NYS and NYC M/WBE Certified Contractor
After a flood, most homeowners focus on what they can see — the waterline on the wall, the ruined flooring, the soaked drywall. What causes the real problems is what you can’t see. Moisture trapped inside wall cavities, beneath subfloors, and inside insulation can sit there for weeks before it shows itself as mold, rot, or a persistent musty smell that doesn’t go away no matter what you clean.
In Highland Falls specifically, that risk is higher than most people realize. The July 2023 storm dropped over 8 inches of rain in a single afternoon — the highest total in the tri-state area that day. That wasn’t a slow basement seep. That was Category 3 black water from Popolopen Creek overflow moving through homes fast, carrying sediment and contaminants into walls, under floors, and into every low-lying corner. Surfaces that looked dry a week later were still holding moisture inside. Some of those homes are still dealing with the consequences.
When flood restoration is done right, you get more than a dry house. You get a verified dry house — confirmed with thermal imaging and moisture meters, not just a visual check. You get mold prevention built into the drying process, not addressed six months later when it’s already a bigger problem. And if your home was built before 1978, you get a contractor who can legally handle asbestos and lead-containing materials that floodwater may have disturbed — without bringing in three separate companies to finish the job.
We’ve been doing environmental restoration work in New York for over 12 years and have completed more than 5,000 projects across the state. That’s not a number pulled from a brochure — it’s the kind of volume that means we’ve handled the full range of what flooding actually does to a home, from straightforward water extraction to complex multi-phase remediation involving mold, asbestos, and structural reconstruction.
What separates us from most restoration companies working in Orange County and the Hudson Valley is the credential stack. We hold IICRC Water Damage Certification, NYS DOL Mold and Asbestos Licenses, USEPA Lead/RRP Certification, and NYS General Contractor licensing — all under one roof. In a community like Highland Falls, where older homes near the Route 9W corridor may contain asbestos floor tiles, lead paint, and pipe insulation that floodwater has disturbed, having one contractor who can legally handle all of it isn’t just convenient. It’s the difference between a complete restoration and a job that stops short of safe.
We’re also NYS and NYC M/WBE Certified, fully insured with liability and workers’ compensation coverage, and carry a 100% Satisfaction Guarantee. This is an accountable, verifiable operation — not a post-disaster crew that showed up after the 2023 storm and disappeared.
It starts with a call, and within 60 minutes someone is on-site. That’s not a window — that’s a commitment. The first priority is stopping the damage from getting worse: water extraction, containment, and an immediate moisture assessment using thermal imaging to locate trapped water that isn’t visible on the surface. In Highland Falls, where flash flooding from the Popolopen Creek watershed can push Category 3 contaminated water through a home in minutes, that assessment includes testing for contamination levels that determine exactly how the remediation needs to proceed.
Once the scope is clear, the drying process begins — industrial-grade dehumidifiers, air movers, and in many cases, controlled demolition of materials that can’t be saved and would otherwise trap moisture and feed mold growth. If your home was built before 1978, this phase includes a check for asbestos-containing materials and lead paint that may have been disturbed by the flood. Under New York State law, those materials require a licensed contractor to handle — and we hold both licenses, so that work happens in the same engagement rather than requiring you to find and schedule a separate abatement company.
After the structure is verified dry — not assumed dry, but confirmed with equipment — reconstruction begins. Drywall, flooring, insulation, framing, and finish work are all handled in-house. The Village of Highland Falls and Town of Highlands require building permits for structural repairs, and we manage that process as part of the job. When the work is done, you get documentation: moisture readings, remediation records, and a completed restoration you can show to your insurance carrier or a future buyer.
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Flood restoration in Highland Falls isn’t a single service — it’s a sequence of connected work that has to be done in the right order by people with the right credentials. We handle the full sequence: emergency water extraction, structural drying, mold assessment and remediation, asbestos and lead abatement where required, full reconstruction, and final inspection. Nothing gets handed off to a subcontractor and nothing falls through the gap between trades.
For homes near the Weyant Green corridor or along the lower sections of the village that took the worst of the 2023 flooding, that often means dealing with more than just water damage. Floodwater that sat for any period of time in a home built before 1980 is a potential asbestos and lead disturbance event. We’re one of the only restoration contractors in the Hudson Valley that holds the NYS DOL Asbestos License, NYS DOL Mold License, and USEPA Lead/RRP Certification simultaneously — which means we can legally assess, contain, and remediate all of it in one project without stopping to bring in outside help.
On the financial side, we bill insurance carriers directly so you’re not out of pocket during the emergency. For costs that insurance doesn’t cover — and standard homeowners policies typically don’t cover weather-related flood damage — financing up to $200,000 at 0% APR is available. After what Highland Falls went through in 2023, and with some residents still navigating incomplete repairs and contested claims heading into 2024, that option is there for anyone who needs it.
This is one of the most common situations we see — a homeowner who did their own cleanup after a flood event, got the visible water out, and assumed the job was done. The problem is that standard cleanup doesn’t reach moisture that’s migrated into wall cavities, under subfloors, inside insulation, or beneath concrete slabs. That moisture doesn’t evaporate on its own. It sits there, and within 24 to 48 hours of a flood event, mold can begin to grow in those spaces — completely out of sight.
For Highland Falls residents who were affected by the July 2023 storm, the risk is real and ongoing. Homes that took on Category 3 floodwater from Popolopen Creek overflow — the kind carrying sediment, debris, and organic contaminants — are particularly susceptible to mold growth behind finished surfaces. A professional moisture assessment using thermal imaging and calibrated moisture meters can locate trapped water that a visual inspection will miss entirely. If you haven’t had that done and your home was flooded, it’s worth the call before you discover the problem the hard way.
Standard homeowners insurance policies typically do not cover flood damage caused by weather events — and that distinction matters enormously for Highland Falls residents. What your homeowners policy covers is sudden and accidental water damage from inside the home, like a burst pipe or an appliance failure. Damage from rising water, creek overflow, or stormwater that enters through the foundation or ground level is generally excluded and falls under a separate flood insurance policy through FEMA’s National Flood Insurance Program.
Many residents in Highland Falls who were affected by the July 2023 storm discovered this gap firsthand. If you don’t have a separate flood insurance policy, the restoration costs come out of pocket — and for severe damage, those costs can range from several thousand dollars to well over $20,000 depending on the extent of structural damage, mold, and any hazardous material abatement required. We bill your insurance carrier directly for whatever is covered, and for costs that fall outside your coverage, financing up to $200,000 at 0% APR is available so that the financial gap doesn’t leave your home in an unfinished state.
Mold can begin to grow within 24 hours of a flood event under the right conditions — and the conditions inside a flooded home are almost always right. Warm temperatures, organic materials like drywall and wood framing, and moisture are all mold needs to get started. The longer water sits or moisture stays trapped, the more established the growth becomes and the more expensive and invasive the remediation process gets.
For Highland Falls homes that experienced the 2023 flooding, the concern isn’t just surface mold — it’s mold growing inside wall assemblies and beneath flooring where it’s not visible and not affecting air quality in an obvious way until the colony is well established. New York State requires a licensed mold remediation contractor (NYS DOL Mold License) to perform any mold remediation work, which means you can’t legally hire an unlicensed handyman or general contractor to handle it. We hold that license and perform mold assessment and remediation as part of the full restoration process — not as a separate engagement you have to schedule and coordinate on your own.
Yes, and it’s one of the most important questions to ask before any restoration work begins. Homes built before 1978 commonly contain lead-based paint, and homes built before 1980 may contain asbestos in floor tiles, pipe insulation, ceiling texture, and drywall joint compound. When floodwater moves through an older home, it can disturb those materials — breaking tiles, saturating insulation, damaging walls — and create an exposure risk that a standard restoration contractor isn’t licensed to address.
Under New York State law, asbestos abatement requires a NYS DOL Asbestos License, and renovation work on pre-1978 homes requires USEPA Lead/RRP Certification. Many restoration companies working in Orange County hold neither. We hold both, along with the NYS DOL Mold License, which means a flood-damaged older home in Highland Falls — the kind that may have all three hazardous materials present — can be fully restored in a single engagement. You don’t need to find a separate abatement contractor, wait for their schedule, and then bring the restoration company back in. It all happens together, which is faster, safer, and significantly less complicated for you.
The timeline depends on three main factors: how much water entered the home, how long it sat before extraction began, and what materials were affected. For a typical basement flood with prompt response, the structural drying phase alone takes three to five days using industrial equipment. Full restoration — including any drywall replacement, flooring, insulation, and finish work — generally runs two to four weeks for moderate damage. Severe structural damage, mold remediation, or asbestos abatement adds time.
In Highland Falls, where the terrain and Popolopen Creek drainage patterns can produce flash flooding that moves fast and contaminates quickly, the Category 3 classification of storm floodwater means the remediation protocol is more involved than a standard water damage job. Contaminated materials that can’t be decontaminated have to be removed rather than dried in place, which affects both the timeline and the scope of reconstruction. The Village of Highland Falls and Town of Highlands also require building permits for structural repairs, and that process needs to be factored into the project schedule. We handle permitting as part of the job, so you’re not managing that separately while trying to get your home back in order.
Absolutely — and you’re not alone in that situation. As of 2024, a number of Highland Falls residents were still dealing with incomplete repairs, broken retaining walls, persistent moisture issues, and the anxiety that comes with every rain forecast after what happened on July 9, 2023. Some were waiting on FEMA funding. Some had done partial repairs and weren’t sure what was still unresolved. Some had simply been living with the damage because the financial and logistical complexity of the full restoration felt overwhelming.
If your home was affected by the 2023 storm and the work was never fully completed — or if you’ve started noticing new signs of moisture, mold, or structural movement — a professional assessment is the right first step. We can come in, evaluate what was done and what wasn’t, identify any hidden moisture or mold that developed in the time since, and put together a complete scope of what the restoration actually requires. Financing up to $200,000 at 0% APR is available for residents who are managing costs that insurance or FEMA didn’t fully cover. The goal is a finished job — not a patched one.
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