Fast, Reliable Fire & Smoke Damage Restoration Across Los Angeles
Fire and smoke damage in Los Angeles is different from anywhere else. Between the Santa Ana winds, wildfire seasons that push ash into every ZIP code, and housing stock that runs from 1920s Craftsman bungalows to flat-roofed Koreatown apartments, restoration here takes someone who knows the buildings and the weather. If you’re standing in a house that smells like a campfire and wondering how fast this gets worse, call Wade’s Restoration of California at (855) 915-0646. Wade Ferris answers his own phone, and he can have a crew on the road to your Los Angeles neighborhood the same day you call.
Why Wade’s Restoration of California Is Los Angeles’s Preferred Fire & Smoke Damage Restoration Company
Wade Ferris founded this company in 2007, and he runs it like a neighbor, not a franchise. His name is on the truck, his license number is published, and if something isn’t done right, he’s the one you call. A 90-Day Done Right Promise goes in writing on every fire and smoke job. If the odor returns or the soot wasn’t fully pulled from the wall cavities, Wade comes back. No juggling a call center, no arguing with a rotating cast of project managers.
Los Angeles homeowners have dealt with enough national chains that quote one number on the phone and another at the door. Wade’s crew works the opposite way: a written scope before work starts, photo documentation throughout, and direct communication with your insurance adjuster so you’re not the one relaying information between two sides. The people Wade sends to your home are background-checked and uniformed, and they carry professional-grade equipment from Dri-Eaz, Phoenix, and Injectidry. IICRC-certified, RIA-affiliated, and IFA-recognized. When a kitchen fire in Echo Park leaves soot in the plaster, or a wildfire pushes ash through every vent in Silver Lake, you want someone who has seen those exact walls before.
We serve all of Los Angeles, from Koreatown to View Park-Windsor Hills. Our Fire & Smoke Damage Restoration team knows which ZIP codes have original plaster-and-lath construction and which apartment buildings have flat roofs that pond water after a fire loss gets tarped incorrectly. That local knowledge is the difference between a clean finish and a house that still smells like smoke six months later.
Our Fire & Smoke Damage Restoration Services in Los Angeles
Every fire is different. A grease fire in a Koreatown apartment kitchen leaves a different residue than a slow-burning electrical smolder behind a 1940s wall in the 90004 ZIP. Here’s what we do most often across Los Angeles.
Fire Damage Cleanup
Fire damage cleanup in Los Angeles starts with a full assessment of what burned, what melted, and what absorbed smoke. We remove charred materials, assess whether structural framing is still sound, and map the smoke line so nothing gets missed. In older Los Angeles homes, that means checking original single-pane windows for heat compromise and looking at how far soot traveled through lath-and-plaster cavities. You get a written scope before we start, not after.

Smoke & Soot Removal
Soot is acidic. Left on a surface, it etches metal, stains paint, and works its way into anything porous. In Los Angeles’s 1920s-1940s bungalows, soot buries itself in the plaster walls and the gaps behind baseboards. We use HEPA air scrubbers and Injectidry panels to pull soot from deep cavities, not just wipe the surface. The goal is a surface that is clean to the touch and clean underneath, so the smell doesn’t come back when the Santa Anas kick up in September.

Odor Removal & Deodorization
Odor removal is the part of fire restoration that separates a real fix from a cosmetic one. Smoke molecules get into drywall, insulation, subfloor, and ductwork. If you only clean what you can see, the smell comes back every time the house warms up or the humidity shifts. We treat odor at the source with thermal fogging, air scrubbing, and duct cleaning. In flat-roofed Spanish Colonial duplexes around Los Angeles, that often means fogging the attic and checking whether roof vents pulled smoke into the top floor units. Wade’s crew has handled enough of these to know that skipping the attic is the number one callback cause.

Contents Cleaning & Pack-Out
Clothing, furniture, rugs, books, electronics. Smoke works into all of it, and the damage keeps progressing while items sit in the house. We offer full contents pack-out: we inventory everything, pack it, clean it off-site with appropriate methods per material, and store it until your home is ready. It’s a bigger job than most people expect, but it’s the difference between keeping your grandmother’s dining table and writing it off. We coordinate directly with your insurance, including the pack-out inventory and the per-item valuation.

What happens when you call
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A real person answersNo phone trees - you reach a local pro.
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You get an upfront price rangeHonest numbers before anyone is dispatched.
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A background-checked tech heads outLicensed & insured, dispatched right away.
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You approve before work beginsNothing starts until you say go.
Trusted Brands We Service in Los Angeles
We don’t cut corners on equipment, because Los Angeles’s housing stock doesn’t forgive cheap tools. Our crews run Dri-Eaz HEPA 500 air scrubbers on smoke jobs and Injectidry panels where we need to pull soot or moisture from wall cavities. We stock parts and filters locally so we’re not waiting on a shipment when your home needs work now. The IICRC, RIA, and IFA credentials backing the work mean the methods we use are the industry standard, not a guess. When you call Wade’s Restoration of California, the equipment shows up with the crew, and the results get documented.
Common Fire & Smoke Damage Restoration Problems We See in Los Angeles Homes
- Smoke hiding behind single-pane windows and original plaster walls. 1920s-1940s bungalows in the 90001-90010 corridor have plaster that wicks smoke like a sponge. Standard surface cleaning leaves the odor behind, and homeowners call us months later wondering why the smell never left.
- Santa Ana winds masking residual moisture. Los Angeles’s September-December Santa Ana events dry visible surfaces fast, but moisture trapped behind stucco and drywall stays put. Restorers who follow standard drying timelines under-treat these homes and face mold callbacks. We extend drying verification on every smoke and water job during Santa Ana season.
- Wildfire ash in HVAC systems across the entire metro. When hillside fires burn, ash infiltrates ductwork in flat urban ZIPs like 90005 and 90007, miles from the fire line. If you don’t address the ducts, the smoke smell recurs every time the heat or AC kicks on, even after structural repairs are complete.
- Board-up crews unfamiliar with flat-roofed apartments. Emergency board-up on a flat-roofed Koreatown or Westlake apartment building is a different job than a pitched single-family roof. If upper-floor openings aren’t tarped correctly before winter rain, a contained fire loss becomes a four-unit water damage cascade. Wade’s crew knows these buildings.
Here’s one from the field. We were called to a 1920s Craftsman bungalow in the 90006 ZIP after a kitchen fire. Smoke had worked into the original plaster-over-wood-lath walls, and a standard surface wipe would have left that persistent campfire smell for months. Our crew ran a Dri-Eaz HEPA 500 air scrubber and used Injectidry panels to pull soot from deep wall cavities, then sealed the attic with thermal fogging to neutralize odors before structural repair began. Because the lath wicked smoke like a sponge, anything less than treating the wall cavities would have failed. That’s the Los Angeles playbook: treat the walls, the attic, and the ducts, or you’ll be calling us back after the next weather shift.
Pricing for Fire & Smoke Damage Restoration in Los Angeles, CA
Fire damage restoration pricing in Los Angeles depends on how far the smoke traveled and what it touched. But here are the ranges we actually quote in this market. Smoke and soot removal for a contained kitchen fire in a Los Angeles apartment or bungalow typically runs $1,800-$4,500. Full odor removal with thermal fogging and duct cleaning usually lands between $2,500 and $6,000. Contents cleaning and pack-out for a whole house is the big variable: $4,000-$15,000 depending on volume and material type. Emergency board-up and tarping in Los Angeles runs $400-$1,200, and structural fire repair is scoped in writing before work starts, not after. Call (855) 915-0646 for a free estimate. Wade is happy to come out, walk the property, and give you a written number. No trip charge inside our own county, and we’ll beat any written estimate you already have by $40 on any repair over $200. Senior and veteran discount is 10%, always.
We Also Serve Cities Near Los Angeles
Beyond Los Angeles proper, our crews regularly work in Koreatown, Echo Park, Silver Lake, and View Park-Windsor Hills. These neighborhoods sit within our Los Angeles dispatch area, so same-day response is normal, not a premium. Wherever you are in Los Angeles, call (855) 915-0646 and you’ll talk to a live person, not a queue.
Serving Los Angeles, CA - Our Local Coverage Area
We’re based in the Los Angeles area and know this community well. Use the map below to see our service coverage - if you’re nearby, we can almost certainly help.
FAQs - Fire & Smoke Damage Restoration in Los Angeles
Wildfire smoke and ash travel for miles on wind currents and enter homes through attic vents, open windows, door gaps, and HVAC intakes. Homes miles from the fire line still get duct contamination, faint ash on surfaces, and recurring odor. Restoration in those flat Los Angeles ZIPs requires duct cleaning, HEPA air scrubbing, and surface washing in addition to any structural work. Call (855) 915-0646 for an assessment, and we’ll check the ducts even if the fire never touched your block.
Plaster-and-lath walls are porous and have gaps behind the lath that drywall doesn’t. Smoke penetrates deep into the plaster and gets trapped in those cavities. Surface cleaning alone never reaches it. You need air scrubbers and cavity injection to pull the soot out from behind the wall, plus thermal fogging to neutralize what’s already absorbed. In Los Angeles’s 1920s bungalow stock, this is the most common reason homeowners call us back after another company “finished” the job. Call for a real fix, and ask about our 90-Day Done Right Promise.
Pack-out is the standard way to clean and restore contents, but some property managers drag their feet on approving it. If you’re in that spot in a Koreatown or Westlake apartment, document everything with photos, get a written estimate for the pack-out scope, and have your restoration company communicate directly with the building’s insurance or management. Wade’s crew does that coordination for you, and we can start cleaning high-priority items on-site while the approval works through. Do not wait weeks, soot etches surfaces fast. Call (855) 915-0646 and Wade will walk you through it.
You look for soot trails around ceiling fixtures, around the attic access, and along the roof vents. In a flat-roofed Spanish Colonial in Los Angeles, smoke rises through wall cavities and collects in the attic space. If there’s any soot near the attic hatch or around the recessed lighting, it got in. Our crews inspect the attic on every fire job in these buildings. If it’s affected, we fog it. Skipping the attic is the fastest route to a house that smells fine for two weeks and then doesn’t. Call (855) 915-0646 for a direct answer.
Yes. Los Angeles’s winter rains come hard and fast, and a burned-out opening in a roof or wall is a direct invitation for water to pour in. Board-up and tarping done properly, with the right materials on a flat roof, stops one disaster from becoming two. On flat-roofed rentals in South LA, we see this all the time: a fire gets contained, then winter rain turns the top floor into a waterfall because the tarp wasn’t pitched correctly. Emergency board-up is carried out on our first visit, not a follow-up. Call (855) 915-0646 and Wade’s crew can be on site the same day.
If you’ve got fire or smoke damage anywhere in Los Angeles, from Koreatown to Echo Park, the fastest move is a phone call. Wade Ferris answers his own phone at (855) 915-0646, 24/7. You’ll get a straight answer, a free estimate, and a written scope before any work starts. Since 2007, that’s been the way we do it, and that’s why people on your street know the name.
Written by Wade Ferris, Owner at Wade’s Restoration of California.