Hear from Our Customers
The smoke smell is gone. Not masked with air fresheners or covered up temporarily, but actually eliminated from your walls, ducts, and belongings using hydroxyl generators and thermal fogging.
Your insurance claim is documented with the photos, moisture readings, and equipment logs adjusters expect to see. You’re not scrambling to prove what happened or justify the work. That’s already handled.
The parts of your home that weren’t touched by fire stay that way. We set up containment barriers and run HEPA filtration so soot and odor don’t spread into clean rooms. You’re not dealing with secondary contamination three weeks later because someone skipped that step.
You know what’s happening and when. We send updates every 48 hours with photos and progress notes. If something changes or takes longer, you hear about it the same day.
Elite Clean Restoration is an IICRC-certified restoration company that’s been handling fire and smoke damage across Central Indiana for over eight years. We’re not a franchise. We’re a local team that shows up when you call, not three hours later after the call gets routed through a national dispatch center.
Trafalgar sits in an area where volunteer fire departments do incredible work, but water damage from firefighting efforts can be just as destructive as the fire itself. We’ve worked with enough homeowners here to know that the clock starts ticking the moment the fire trucks leave. That’s why we’re on-site within 90 minutes, even if it’s 2 a.m.
We carry WRT, ASD, and AMRT certifications. We’re BBB accredited with an A+ rating. And we’ve handled over 300 fire restoration projects where the customer left a five-star review because the job was done right and the insurance claim went through without a fight.
You call our live-answer line and talk to a real person who asks a few questions about what happened, where the fire started, and whether the fire department used water. No voicemail. No callback queue. We dispatch a crew to your property in Trafalgar within 60 to 90 minutes.
When we arrive, we do a full walkthrough and document everything with photos, thermal imaging, and moisture mapping. If there’s standing water from the fire hoses, we extract it immediately and set up drying equipment. If windows or doors were damaged, we board them up so your property is secure. You get a detailed scope of work and an estimate aligned with Xactimate pricing that same day.
Next, we set up containment to isolate affected areas and start the actual restoration work. That includes soot removal from walls and ceilings, HVAC duct cleaning to clear out smoke particles, pack-out of salvageable contents, and odor neutralization using hydroxyl or ozone treatment depending on what’s safe for your space. We update you every 48 hours with progress photos and let you know if anything changes.
Once everything is dry, clean, and odor-free, we do a final walkthrough with you to make sure you’re satisfied. Then we follow up 14 days later to confirm everything is still holding up the way it should.
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Fire restoration in Trafalgar means dealing with more than just soot on the walls. Homes here are a mix of newer builds and older properties, and older structures often have porous materials that absorb smoke deep into the wood framing and insulation. We handle both the visible damage and what’s hidden behind drywall.
You get emergency water extraction if firefighting efforts left standing water or soaked insulation. You get structural drying with commercial dehumidifiers and air movers to prevent mold from taking hold in the next 48 hours. You get soot and ash removal from every surface, including the stuff that settled on top of cabinets or inside closets.
We clean or replace your HVAC filters and duct-clean the system if smoke circulated through your vents. We pack out contents that can be restored and store them in a climate-controlled facility while we work. And we treat persistent smoke odors with hydroxyl generators or thermal fogging, depending on the severity and materials involved.
You also get a dedicated insurance liaison who communicates directly with your adjuster, uploads documentation to the claim portal, and makes sure you’re not stuck paying out of pocket for covered work. If you’re military, a senior, a teacher, or a first responder, we offer discounts on any non-insurance work that falls outside your claim.
We’re on-site within 60 to 90 minutes of your call, even in the middle of the night. Fire damage gets worse the longer it sits, especially smoke odor and water damage from firefighting efforts. Soot becomes harder to remove after 48 hours because it etches into surfaces, and standing water starts growing mold within 24 to 48 hours.
Our crews are dispatched from the Indianapolis metro area, and Trafalgar is close enough that we can get there fast. You’re not waiting until the next business day or getting pushed to the back of a queue because a franchise location is handling three other jobs.
When we show up, we bring everything needed to start work immediately. That includes water extraction equipment, air movers, dehumidifiers, containment barriers, and HEPA filtration. We don’t do a walkthrough and then come back later to start the actual work. We start securing your property and mitigating damage the same day you call.
Most homeowners insurance policies in Indiana cover fire damage restoration, including smoke cleanup, water extraction from firefighting, soot removal, and contents pack-out. The specifics depend on your policy, your deductible, and whether the fire was caused by something excluded in your coverage.
We work directly with your insurance company to make this easier. That means we document everything with photos, moisture readings, and detailed notes that adjusters expect to see. We use Xactimate pricing, which is the same software most insurance companies use to estimate claims, so there’s no back-and-forth over whether our pricing is reasonable.
You’re not stuck paying upfront and waiting for reimbursement. We bill your insurance company directly in most cases. If there’s a gap between what’s covered and what needs to be done, we’ll explain that before we start the work so you’re not surprised later. And if your claim gets pushback, we provide the documentation and explanations needed to support it.
Smoke odor doesn’t go away with air fresheners or surface cleaning. It penetrates porous materials like drywall, insulation, wood framing, upholstery, and carpets. If you can still smell it after wiping down the walls, that’s because the particles are embedded deeper than a sponge can reach.
We use a combination of methods depending on what’s in your home. Hydroxyl generators break down odor molecules at a chemical level and are safe to run while people and pets are in the house. Ozone treatment is more aggressive and works well for severe odor, but it requires the space to be unoccupied during treatment. Thermal fogging releases a deodorizing vapor that penetrates the same places smoke did, neutralizing odor in hidden areas.
We also clean your HVAC system, because smoke particles circulate through ducts and settle on coils and filters. If we don’t address that, the smell comes back every time you turn on the heat or AC. In cases where materials like carpet padding or insulation are too saturated, we remove and replace them. You’re not living with a lingering smoke smell six months later because we tried to save something that couldn’t be saved.
Fire damage refers to structural harm caused by flames, heat, and combustion. That includes charred wood, melted materials, compromised framing, and anything that was directly burned. Smoke damage refers to the soot, ash, and odor that spread throughout your property, even in rooms that were nowhere near the fire.
Smoke damage is often more widespread than fire damage. A kitchen fire might only burn part of one room, but smoke travels through vents, under doors, and into every corner of your house. It leaves a residue on walls, ceilings, furniture, and belongings. That residue is acidic and continues to corrode surfaces and fabrics if it’s not cleaned quickly.
We handle both. Fire damage restoration includes debris removal, structural drying if water was used to extinguish the flames, and rebuilding or repairing damaged framing and materials. Smoke damage restoration includes soot removal, HVAC cleaning, odor neutralization, and contents cleaning or pack-out. Most fire restoration projects involve both types of work, and we scope the full extent of damage during the initial inspection so nothing gets missed.
It depends on the extent of the damage and what type of work we’re doing. If the fire was contained to one room and we’re only treating smoke odor in the rest of the house, you can usually stay. If there’s significant structural damage, standing water, or we’re using ozone treatment for odor removal, you’ll need to stay elsewhere temporarily.
Ozone treatment requires the space to be unoccupied because ozone is a respiratory irritant at the concentrations needed to neutralize smoke odor. Hydroxyl treatment is safe to run while you’re home, and we use that whenever possible. If we’re tearing out drywall, pulling up flooring, or running loud drying equipment 24/7, most people choose to stay with family or in a hotel because it’s disruptive.
Your insurance policy may cover temporary living expenses if your home is uninhabitable during restoration. We document the reasons you need to relocate and provide that information to your adjuster so you’re not paying for a hotel out of pocket. If you do stay during the work, we set up containment barriers and use HEPA filtration to keep dust and odor out of the areas you’re living in.
Most fire restoration projects take one to three weeks, depending on the size of the fire, how much water was used to put it out, and whether we’re just cleaning or also rebuilding. A small kitchen fire with minimal smoke spread might be done in five to seven days. A fire that damaged multiple rooms and required structural drying and reconstruction can take three weeks or longer.
Drying is usually the longest part of the process. If firefighters soaked your walls, insulation, and subfloors, it takes several days of running dehumidifiers and air movers to get moisture levels back to normal. We monitor progress with moisture meters and don’t move on to the next phase until everything is dry, because starting reconstruction on wet materials leads to mold growth later.
Smoke odor treatment and soot removal can often happen while drying equipment is running, so those timelines overlap. Contents pack-out and cleaning happen early in the process so your belongings aren’t sitting in a smoky environment longer than necessary. We give you a timeline during the initial walkthrough and update you if anything changes. You’re not left guessing when you’ll be able to move back in.
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