NYS and NYC M/WBE Certified Contractor
The visible damage — the charred walls, the blackened ceiling — is only part of what a fire leaves behind. Smoke travels through ductwork, seeps into wall cavities, and embeds itself in insulation and drywall well beyond the burn zone. In Westbury’s post-WWII capes and ranches, where original ductwork runs through tight structural cavities built in the 1950s, that smoke contamination can reach every room in the house before the fire trucks leave the block.
Then there’s the water. Every gallon used to put out the fire is now sitting in your subfloor, your framing, and your insulation — and mold can start growing within 24 to 48 hours. A restoration company that only handles the fire damage and ignores the water intrusion isn’t solving the problem. They’re delaying the next one.
When the work is done correctly, you’re not just getting a cleaned-up house. You’re getting a home that’s been fully assessed, properly dried, structurally repaired, and cleared of hidden hazards — with documentation your insurance company will actually accept. That’s what a complete fire damage restoration looks like.
We’re a locally owned restoration and general contracting company serving Westbury and surrounding Nassau County communities like Carle Place, Mineola, and New Cassel. With more than 5,000 completed restoration projects across New York State, our team has worked through every scenario Westbury’s older housing stock can produce.
What makes the difference here isn’t just experience — it’s licensure. We hold the Nassau County General Contractor license, the NYS Department of Labor Asbestos License, the USEPA Lead/RRP Certification, and IICRC certification for fire and smoke restoration. In Westbury, where roughly 90% of homes predate 1980, those credentials aren’t optional extras. They’re what allow the job to be completed legally and completely, without stopping mid-project because something unexpected turned up in the walls.
We also bill insurance companies directly and handle the documentation process from start to finish — so you’re not left navigating an adjuster’s questions while you’re trying to figure out where your family is sleeping.
The first call triggers an immediate response. We reach Westbury properties within one hour, around the clock. When our crew arrives, the first priority is stabilizing the property — boarding up openings, tarping the roof if needed, and containing the damage so it doesn’t spread further overnight or over a weekend.
From there, the full assessment begins. That means documenting the fire damage, the smoke penetration, and the water saturation from firefighting — all photographed and recorded to insurance standards. In Westbury homes built before 1978, that assessment also includes checking for asbestos-containing materials and lead paint before any demolition or structural work begins. This isn’t a formality. It’s a legal requirement, and it’s one reason why our crew is licensed to handle it rather than stopping work and sending you to find someone else.
Once the assessment is complete and the insurance documentation is submitted, the remediation and reconstruction phase begins under one roof. The Village of Westbury requires building permits for structural work, and all plumbing and electrical subcontractors must be licensed by the Village. We manage that entire process — pulling permits through the Building Department at 235 Lincoln Place, scheduling inspections with the required 48-hour notice, and coordinating every licensed trade through to the final walkthrough.
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Fire damage restoration in Westbury covers more ground than most homeowners expect going in. The visible fire and smoke damage is the starting point — structural drying, soot removal, odor elimination, and HVAC cleaning. We hold NADCA certification for air duct cleaning, which matters in older Westbury homes where ductwork runs throughout the entire house and smoke contamination doesn’t stay in the room where the fire started.
For homes with oil heat — which is common throughout Nassau County’s post-WWII housing stock — we also handle oil burner puff-back remediation. A puff-back isn’t a fire, but it coats your walls, ceilings, and ductwork in oily black soot and requires the same professional-grade cleaning process. It happens more often than most people realize, and trying to clean it yourself typically makes it worse.
Beyond the remediation work, we carry the Nassau County General Contractor license to handle full structural reconstruction — framing, drywall, roofing, and finishes — all permitted and inspected through the Village of Westbury’s Building Department. If the fire also disturbs asbestos or lead paint, which is a realistic possibility in any Westbury home built before 1978, that abatement work is handled in-house under proper state and federal licensure. One company. Every phase. No gaps.
Yes — and this is one of the details that catches homeowners off guard. The Village of Westbury requires building permits for any structural alteration, and all plumbing and electrical work must be performed by contractors specifically licensed by the Village. The Building Department is located at 235 Lincoln Place and requires at least 48 hours’ notice before any scheduled inspection.
If your fire damage is extensive enough that the reconstruction value exceeds 50% of the home’s structural value, there’s an additional layer: the Village requires compliance with the New York Energy Star Labeled Homes Program for projects that hit that threshold. A restoration company that isn’t a licensed General Contractor in Nassau County cannot legally pull these permits or manage this process on your behalf. We hold that license and handle the entire permit and inspection process as part of the job — you don’t have to coordinate any of it yourself.
Mold can begin growing within 24 to 48 hours of water exposure — and every house fire in Westbury that required firefighting water has a mold risk. The water used to extinguish the fire doesn’t just sit on the surface. It soaks into subfloors, wall framing, insulation, and structural cavities, and in Westbury’s older homes where vapor barriers may be absent or degraded, that moisture has nowhere to go quickly.
The practical implication is that mold remediation isn’t a separate follow-up job you schedule weeks later if you notice a smell. It needs to be addressed as part of the initial restoration response. We hold the NYS Department of Labor Mold License required to legally perform mold remediation in New York, and our teams address water intrusion and mold risk simultaneously with the fire and smoke damage — preventing a manageable cleanup from turning into a much larger problem down the road.
It does, significantly. Approximately 90% of Westbury’s housing stock was built before 1980, and the majority of that was constructed in the 1940s through 1960s. Homes from that era commonly contain asbestos in floor tiles, ceiling tiles, pipe insulation, and joint compound, as well as lead-based paint on walls, trim, and windows. When a fire disturbs these materials, it creates a hazardous materials situation that most restoration companies are not licensed to handle.
Under New York State law, asbestos abatement requires a NYS Department of Labor Asbestos License. Work involving lead paint requires USEPA Lead/RRP Certification. A contractor without these credentials who discovers asbestos or lead mid-project must legally stop work — leaving you in limbo while you scramble to find a licensed company to take over. We hold both certifications and can handle the full scope of what a fire in a 1950s Westbury home can uncover, without interruption and without sending you to a second or third contractor.
The claims process is where a lot of homeowners feel most out of their depth, and understandably so. After a fire, you’re dealing with displacement, stress, and a long list of decisions — and the insurance company’s adjuster is not on your side. Their job is to assess the damage and settle the claim, not to make sure you’re fully compensated for everything the restoration requires.
We bill insurance companies directly and document every phase of the work to insurance-standard specifications — photographs, moisture readings, scope-of-damage reports, and material replacement documentation. For Westbury homeowners with properties valued at $644,000 and above, the difference between a well-documented claim and a poorly documented one can easily reach tens of thousands of dollars. We’ve guided hundreds of Long Island families through this process and can attend material selection appointments with you to make sure the replacement value reflects what your home actually requires, not what’s easiest for the adjuster to approve.
A puff-back happens when an oil-burning furnace misfires and releases a cloud of unburned oil and fine black soot through your home’s ductwork and living spaces. It doesn’t involve an open flame, but it coats walls, ceilings, furniture, and personal belongings in oily residue that looks and smells like fire damage — because chemically, it’s very similar. Oil heat is extremely common in Nassau County’s post-WWII housing stock, and puff-backs are one of the most frequent soot contamination events in this area.
Most standard homeowners insurance policies in New York do cover puff-back damage, but the documentation requirements are the same as any other fire damage claim. The oily soot from a puff-back cannot be wiped off — it smears and spreads when you try. It requires industrial dry-cleaning sponges, professional-grade suction equipment, and NADCA-certified HVAC cleaning to remove the contamination from the ductwork before it re-circulates every time the heat runs. We handle puff-back remediation regularly throughout Nassau County and can manage the insurance documentation for that claim as well.
The honest answer is that it depends on the scope of the damage, and in Westbury specifically, there are a few factors that can affect the timeline. The Village’s permit process requires building permits for structural work and 48-hour advance notice for inspections — that’s a fixed timeline built into the reconstruction phase that every contractor working in Westbury has to work within. If the assessment uncovers asbestos or lead paint, which is common in homes built before 1978, the abatement work adds time before structural repairs can begin.
For a contained fire — a kitchen fire or a garage fire that didn’t spread to the main structure — the remediation phase can often be completed within one to two weeks, with reconstruction following based on the permit schedule. A more significant fire affecting multiple rooms or structural systems will take longer, sometimes six to twelve weeks through full reconstruction. We can tell you on day one a realistic timeline based on the actual assessment, not a number designed to get you to sign. The goal is to get your home back to you correctly — and in a community like Westbury where most families have deep roots in their homes, doing it right matters more than doing it fast.
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