.
Damage they cause to your property while working.
For everyone on site, subcontractors included. Without it, an injury on your property can become your problem.
If there is a contents pack-out. General liability may not cover property in the contractor’s own custody. See contents restoration.
Limited financial recourse, not a guarantee of quality.
How should drying be documented?
Moisture documentation handed to you is one of the clearest signs of a careful operation, and it is easy to check.
Readings from undamaged material of the same type elsewhere in the house. This is the goal. Ask where it was taken.
Fixed locations, marked, so each day’s reading is taken in the same place.
With a moisture meter, and a thermal camera where it helps find wet areas.
Drying ends when the wet material reaches the goal and holds it, not after a set number of days. Without the log, nobody can show the house is dry or justify the equipment days billed. See structural drying.
Work authorization or assignment of benefits?
Settle this before anything is signed, because it decides who controls your claim.
| Question | Work authorization | Assignment of benefits |
|---|---|---|
| What it does | Permits defined work at your property | Transfers your right to policy payment for that work to the contractor |
| Who deals with the insurer | You | The contractor |
| Who is paid | You, then you pay the contractor; your lender can be named on the check | The contractor, directly |
| Regulation | Ordinary contract terms | Regulated specifically in some states, with required disclosures and cancellation rights in some |
| How to read it | Read it | Read it twice, and ask your insurer before signing |
Neither document is wrong in itself. A form presented at the door “just so we can bill your insurance” describes an assignment of benefits. Read assignment of benefits first, and ask what you owe if the insurer pays less than the invoice.
What belongs in the written scope
Anything beyond emergency drying should wait for a scope you have read. A line reading “water mitigation as required” is not one.
With quantities, tied to a sketch.
And why for each.
Type, count and how it is charged.
Including the daily monitoring visits.
And where the reading points are.
What happens if it is found: the change order process, and disposal charges.
The cost page lists every line group a mitigation invoice can contain, which is the list a scope should be written against.
You can use a different company for the rebuild.
Drying happens under time pressure. The rebuild is an ordinary building job, and the place where two bids against one written scope are possible and worth getting. Make sure nothing you sign now commits you to both.
What should you ask before you sign?
Will you put their names on the scope?
Then check the number yourself.
How long have you operated here, and who do I call in a year?
Or who do you refer to, and what is your relationship with them?
And what will I be copied on?
Get the answer before the work.
What is the fifteen-minute version?
And look at the address.
With the state board, by number.
From the insurer or broker.
On the scope.
In writing.
Work authorization or assignment of benefits, and whether the rebuild is included.
Which signs mean slow down?
Nothing about a wet house requires a full-scope contract at the door.
A deadline on your signature exists to stop a second opinion.
See avoiding restoration scams for why this is a warning sign.
Or an explanation of a document that is shorter than the document.
Any payment method with no recourse.
Not proof of fraud, but a warranty is only as good as the company’s reason to come back. See storm damage restoration.
Your inquiry
Tell us about the damage
Nothing goes to a restoration company unless you agree.
A person reads it and replies by email, free and with no obligation. Matching is not live yet, so this is not a dispatch line and nobody is sent to the property.
Get Help With Your Restoration Project
One short form: your address and how to reach you. A person at HyreRestore reads it and replies.
Questions
What certification should a restoration company have?
Do restoration companies need a state license?
Should the same company test for mold and remove it?
How do I verify a restoration company’s insurance?
Is it a bad sign if a restoration company will not quote a price by phone?
Do I have to use the same company for the rebuild?
Does HyreRestore vet the companies it connects me with?
Written and audited by
HyreRestore Research Desk
Primary-source research and fact checking
We are a research desk, not a restoration company and not an insurance adjuster.
We read the federal agency guidance, the state insurance statute or the industry standard ourselves, and we publish the rule with the document it came from and the date we read it.
Where a number cannot be traced to a primary source, we publish the shorter page and say what we could not verify. The counts below are taken from the pages on this site.
- 56
- source documents linked from these pages
- 15
- government (.gov) domains among them
- 0
- average prices published without a source
- 0
- restoration jobs we perform
How this desk works
- Primary sources only. A mold rule comes from the EPA, a flood rule from FEMA and the NFIP, a claim rule from the state insurance statute. We do not cite an article that cites a source.
- Every figure carries its retrieval date. Guidance is revised and statutes are amended. A number without the date it was read cannot be checked.
- Paywalled standards are named, not quoted. IICRC S500 and S520 define the categories and classes of water and mold work. We describe their public structure and say plainly when the controlling text sits behind a purchase.
- Safety before the claim. Electricity near water, sewage, smoke and mold come first on every page where they apply. We explain the work; we do not tell you to do it yourself.
- We do not dry, remediate or rebuild anything, we do not adjust claims, and we take no payment for placement, ranking or a favorable mention.
Authorship on this site is organizational: the analysis belongs to the desk rather than to a named individual, and we do not publish credentials we do not hold. Our editorial policy sets out how we source, date and correct what we publish.
Sources & retrieval dates
Information on this page is general and may vary by location, building code, zoning, the condition of your house and your own circumstances. It is not legal, insurance, medical or engineering advice.
HyreRestore is not a restoration contractor and not an insurance adjuster: we dry nothing, remediate nothing and rebuild nothing, and we do not supervise or warrant anyone's work.
This page explains the work so you can read a scope, judge the company that wrote it and follow your own claim.