Cardinal Clean lists content pack-out and pack-back, textile and soft goods cleaning, electronics cleaning, furniture repair, odor removal, soot removal and 3-D imaging. Its website says the team has more than 25 years of combined experience in fire and flood damage, and lists service across Arizona, including Chandler, Gilbert, Mesa, Scottsdale and Tempe.

Listed since 05/04/2020

Fire and flood contents recovery in Phoenix

Heat shapes every loss in Phoenix. In 2023 the city set a record of 31 straight days with highs of 110 degrees or more, finished the year with 54 such days, and logged a run of nights that never dropped below 90. A house that loses cooling after a fire or a flood gets hot quickly, and heat is hard on wet materials and on anything holding smoke odor. The monsoon adds a second window of risk: the National Weather Service counts June 15 through September 30 as monsoon season, when storms can bring flash flooding, hail and destructive wind.

When water or soot reaches a whole floor at once, the question quickly becomes what can be cleaned and what cannot.

What a contents pack-out job involves

Pack-out means moving a household's belongings out of the damaged space so the structure can be repaired and the items cleaned elsewhere. A crew photographs and inventories each room, labels boxes, and moves furniture, clothing, electronics and keepsakes to a cleaning facility or storage. Soft goods such as clothing and drapes are laundered or treated for smoke, electronics are cleaned by a technician rather than simply wiped, and everything returns once repairs are done.

Ask how items are inventoried and tagged, where they will be stored, who is responsible while they are in transit, and how anything judged not salvageable is documented for your insurer. Our guides on smoke damage you can't see and what can be saved after a house fire explain why some items come back clean and others do not.