What Happens to My Home and Everything I Own?

 

When contamination affects your home, one of the first questions is also one of the hardest:

What happens to my house, and what happens to everything I own?

Your furniture. Your clothes. Your children’s toys. Your mattresses and bedding. Your photographs, books, electronics, important documents and keepsakes.

Before you start throwing things away, find out what you are actually dealing with.

Whether contaminated belongings can be cleaned, professionally restored or should be replaced depends on several things, including the type of contamination, the extent of exposure, how long the exposure occurred and what the item is made from.

The good news is that discovering contamination does not automatically mean losing your home or everything inside it.

But there may be some difficult decisions ahead.

Does Contamination Mean I Am Going to Lose My Home?

Not necessarily.

Discovering contamination does not automatically mean your house or building is beyond recovery.

The source of the problem needs to be identified and corrected. Depending on what happened, contaminated building materials may need to be removed. Remaining surfaces, cavities, HVAC components or other building systems may also need to be cleaned, remediated or evaluated.

The extent of the work will depend on the contaminant and how far it has travelled through the building.

The important point is that the building itself needs to be properly addressed.

You do not want to clean or replace everything you own only to bring those belongings back into the same unresolved environment.

Can My Belongings Be Saved After Contamination?

Some can. Some cannot.

Not everything inside a contaminated building should be treated the same way.

Hard, nonporous belongings such as glass, metal, dishes and many hard plastics may be relatively straightforward to clean, depending on the contaminant.

Washable clothing, bedding, towels and other textiles may also be candidates for laundering or specialized textile cleaning.

Other belongings can be considerably more difficult.

What can be successfully decontaminated depends on the material, its construction, the contaminant involved and the extent of exposure.

This is why there is rarely one rule that applies to everything inside the house.

Can Porous Items Be Decontaminated?

Porous materials can present some of the greatest challenges.

Mattresses, pillows, upholstered furniture, carpeting, rugs, books, cardboard, stuffed animals and similar materials may allow contamination to penetrate or become trapped within the material itself.

That can make thorough cleaning and decontamination much more difficult.

It does not mean that every porous item automatically has to be discarded. Some belongings may be candidates for specialized professional contents restoration.

Others may not be practical or appropriate to restore.

There is an important distinction to remember:

Making something look clean is not necessarily the same as successfully decontaminating it.

Can Contaminated Clothing and Bedding Be Washed?

Depending on the contaminant and the extent of exposure, some clothing, bedding, towels and other washable textiles may be cleaned through laundering or professional textile cleaning.

However, a washing machine is not a universal decontamination solution.

Different contaminants behave differently, and heavily exposed materials may require different handling.

Care should also be taken when moving contaminated laundry. Carrying, sorting or shaking exposed textiles through clean areas can potentially move contaminants into places where you do not want them.

Washable belongings should therefore be considered separately from items such as mattresses, upholstered furniture and carpeting that cannot simply be placed in a washing machine.

Can Contaminated Furniture and Mattresses Be Cleaned?

Sometimes, but this is where some difficult decisions may begin.

Mattresses, pillows, sofas, recliners, upholstered chairs, carpeting and other thick or porous belongings can contain layers of material that are difficult to access.

Cleaning the visible surface does not necessarily address contamination that may have penetrated farther into the item.

Professional decontamination or contents restoration may be possible in some circumstances.

In other cases, replacement may be the safer, more practical or more economical decision.

What Contaminated Items Should Be Thrown Away?

There is no universal list that applies to every contamination event.

The decision should consider what the item is made from, the contaminant involved, how extensively it was exposed, whether it can be reliably cleaned, the cost of professional restoration and the cost of replacement.

Some belongings may simply not be reasonably or reliably cleanable.

Others might technically be capable of restoration, but restoring them could cost considerably more than replacing them.

That is where practicality matters.

If an ordinary household item can be safely replaced for substantially less than the cost of professional decontamination and restoration, replacement may make more sense.

This is especially important when you may already be facing expenses for assessment, remediation, repairs, temporary accommodations and replacing damaged building materials.

Possible to restore does not always mean practical to restore.

Sometimes the sensible decision is to let an item go.

What About Photographs, Documents and Family Heirlooms?

This is where the calculation changes.

A mattress can be replaced.

The only photograph you have of someone you love cannot.

Family photographs, important documents, children’s keepsakes, artwork, antiques, family Bibles, inherited furniture and other sentimental belongings deserve a different conversation.

Specialized restoration may be available for certain photographs, documents, books, electronics, artwork and other possessions.

That restoration may be expensive, and successful decontamination cannot always be guaranteed.

But when something is truly irreplaceable, it may be worth finding out what options exist before deciding to discard it.

Replacement value and personal value are two very different things.

What Is a Contents Pack-Out?

There are professional contents restoration companies that can remove belongings from a contaminated home for cleaning, restoration and storage. This process is commonly called a contents pack-out.

• • • • • • Depending on the company and the situation, a contents restoration service may:
          • Photograph and inventory belongings.
          • Pack and remove household contents.
          • Transport belongings to a specialized restoration facility.
          • Separate items according to the type of cleaning or restoration required.
          • Clean or restore appropriate belongings.
          • Store cleaned contents while the building is being remediated.
          • Return belongings when the home is ready.

For someone dealing with extensive contamination, professional contents restoration can be an enormous help.

It can also be very expensive.

Cleaning the contents of an entire home can involve hundreds or thousands of individual items. Each item has to be handled, and different materials may require different cleaning or restoration methods.

Before committing to extensive contents restoration, ask what the process will cost and compare that cost with replacing ordinary household belongings.

When resources are limited, it may make more sense to reserve specialized restoration for possessions that are valuable, difficult to replace or truly irreplaceable.

Can Contaminated Belongings Contaminate a New Home?

Potentially, which is why belongings should be considered before they are moved.

If you leave a contaminated home and immediately move questionable belongings into a hotel, rental property, storage unit, vehicle, family member’s home or new residence, those belongings may provide a pathway for contaminants to move into another environment.

That does not mean one exposed object automatically contaminates everything around it.

It means you should think carefully about what you take with you and how it is handled.

Some belongings may be appropriate to clean first. Some may need to be contained. Some may require professional evaluation. Others may be better left behind temporarily until you understand the extent and nature of the problem.

The goal is not to solve one contamination problem by carrying part of it into the next environment.

What Should I Do Before Throwing Contaminated Belongings Away?

When you first discover a serious contamination problem, it can feel as though every decision has to be made immediately.

It does not.

First determine what happened and how extensive the problem is.

When circumstances allow:

• • • • • • Photograph belongings before they are discarded.
          • Create an inventory of significant losses.
          • Check whether insurance coverage may apply before disposing of property.
          • Find out what documentation an insurer may require.
          • Separate ordinary replaceable belongings from possessions with significant financial or personal value.
          • Ask about specialized restoration before giving up on something that cannot be replaced.

Most importantly, do not throw away something irreplaceable simply because you do not yet know whether it can be saved.

Find out what options exist first.

You Do Not Have to Decide Everything Today

Some things may be cleaned.

Some may require professional contents restoration.

Some may simply make more sense to replace.

And some things may matter enough that they are worth making an extraordinary effort to save.

The goal is not to frighten you into throwing your life into a dumpster.

It is also not to promise that everything can be saved.

The goal is to understand what you are dealing with well enough to decide what can be cleaned, what is worth restoring, what needs to be replaced and what matters enough to fight to save.

Because dealing with a contaminated home is not only about recovering a building.

It is about recovering your life inside it.

Want to Learn More About Saving Your Belongings?

Deciding what to clean, what to restore and what to replace can be one of the hardest parts of recovering from a contaminated home.

Read our in-depth article, What Happens to My Home and Everything I Own?, for a closer look at your options for cleaning, restoring, replacing and protecting the things that matter most.