Every restoration project has two halves. Mitigation is the emergency phase: stop the source, extract, remove damaged material, contain contamination, and dry the structure. Reconstruction is everything that puts the house back: framing, drywall, texture, paint, flooring, cabinets, trim, and fixtures.
Most homeowners discover the split at the worst possible moment. A mitigation company dries the house, pulls its equipment, sends a bill, and leaves. The house is now dry, open, and unfinished, and finding a general contractor with availability adds weeks, sometimes months. Meanwhile the insurance scope has a seam in it, and anything that falls between the two contracts becomes an argument.
Mitigation itself runs about three to five days for a typical water loss, longer for fire or a large mold job. Reconstruction depends on scope: a single bathroom might be two to three weeks, a kitchen four to six, a multi-room fire rebuild several months. Materials and permits drive the schedule more than labor does, which is why ordering starts before demolition finishes on a well-run job.
When one company handles both, a few concrete things change. The rebuild scope is written against what was actually removed, because the same people removed it. There's no gap between contracts for a carrier to question. Materials get ordered during the drying phase instead of after it. And there is one person accountable for the finished result rather than two who can each point at the other.
What to ask any restoration contractor: do you do the reconstruction yourselves or subcontract it, will you write a scope that matches the approved insurance estimate line by line, who is my single point of contact, and what does the warranty cover. Clear answers to those four questions predict how the rest of the job will go.
Dr. Restorations LLC handles both halves in-house across San Antonio and the surrounding area, from the first emergency call to the final walkthrough. Call (210) 300-4038, any hour.