Fire damage · Houston, TX

Sell a fire-damaged house in Houston — repaired, unrepaired, or mid-claim.

After a fire, most owners face the same question: rebuild, or sell and move on? Both are reasonable. If selling is the answer, you don't need to restore anything first.

First things

What to sort out before you sell a fire-damaged home

Your insurance claim

You can generally sell before, during, or after a claim. Talk to your adjuster about how a sale affects it — some policies pay the actual cash value if you don't rebuild. Keep all correspondence.

Your mortgage

If the house is mortgaged, insurance checks are usually payable to you and the lender. The lender will need to be paid off at closing from the sale proceeds and any claim funds, so involve them early.

City notices

The City of Houston may post the structure as unsafe or require securing or demolition. These don't prevent a sale, but they affect timing and cost — send us anything you've received.

Safety and access

Don't enter an unstable structure to retrieve items. If we can't walk through part of the house, we'll price conservatively and adjust once it's safe.

Rebuild or sell

Weighing restoration against a sale

Restoring a fire-damaged home means demolition of damaged areas, smoke and soot remediation, structural repair, and then a full rebuild of the affected rooms — all managed through permits and inspections while you live somewhere else. Insurance may cover much of it, but coverage gaps, code upgrades, and delays are common, and the process routinely takes many months.

Selling as-is converts the property to cash now, lets you settle the claim with your insurer on its own track, and moves the rebuild risk to us. Which makes sense depends on your coverage, your equity, and whether you want to return to the house.

How we price it

What a fire-damaged house is worth to a direct buyer

We start with the value of a rebuilt home on the lot, then subtract the full cost of remediation, demolition, and reconstruction, plus our holding and resale costs. For a partial fire, that's a repair project. For a total loss, we're effectively valuing the lot plus any salvageable structure. Either way, we'll show you the components.

A structural engineer's assessment, fire department report, or contractor estimate — if you have them — helps us be accurate, but none are required to get an offer.

How it works

How selling to us works in Houston

1
Tell us about the property
Enter the address and answer a few quick questions. It takes about two minutes, and you don't need to know anything about the market.
2
We review it and talk
We look at the property and comparable sales, and may reach out for a few details or a quick walk-through. No pressure, no obligation.
3
Get an offer and pick your closing date
If the property fits what we buy, we'll make a clear cash offer. Accept it or not — and if you do, close on the timeline that works for you.

FAQ

Questions Houston homeowners ask

Can I sell while my insurance claim is still open?

Usually, yes, but talk to your adjuster and your lender first — the claim payout may need to be assigned or paid to the lender at closing. We can work around the claim timeline.

Do you buy houses with smoke damage only?

Yes. Smoke and soot damage without structural loss is a remediation cost we price in.

What if the city has ordered demolition?

Send us the notice. Depending on the deadline and the structure, we can often still buy and handle the demolition or the appeal ourselves.

Do I need to clean up debris first?

No. Leave it as it is.

Other Houston situations we help with

See everything we buy in Houston and Harris County.

See what we could pay for your Houston house.

Enter the address. It takes two minutes and there's no obligation.