True Builders rebuilds houses after a fire in Plant City. Headquarters is 4000 N Frontage Rd, Plant City, FL 33565. Florida contractor license CRC1335717. Search that number in the DBPR database before you let anyone open a wall.
Cleaning crews wipe soot. Franchises show up with a van. The rebuild is framing, electrical, drywall, cabinets, floors, and paint under one permit. That is fire damage restoration. That is us.
Mitigation versus reconstruction
Mitigation stops the damage from getting worse. Reconstruction puts the house back together. They are two jobs. The gap between them is where fire projects stall.
Mitigation is the first hours and days: board-up, tarping, soot removal, odor treatment, and tearing out materials that cannot be saved. Reconstruction is licensed construction: framing, electrical, plumbing, drywall, cabinets, flooring, paint, permits, and inspections. A cleanup crew can legally do the first. Only a licensed contractor can do the second.
One piece of mitigation is not ours. Water extraction and structural drying after the fire department leaves belong to True Plumbers at trueplumbers.com. We do not run that scope. We take the house once it is dry. One call to us routes the water work there.
What happens in the first day
Do not re-enter until the fire department says the house is structurally safe. Call the insurer and write down the claim number. Photograph and video every room before anything is moved or cleaned.
Board the openings. Photograph the soot trail. Do not wipe a wall until someone who knows soot is on site. Wipe it wrong and the stain sets. Leave the power and water off if firefighters shut them down. Keep receipts for hotels, meals, and anything you buy after the fire.
Firefighting water is under cabinets and in the subfloor. That drying step is the Plumbers scope. We board and tarp, then we write the reconstruction once the structure is dry.
A kitchen fire is the common call. The range, the boxes beside it, and the room behind the return. That rebuild is kitchen fire repair. The causes sit on the five most common kitchen fire causes.
If the structure itself is gone, that is complete-loss fire rebuilds.
How long a rebuild runs
A single room is usually four to eight weeks of construction. Smoke through the house and structural repairs run three to six months. A house that has to come off the slab is nine to eighteen months. Those ranges are already on the fire hire page because that is how the jobs run.
The calendar starts after the house is dry and the scope is written. Ordering cabinets and waiting on inspections sit inside those bands. We confirm a schedule after we walk the house, not on the night of the fire.
The Ranney family lost their Lakeland home and told the rebuild on camera. That video is on the videos page if you want to see a finished reconstruction before you call.
What the number looks like
HomeGuide puts fire damage restoration at roughly $4 to $7 per square foot, averaging about $5.50, with a typical total job landing between $8,000 and $18,000. A kitchen or grease fire sits at $11,000 to $18,000. Smoke and soot removal runs $500 to $5,000. Thermal fogging for odor is listed at $200 to $585. Structural repair runs $2,000 to more than $50,000. A total-loss rebuild is listed at $180 to $450 or more per square foot. Water removal and drying after firefighting is listed at $2,000 to $6,000 or more, and that line belongs to True Plumbers.
Palm Build reports a wider national spread of $3,098 to $51,243 with an average near $27,091. A Class A fire in wood, paper, and textiles usually runs $8,000 to $14,000 on HomeGuide.
Those are published market ranges, not a True Builders quote. We write a scope after we walk the house. You see the number before we order cabinets.
The claim, without the myth
We document the loss and rebuild what the policy pays for. If you want a better layout than you had, that add is written separately. We are not in-house insurance adjusters. We are not a public adjuster. The insurer prices the claim. We price the work.
The old how-to on filing is steps to take for an insurance claim. This post is who does the rebuild in Plant City.
What we put back, in order
Board-up and tarp first, so rain and animals stay out. Photographs next, so the adjuster sees the house the way the fire left it. Then drying, which is not our crew. Then the rebuild: framing where the structure failed, electrical where the heat cooked the wire, drywall, cabinets, floors, paint.
A kitchen fire that stayed in the room is framing and boxes in that room, then the soot rooms next door. Smoke through the whole house is three to six months because every finish has to come off. A house off the slab is a new house on the old lot. That last job is the complete-loss page, not a cleaning invoice.
We pull the Polk or Plant City permit for the reconstruction. Cleanup certifications do not cover that. Hours are 24 hours, every day. The night-of-the-fire call is board-up. The rebuild meeting is after the house is dry.
Where we work from
Plant City HQ: 4000 N Frontage Rd. Lakeland office: 2829 Badger Rd #19. Same crews, Lakeland and Winter Haven included. Open 24 hours. Call (863) 647-1800 or get a quote.
