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AfterHow Much Does Fire & Smoke Damage Restoration Cost in Austin?
Fire and smoke damage restoration in Austin typically runs between $3,200 and $38,000, with most homeowners paying $8,600 to $18,000 for moderate damage that affects two or three rooms. Small kitchen fires that are caught fast often land in the $3,500 to $7,000 range, while whole-home fires with structural damage routinely exceed $40,000. Those numbers reflect 2026 pricing in the Austin metro, including the cost of soot removal, odor treatment, drywall replacement, and refinishing.
What you pay depends on three things more than anything else: how far the smoke traveled, how long soot sat on surfaces before cleanup began, and whether water from firefighting efforts soaked into drywall and flooring. Homes in older Austin neighborhoods like Hyde Park or Bouldin Creek often carry higher restoration bills because lath-and-plaster walls hold smoke differently than modern drywall, and original hardwood floors need specialized cleaning instead of replacement. At Marsh Water Damage Austin, we’ve worked smoke and water damage jobs across Travis, Williamson, and Hays counties since 2005, and we give every homeowner a written price before any work starts.
For a complete walkthrough of our fire restoration process, see our Fire & Smoke Damage Restoration in Austin page.
Fire & Smoke Damage Restoration Cost Breakdown (2026)
Here’s what we’re actually charging on Austin-area jobs in 2026. These are real ranges from the past twelve months of work, not national averages from a calculator:
| Service | Typical Cost Range (Austin, 2026) | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Assessment and inspection | $150 – $400 | Often waived when you proceed with restoration. Marsh never charges for the estimate itself – it’s free. |
| Board-up and tarping | $500 – $1,800 | Secures broken windows, doors, and roof openings. Needed for most structural fires. |
| Soot and smoke residue cleanup (single room) | $1,200 – $3,500 | Walls, ceilings, trim, light fixtures. Includes dry-sponge and wet-cleaning techniques. |
| Soot and smoke cleanup (multi-room, light to moderate) | $3,000 – $8,000 | Two to four rooms with common areas. This is the most frequent job we quote. |
| Deodorization (ozone or thermal fogging) | $500 – $2,500 | Neutralizes smoke odor lingering in walls, ductwork, and fabrics. |
| HVAC and duct cleaning after fire | $600 – $2,000 | When smoke pulled through the return air system. Common in Austin homes with central units. |
| Content cleaning (furniture, clothing, personal items) | $800 – $5,000 | Depends on volume. Soft goods often need ultrasonic or immersion cleaning. |
| Drywall replacement and repainting | $2,000 – $9,000 | Runs higher in older Austin homes with textured walls or custom paint. |
| Water extraction and drying (from firefighting) | $1,800 – $6,000 | Fire hoses dump hundreds of gallons. You are almost always dealing with a water damage job inside a fire job. |
| Mold remediation after water sits | $1,500 – $7,500 | Firefighting water soaks drywall and insulation within minutes. Mold follows if drying is delayed by even 48 hours in Austin heat. |
| Full restoration (moderate house fire) | $15,000 – $45,000 | Multi-room rebuild, structural repair, full-content cleaning. |
| Full restoration (severe or whole-home fire) | $45,000 – $150,000+ | Includes framing, roofing, electrical, and full interior rebuild. |
Those are line items. Most Austin homeowners aren’t buying one line item – they’re buying a package of three to six services at once, which is why the average total invoice lands between $8,600 and $18,000. If a fire in Round Rock or Cedar Park stays contained to the kitchen and is extinguished within five minutes, you might get out for under $5,000. If it smolders for an hour and batters the house with thick, greasy smoke, count on the higher end of every line.
One thing that surprises people: water damage from the fire department is often more expensive to fix than the fire itself. Austin FD can flow 150 to 250 gallons per minute. That water hits the floor, soaks through the subfloor, wicks up drywall, and saturates insulation. The drying and mold prevention work that follows can cost more than the soot cleanup on the other side of the room. You need someone who handles both, and that’s exactly what we do at Marsh Water Damage Austin.
What Affects Fire & Smoke Damage Restoration Pricing in Austin
- How far smoke traveled through the structure. Smoke doesn’t stop at the fire’s room. It moves through wall cavities, up stairwells, into closets, and through the HVAC system. A kitchen fire in a two-story home in Mueller might leave soot deposits in the upstairs bedrooms. More square footage affected equals more labor and more equipment rental time.
- The type of smoke residue. Protein fires (burned food) leave a thin, nearly invisible film that bonds to paint the longer it sits. Synthetic fires (burned plastics, furniture, electronics) leave a thick, greasy, acidic soot that etches surfaces within 72 hours. Fuel oil or puff-back fires from a furnace leave an oily residue that requires solvent-based cleaning. Each type demands different chemicals and effort, and the pricing shifts with it.
- Surface materials affected. Painted drywall cleans easier than raw wood. But if your Austin home has exposed brick, stone, or original mid-century paneling, those porous surfaces absorb smoke deep and require media blasting or sealing rather than simple wiping. Porous surfaces run 30 to 50 percent more than non-porous on the same square footage.
- Water saturation from firefighting. Almost every structural fire in Austin means water damage too. How long water sits before drying begins is the single biggest cost multiplier. If your fire happened on a Friday night and nobody got into the home until Monday, that’s 48-plus hours of water working through drywall and subfloor, which in a Texas summer means mold pressure is already building. Delayed response adds $2,000 to $8,000 in water and mold line items.
- Structural and electrical damage. Fire weakens framing, burns wiring, and compromises drywall. In homes across Austin built before 1990, you may be dealing with older electrical panels, single-pane windows, and materials that don’t match modern code. Replacement of charred studs, beam sistering, and rewiring push a job from cleaning into reconstruction.
- Content recovery and pack-out volume. The more furniture, clothing, books, rugs, and personal items affected, the more labor goes into inventory, packing, off-site cleaning, and return. A home in Travis Heights with dense furniture and years of collected belongings will run higher than a spare, modern build in East Austin with minimal contents.
Here’s the thing most national pricing guides won’t tell you: in Austin, the condition of your home’s materials and the age of the build matter more than the square footage. A 1,200-square-foot 1930s bungalow in the Zilker area can cost more to restore than a 3,000-square-foot 2015 build in Leander, simply because old plaster, real hardwood, and painted-over wallpaper all hold smoke and water differently. Every job gets a written price from us before work begins, so you’ll know exactly where your home lands.
Step-by-Step: How Fire Damage Restoration Works in Austin
If you’ve never been through a fire restoration, here’s the order of events, from the moment the fire truck leaves to the day you move back in:
- Call immediately. The clock starts when the fire is out. Soot is acidic and etches surfaces by the hour. Water from firefighting is moving through materials by the minute. A live person answers at (361) 315-6142 any time, day or night. Within minutes you’ll have a real name and a scheduled arrival time, not a callback promise.
- Assessment and scope. A technician walks the property, documents damage with photos, tests surfaces for soot type, and measures moisture levels with a thermal imaging camera and psychrometric readings (measuring the moisture in the air to know how wet the structure actually is). You get a written scope line by line.
- Written price, no surprises. Before any equipment comes off the truck, you see a line-itemed dollar figure. Not a range, not a “we’ll see how it goes.” A written price. That’s how Marsh has run every job since 2005.
- Board-up and water extraction. We secure broken openings and begin pulling out standing water. If needed, we set professional drying equipment from Dri-Eaz, Phoenix, and Injectidry to pull moisture from walls, floors, and the air. This step alone often stops mold before it starts.
- Soot removal and surface cleaning. Using dry-sponge, wet-cleaning, and where needed, abrasive techniques, we remove soot from walls, ceilings, trim, fixtures, and horizontal surfaces. Porous materials that can’t be cleaned are marked for replacement.
- Deodorization. Smoke odor is the longest lingering problem after a fire. We use ozone treatment or thermal fogging (heating a deodorizing agent into a vapor that travels the same paths smoke did) to neutralize odor inside wall cavities, ductwork, and soft surfaces.
- Content cleaning and pack-out. Affected belongings are inventoried, packed, and cleaned off-site or in a controlled area. Items that can be saved are returned cleaned. Items that can’t are documented for your insurance claim.
- Repair and reconstruction. Drywall goes in, paint goes on, flooring is replaced, and your home comes back together. Every repair is backed by a written guarantee, and if it’s not right within 365 days, we come back and make it right. Free second visit included, automatically.
- Final walkthrough. We walk the space with you, point out what was done, and hand you the paperwork: scope, price, guarantee, and completion notes. You sign off only when the work meets the standard we agreed on.
Every step here is performed by a technician who is background-checked and identity-verified under our Threshold Verified protocol. Before any Marsh tech arrives at your door in Austin, you’ll receive their name and photo. When they knock, they’ll show you a photo ID badge. It’s the same standard on every job, every time – not just the first impression.
How to Save on Fire & Smoke Damage Restoration
- Call within the first few hours. Soot etches paint and metal within 72 hours. Water soaks through materials within minutes and sets the stage for mold within 48 hours in Austin’s heat. A fast response time directly reduces how much demolition and replacement your job requires.
- Ask for a written, line-itemed price up front. You should not be paying for discovery. A reputable restoration company can scope a job accurately before they start. If someone says they can’t give you a number until they open a wall, that’s a red flag. At Marsh, every job starts with a written price. Call (361) 315-6142 and we’ll give you one for free.
- Understand what insurance covers. Most Texas homeowners policies cover fire and smoke restoration, but deductibles vary widely in the Austin market, commonly $1,000 to $5,000 depending on the policy. We work directly with your adjuster to align scope and pricing, because we’ve been doing insurance restoration in Central Texas for two decades.
- Don’t replace what can be cleaned. Some contractors default to replacement because it’s easier. A good restoration tech knows when ultrasonic cleaning can rescue a $2,000 sofa or a fireplace mantel with smoke damage. That’s the difference between saving and replacing thousands of dollars of contents.
- Address HVAC duct cleaning early. If smoke was pulled through your return ducts, cleaning them costs $600 to $2,000. Skipping it means the odor returns every time the AC kicks on, and you’ll be paying for deodorization twice. In a Texas summer, that’s not a corner you want cut.
- Use a company that handles both fire and water. Most fire jobs in Austin have significant water from firefighting. If you hire two companies to handle the two problems, you pay for two mobilizations and deal with two schedules. Marsh handles the water, the fire, the smoke, and the rebuild under one written price and one guarantee.
Free estimates aren’t a special offer at Marsh. They’re the way every job starts. Call (361) 315-6142 and we’ll assess your fire damage, write down exactly what it will cost to fix, and hand you a printed number before any work begins.
FAQs – Fire & Smoke Damage Restoration Cost
How much does fire and smoke damage restoration cost in Austin?
Most Austin homeowners pay between $8,600 and $18,000 for moderate fire and smoke restoration that affects two or three rooms, including soot cleanup, deodorization, water extraction, and repair. Small contained fires can run as low as $3,500, while whole-home fires routinely exceed $45,000. For an exact price on your home, call (361) 315-6142 for a free written estimate.
Is it cheaper to repair or replace after a fire?
In Austin’s 2026 market, it’s typically cheaper to repair and restore than to replace when the structural framing is intact. Full rebuilds run $150 to $220 per square foot in Travis County, while restoration of comparable space typically runs $45 to $90 per square foot. The break point usually comes when charring has compromised load-bearing framing or the smoke has saturated the entire envelope. We’ll tell you honestly which side your home falls on, in writing, before any work starts.
Can you come today?
Yes. Marsh Water Damage Austin keeps crews on call 24/7 in the Austin metro, including Round Rock, Cedar Park, Pflugerville, Georgetown, and Buda. A live person answers the phone at (361) 315-6142 any hour of any day. We can typically have a technician at your door within hours of your call, not days.
Does homeowners insurance cover fire and smoke restoration?
Most standard Texas homeowners policies cover fire and smoke restoration as a named peril, less your deductible, which typically runs $1,000 to $5,000 in Austin. The average fire claim in Texas exceeded $80,000 in 2024, so your coverage is usually the primary payer. Marsh documents everything, invoices line by line, and works directly with your adjuster so scope and price are transparent to everyone at the table.
How much does it cost to clean smoke damage after a kitchen fire?
A contained kitchen fire with smoke damage to the kitchen, adjacent hallway, and parts of the living area typically runs $4,000 to $9,000 in Austin. That includes soot removal, wall and ceiling cleaning, deodorization, and repainting. If the fire department used water and the cabinets and flooring are involved, the number moves into the $8,000 to $15,000 range.
How much does it cost to remove smoke smell from a house?
Standalone smoke odor removal with ozone treatment or thermal fogging costs $500 to $2,500 in Austin depending on square footage and how many rooms are affected. But if the odor source is inside the HVAC ductwork or saturated into drywall, you will need duct cleaning and possibly replacement of porous surfaces, which can push the total to $5,000 or more. We’ll test where the smoke settled and show you exactly what it takes to get your house smelling like your house again.
For a full breakdown of the fire restoration process in Central Texas, visit our Fire & Smoke Damage Restoration in Austin page or home for all services.
Pricing reflects the Austin market as of 2026. Marsh Water Damage Austin offers free estimates – call (361) 315-6142.
Written by Tobias Reyner, Owner at Marsh Water Damage Austin, serving Austin and Central Texas since 2005.
What Our Customers Say
"Pipe broke under the sink and soaked the cabinet and floor. They extracted the water, removed the wet flooring, and documented everything for the insurance."
- Judith L."Washing machine hose burst while we were out. The crew arrived with badges, set up fans and dehumidifiers, and checked the wall cavities with a moisture meter. Floors were dry in four days."
- Colleen A."Dishwasher leak had gone under the kitchen floor. They found it with a thermal camera and dried it without ripping up everything."
- Helen B.