Home Resilience in Los Angeles

When water has already been in, the work is water damage repair and rebuild: stop the source, verified dry before anything closes, remove what is ruined, rebuild, document for the adjuster. That page carries the first-24-hours list and the ten questions owners ask.

When the water came from outside, the second job is water intrusion prevention: grading that slopes away from the house, drains that drain, downspouts that carry water past the foundation, waterproofing where the ground meets the wall. A coastal house that has taken water from the street is the clearest case: the water found a path, and it will take the same path until the path changes.

The first question for any older Los Angeles house on a raised foundation is whether the frame is tied to the foundation: anchor bolts through the sill plate, bracing on the cripple walls. The Assessment looks and answers it in writing, with photographs. The retrofit itself, bolting, cripple-wall bracing, soft-story work, runs on a structural engineer's calculations and drawings, with the engineer named in the agreement before any of it is scoped.

Fire hardening starts with the first five feet around the house kept free of what burns, and with the vents, the roof edge and the surfaces that face the hillside detailed against embers. Those pages exist: the Zone 0 Courtyard and the Resilient Yard Standard, inside the Resilient Yards line, which names its code lines and states what it does not claim. A house that has burned has its own page, fire damage rebuild. This page writes neither twice.

Backup power readiness is a generator inlet and a transfer switch, so a portable generator runs the circuits that matter without feeding the street or the house wiring the wrong way. That is a licensed electrician's work, with the electrician named in the agreement. A portable generator runs a short list of circuits chosen in advance, and no page here will promise whole-house power from one. Emergency water storage, a tank system with its plumbing tie-ins, is a licensed plumber's work on the same terms. The Assessment writes down what your house would need and in what order.

Every risk on this page has a materials half. Non-combustible assemblies for a house in a mapped fire zone. Seismic detailing specified at the level of the connectors and the sheathing. A moisture and termite strategy chosen with the framing system. The Advanced Building & Materials Consultation is where those decisions are written down before design, with their trade-offs, and building in a fire zone: the materials decisions that matter is the fire half at length.

The Home Resilience Assessment: I walk the house with you, inside and out, and you get a written report. Is the house bolted. Where does water get in. Where are the shutoffs. What would three days without power and water look like here, and what fixes it, in what order. The report is the first deliverable; the projects follow in the order the report sets, and you choose which ones.

Every project under this page carries the same terms as every other job on this site: a written scope, payment stages tied to milestones you can verify, inspections where the City requires them, and the one-year workmanship warranty. Where a licensed trade partner carries part of the work, the agreement names them.

It sells no fear and no supplies. It promises no fire rating, nothing about how the house rides an earthquake, and no whole-house power from a portable unit. It says what a licensed contractor checks and fixes, and it writes the list down before anyone spends.

What do I do first after water gets in? Shut off the source if you can do it safely, kill the power to wet areas at the breaker, photograph everything before you move it, get the standing water out and the air moving, close nothing that is still damp, and call your insurer early. The water page carries the full first-24-hours list.

Can a contractor stop water coming in, or only repair it afterwards? Both, and the order matters. The repair puts the room back. The prevention work changes where the water goes: grading away from the house, drains that drain, downspouts that carry water past the foundation, waterproofing where the ground meets the wall. A house that has taken water from outside once will take it the same way until the water's path changes.

Is my house bolted? On older Los Angeles houses with raised foundations we regularly find unbolted sill plates and unbraced cripple walls, and the only way to know is to look: anchor bolts through the sill plate into the foundation, and bracing on the short cripple walls in the crawl space. The Home Resilience Assessment answers it in writing with photographs; the retrofit runs on a structural engineer's calculations and drawings, with the engineer named in the agreement.

What does three days without power actually look like in this house? Which circuits matter: the refrigerator, the well or sump pump if you have one, medical equipment, one light and one outlet per floor. Where the shutoffs are: gas, water, main breaker. What runs with the power out, checked fixture by fixture instead of assumed. The Assessment writes that list for your house; the backup-power work runs with a licensed electrician named in the agreement.