Choosing a restoration company in Michigan when there is no license to check

There is no restoration license to look up

For a plumber or an electrician, Michigan has a state license and a lookup, and a homeowner can settle the first question in two minutes. Restoration is different. The residential maintenance and alteration license lists crafts such as carpentry, concrete, insulation, masonry, roofing and waterproofing a basement, and does not name water damage, mold or fire restoration. We found no separate Michigan license for the water, fire or smoke work itself, and the State’s health department says it does not certify mold remediators. Absence is hard to prove, so we say what we read and nothing more.

That leaves you to check what does exist, and a few things that are not licenses but are checkable. This guide is the list. We are a referral service and cannot vouch for any company we send a request to, so none of what follows is a claim about them.

The license that attaches to rebuilding

Under MCL 339.2401, a residential maintenance and alteration contractor is a person who, for compensation, undertakes the repair, alteration, addition, improvement, wrecking or demolition of a residential structure, meaning a detached one- or two-family dwelling or a townhouse of up to three stories. A license is required once a single project reaches $600, and the exemption is lost if the work is split to evade it. Owners working on their own occupied property are exempt, and so are licensed electrical, plumbing and mechanical contractors for their own trades.

So if a quote includes drywall, framing, flooring or similar rebuilding, ask for the company’s license number and look it up with the state. If it is a drying-only quote, there may be nothing to look up, and the next checks matter more. MCL 339.601 says a person shall not engage in a regulated occupation without a license. A complaint about a licensed maintenance and alteration contractor must be made within 18 months after the latest of completion, occupancy or purchase.

Other rules that may attach

Removing friable asbestos on another’s premises requires a license from the state asbestos program, with narrow exemptions. EPA’s lead rule requires firm certification for paid work disturbing painted surfaces in homes built before 1978, and EPA’s online search lets you check a firm. Pipe repair is plumbing, which requires a licensed plumber under MCL 339.6107.

IICRC credentials: voluntary and checkable

IICRC is a private standards and certification body. EPA lists it among professional organizations and says EPA has no certification program. A company may hold firm and technician credentials, and you should ask who on the job holds them: WRT has no prerequisite, and Applied Structural Drying and Applied Microbial Remediation Technician require it. Ask for the certificate, and see our IICRC guide.

Insurance steps that protect you

Contact your insurer before hiring, DIFS advises. Its adjusters work for and are paid by the insurer, and you should not be asked to pay them. You do not need a public adjuster, and if you hire one, DIFS says the person must be licensed, the fee cannot exceed 10 percent of the settlement, and a contract signed within 48 hours of the loss can be voided for 10 days. A public adjuster may not take a fee from a repair contractor for obtaining repair work.

A restoration company is not an adjuster. Our reading of MCL 500.1222 is that it should not negotiate your claim with the insurer unless it holds a Michigan adjuster license. That is an inference, not a DIFS statement, so treat it as a question to ask.

DIFS’s warning signs

DIFS lists contractors demanding full payment upfront, high-pressure tactics, unsolicited door-to-door offers and requests to sign insurance checks directly over to a contractor among the signs of disaster scams, and it lists unlicensed people offering to raise your settlement for a fee. A contractor waiving or absorbing your deductible, and assignment of benefits, have no Michigan statute to cite here, so we make no claim either way; ask your insurer about both before you sign.

Price and payment

No Michigan price list exists to hold a quote against, and every cost table on this site says so. What you can compare is structure. Ask if the price is a fixed scope or is priced as the work goes, what is included in each line, what happens if the scope grows, and when each payment is due. DIFS’s warning about demands for full payment upfront is the one payment rule we can cite. Ask your insurer which costs it will pay directly and which it will reimburse, and keep the receipts either way.

Read the contract before you sign it, which DIFS also advises, and take the time: an offer that is only good today is the high-pressure tactic DIFS lists. If a company wants the insurer’s check signed over, call your insurer before you do anything else.

A short list of requests

1. The company’s name, address and the license numbers that apply to the work in the quote.
2. The name of the person who will run your job and what credentials that person holds.
3. A written scope that separates extraction, drying and rebuilding, with the standard and edition it follows.
4. Moisture readings at the start and a drying log at each visit.
5. A written statement of who pulls any permit.
6. Who is responsible for belongings, and where they go if they are removed.

Keep every quote, message and receipt in one folder. If a dispute comes later with the company or the insurer, the folder is your evidence.

If something goes wrong

Resolve it with the company first. If an insurer is the problem, DIFS says to resolve it with the insurer first, then call DIFS at 877-999-6442 or file at Michigan.gov/DIFScomplaints. Report scams or price gouging to the Attorney General at 877-765-8388.

A company that receives your request through the form has not been endorsed by us.