A house fire compresses a lot of decisions into a short window. The first seventy-two hours largely determine whether the loss stays contained or grows — whether soot sets permanently into surfaces, whether firefighting water starts mold, and whether your insurance claim begins on solid documentation or on gaps. This checklist walks the sequence in order. Read it through once, then work down it. None of it requires expertise. Most of it only requires resisting the urge to start cleaning.
Stay out of the house until the fire department says otherwise, even if the damage looks minor from the yard. Fire compromises what you cannot see: floor structure over a burned basement, ceiling drywall soaked heavy with hose water, wiring cooked inside intact-looking walls. The fire department typically shuts off gas and electricity during the response — leave utilities off and do not restore them yourself; that step belongs to the utility companies and a licensed electrician after inspection. Keep children and pets away from the property entirely, and account for everyone before anything else gets your attention.
The first call is your insurance company's claims line, and it should happen the same day. You do not need your policy documents in hand — insurers can locate your policy from your name and address. Ask for three things while you are on the phone: your claim number, an explanation of your additional living expense or loss-of-use coverage, and a list of what they need from you next. Write down the date, the representative's name, and what was said; that habit starts now and continues through the whole claim.
The second call is a fire restoration contractor, because the property needs securing and drying before the damage compounds. Fire 801 answers at 801-515-0640 and can walk you through the immediate steps even before a crew is scheduled.
An open house keeps losing value by the hour. Broken windows and forced doors invite weather, animals, and theft; a burned-through roof pours the next storm directly onto your interior. Your policy also obligates you to take reasonable steps to prevent further damage — the duty to mitigate — and board-up and tarping is the standard way that duty is met after a fire. Whether a contractor does it or you do, keep receipts for materials and labor; mitigation costs are generally part of the claim. Photograph the property before it is boarded, because those images document the loss as the fire left it.
This is the most counterintuitive part of the first days, and the most financially important. Do not wipe soot off walls — household wiping smears the residue into paint and drywall and can turn a cleanable surface into a repaint. Do not run the furnace or air conditioner; the blower will pull soot into the duct system and push it into every room the smoke had not reached yet. Do not power on televisions, computers, or appliances that sat in the smoke; soot is conductive and corrosive, and energizing a contaminated device can destroy it. Do not eat food, take medications, or use cosmetics that were exposed to heat or smoke — ask a pharmacist about any medication you depend on. And throw nothing away yet, even obviously ruined things: every item, saved or lost, belongs on the contents inventory your claim will be built from.
If the fire department clears you for brief entry, go in with a short list and come out. The list is: medications, eyeglasses, wallets and identification, phones and chargers, checkbook and financial cards, insurance documents if you know where they are, and a few days of clothing — expecting that the clothing will smell of smoke and need laundering. Do not extend the trip into sorting or salvage. The house will still be there tomorrow, and everything else goes through the inventory process properly.
Do not sleep in a smoke-damaged house to save money — the air is carrying particulate and the structure has not been evaluated. If your policy includes loss-of-use coverage, it generally pays reasonable additional costs of living elsewhere while the home is uninhabitable: lodging, meal costs above your normal grocery spending, even pet boarding in many policies. Keep every receipt from the first night onward, including small ones. If you stay with family, track the arrangement anyway and ask your adjuster what applies; the coverage is there to be used.
Three folders — physical or on your phone — carry the whole claim: photographs, receipts, and conversations. Photograph every room, wide shots then close-ups, before anything is moved or removed. Save receipts for everything the fire causes you to spend, from tarps to toothbrushes. Log every call with the insurer: date, name, substance. None of this takes long in the moment; all of it is painful to reconstruct later.
With the property secured and the claim opened, the seventy-two-hour window closes on planning rather than panic. Firefighting water is the clock that matters most now: saturated drywall, insulation, and flooring degrade daily and can begin growing mold, so extraction and structural drying should start promptly. A restoration contractor's assessment maps where fire, smoke, and water each traveled — three different maps in most houses — and becomes the scope of work your adjuster prices against. The contents inventory begins. The adjuster's inspection gets scheduled.
The house does not need to be solved in seventy-two hours. It needs to be safe, secured, documented, and drying — with the claim open and the sequence underway. Everything after that is a project, and projects are manageable.
Only essentials, and only after the fire department clears entry: medications, identification, eyeglasses, phones, financial cards, and a few days of clothing. Ask a pharmacist before taking heat-exposed medications. Make it one short trip with a list — sorting and salvage come later, through the documented inventory process, when the structure has been properly assessed.
No. Securing and drying, yes — that is mitigation your policy expects. Cleaning, no. The adjuster needs to see and price the loss as the fire left it, and amateur cleaning can both erase evidence of damage and make the damage worse, since wiping soot the wrong way sets it. Photograph everything, secure the building, and leave surfaces alone.
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