Every Unit Accounted For. Every Finding Ranked.
A managed portfolio does not need a chimney sweep. It needs a program that gets into occupied units on schedule, produces a per-unit record an owner can read six months later, and ranks what it finds so the dangerous units are the ones that get funded.
Walkthrough first, quote second. We do not price a property we have not seen.
Property management is where fireplace work stops being a trade problem and becomes a logistics problem. The sweep itself is routine. Running it across occupied units, on a notice period, with a record that survives an ownership change — that is the part that actually breaks. This page is how we run it, in the order it happens, so you can judge the program before you ever call.
What actually lands on your desk.
Access is the hard part, not the work
The flue is thirty minutes. Getting into forty occupied units on a weekday, with notice periods, pets, work-from-home schedules and two tenants who never answer, is the actual job. A vendor who can't run that is a vendor who bills you for a second trip.
“The building was cleaned” proves nothing
If a unit has an incident, a single line item for the property is not evidence that unit was serviced. What holds up is a numbered per-unit record with photos and a date — one row per address, including the units nobody could get into and why.
Invoices that don't match the ledger
You book to a property, sometimes to a portfolio, occasionally to a specific unit for a chargeback. An invoice that bundles three buildings into one number costs you an hour of splitting before it can be coded.
The owner asks six months later
Owners and carriers ask for the record long after the work, usually at renewal or during a sale. If the file lives in a technician's phone, it doesn't exist. It has to be retrievable by property, by unit, by date.
Everything is urgent, so nothing is
A punch list of forty findings with no severity attached is not a plan — it is a liability document you now own. Findings have to be ranked, or the budget goes to whichever unit complained loudest.
Vendor onboarding is its own project
COI with the right additional-insured wording, W-9, signed vendor agreement, sometimes a portal upload. If that packet arrives late, the schedule slips past the season no matter how good the crew is.
How the program runs, in order.
Seven steps, every property, same order. Nothing here is optional and nothing is improvised on site — that is the whole point of running it as a program instead of a series of calls.
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Portfolio intake
Send over what you have — the addresses, how many units sit at each, which burn wood, which run on gas, which share a chase. We tell you what that list confirms on its own and what still needs eyes on it. Nothing gets scheduled off an assumption.
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Walkthrough and scope
No number goes out until we have stood on the property — roofline, chase tops, terminations, a sample of interior units. That walk is what sets the real per-unit time, the access difficulty, and whether the property has one repeating defect or forty individual ones.
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Onboarding packet
COI with your additional-insured wording, W-9, and the signed service agreement go out before the first visit, not after the first invoice bounces. If your ownership group uses a vendor portal, we upload there too.
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Blocked scheduling, not scattered
We take a building in blocks — a stack of units per day, in floor order — so the notice you post covers a defined window instead of a month of drop-ins. Vacant and turn units go first while they're empty and easy.
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Tenant notice and entry
You send the notice on your letterhead with the window we agreed; we work the window. Techs arrive in uniform, carry ID, use drop cloths and a HEPA vac, and leave a door-hanger record in the unit. Missed units are logged the same day so you can re-notice while the crew is still on site.
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Per-unit service and photo record
Every unit gets its own line: unit number, date, technician, what was done, and photos of the firebox, damper, flue and termination. A unit we could not enter gets a line too, with the reason. The record is complete or it isn't a record.
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Risk-ranked findings and one invoice
Findings come back sorted by severity, not by unit number, so the first page tells you where the money has to go. The invoice is issued per property or rolled to the portfolio, whichever your accounting expects — you tell us at intake.
The part most vendors quietly fail.
A crew that shows up and finds half the doors closed will bill you for the day and come back for a second one. Access is not a courtesy layer on top of the work — it is the schedule, and it is planned the same way the work is.
Defined windows, not open days
Units are grouped in floor order into half-day blocks, so your notice states a real window a tenant can plan around instead of a date range they will ignore.
Vacants and turns go first
Empty units are the cheapest and fastest access you will ever have. We sequence them ahead of occupied stock so the occupied schedule is as short as possible.
Entry is logged either way
Serviced, no answer, or declined — every unit ends the day with a status and a timestamp. A missed unit that is not written down becomes an argument later.
Re-notice while we are still there
Missed units come back to you the same afternoon, so a second pass can be posted before the crew leaves the property rather than scheduled as a new mobilization.
Three bands, so the budget has a target.
A findings list with no severity attached is a list of things you now officially know about and have not fixed. Every finding we hand you carries one of three bands, and the report is sorted by band before it is sorted by unit number.
Unsafe to use — act now
What it means
A condition that makes burning unsafe right now: a breached or collapsed liner, a blocked flue, a gas appliance with a cracked heat-exchanger path, signs that the flue has already caught fire, or a spillage failure that puts combustion gases into living space.
What happens
The unit's fireplace is tagged out of service in writing and the tenant is told not to use it. You get the finding the same day, not in the monthly summary. Repair is quoted separately so you can decide.
Fund this budget cycle
What it means
Deterioration that is not an emergency today and will be within a season or two: a failed crown, missing or rusted caps, lifted flashing over an active leak path, spalling brick, a chase cover holding water.
What happens
Grouped by defect across the property so you can price it as one scope instead of forty small jobs. This is the tier that turns into next year's capital line if it is ignored.
Watch and re-photograph
What it means
Cosmetic or early-stage wear with no current safety impact: light mortar erosion, surface staining, a damper that is stiff but functional, minor creosote accumulation consistent with normal use.
What happens
Photographed and carried forward, so next year's visit compares against this year's image instead of starting from zero. Movement between visits is what tells you it is real.
The paperwork is half the product.
Per-unit service record
One numbered row per unit: address, unit, date, technician, work performed, and the entry outcome — serviced, no access, or declined by tenant.
Photo set per unit
Firebox, damper, visible flue, and termination, date-stamped. Any finding is photographed at the finding, not represented by a stock diagram.
Risk-ranked findings report
Every finding sorted A / B / C with the condition described in plain English and the standard it is measured against — NFPA 211 and the IRC for clearances and terminations.
Property roll-up
A one-page summary per property: units serviced, units not accessed, count of findings by band, and the total repair scope — the page you forward to an owner without editing it.
Out-of-service documentation
Where a fireplace is tagged unsafe, you get the written tag, the photo behind it, and the tenant notification record — the trail that shows the finding was acted on and communicated.
Vendor compliance packet
Certificate of insurance with your additional-insured wording, W-9, and the signed agreement — kept current, and re-issued to your portal at renewal without you chasing it.
Priced per property, after a walkthrough.
Portfolio work is not a menu price. Per-unit cost moves with access difficulty, how many units share a chase, roof pitch and tie-off requirements, and how much of the stock is vacant when we run it. So we walk the property, then quote it — one number per property, or a portfolio rate if you want a single agreement across buildings.
Per-unit sweep & inspection, from
$119
Starting point for a scheduled multi-unit block. Volume, access and vacancy move it; the walkthrough is what settles it.
Repairs and capital scopes
Quoted per scope
Band A and Band B findings are quoted as separate line items you approve or decline. Repeating defects are grouped across the property so you price one scope, not forty small jobs.
Prices shown are starting estimates and may change with the condition, access, and scope we find on site. Only a written quote from an on-site visit is a price we commit to.
Anything falling under a gas, electrical, or structural license gets carried out by someone holding it, or certified by them, at the standard your jurisdiction enforces.
Where this connects
Send the properties. We will walk them.
Addresses, unit counts, and whether the fireplaces are wood or gas is enough to start. We will come back with a walkthrough date, the onboarding packet your ownership group requires, and a per-property number once we have seen the roofline and a sample of the units. If you only want one building scoped first, that is the sane way to do it.
Request a compliance quote
Single-site, multifamily, or national portfolio — tell us the system and the sites.
Property managers — FAQ
We have units we can never get into. How is that handled so it doesn't become our problem?
It gets documented rather than quietly dropped. Every unit we cannot enter is logged the same day with the reason — no answer, tenant declined, pet restraint, chain lock. You get that list while the crew is still on the property so you can re-notice, and the unserviced units carry forward on the report instead of disappearing into a “building complete” line. If a unit stays unreachable across two cycles, it shows on the roll-up as an open item, because that is exactly the unit an owner will ask about later.
Can we get one invoice for the portfolio, or does it have to be per property?
Either, and you tell us at intake so it is set up correctly from the first cycle. Per-property invoicing is the common request because it codes straight to the building's ledger; portfolio-level rollup with a per-property breakdown attached is the other. Individual unit-level detail is always available underneath, which is what you need when a repair is a tenant chargeback rather than an operating expense.
What does a tenant actually experience? We do not want complaints.
A notice on your letterhead with a defined window, a uniformed technician with ID, drop cloths and a HEPA vacuum inside the unit, and a door-hanger record left behind showing what was done. A standard fireplace visit is well under an hour in the unit. The two things that generate complaints are unannounced arrivals and soot on carpet, and both are procedural, so both are ours to prevent.
How do you decide what is urgent versus what can wait a year? We have been burned by a punch list that flagged everything.
Three bands and no fourth. Band A is unsafe to use now, and it is tagged out of service in writing the day we find it. Band B is deterioration we expect to become a failure within a season or two, grouped by defect so you can price it as one scope. Band C is watch-and-re-photograph. A report where everything is urgent is not a report, it is a liability transfer, and it makes the budget conversation impossible.
Our owners ask for records months later, sometimes at sale. Will the file still be there?
Yes — records are kept by property, unit and date, and we re-issue them on request in the same format they were delivered. That request usually arrives at renewal, at a refinance, or when a buyer's inspector asks what maintenance was performed. Handing over the per-unit record and photo set answers it directly instead of starting a reconstruction from memory.
Do you also do the repairs you find, and is that a conflict?
We do, and the honest answer to the conflict is that the evidence has to stand on its own. Every finding carries a photo and the standard it is measured against, and the repair is quoted as a separate line you approve or decline. Take the report to another contractor if you want a second number — that is a fair use of it, and a finding that only holds up when we are the ones fixing it was never a real finding.
Who signs off on gas work in a unit?
A license holder does. Anything falling under a gas, electrical, or structural license gets carried out by someone holding it, or certified by them, at the standard your jurisdiction enforces. On a gas fireplace or gas log set, that covers the valve, the connection, and anything downstream of the shutoff. We document the condition either way; the sign-off is not something we improvise.
Talk to a real chimney tech today.
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Active leak, animal in flue, post-fire damage, or smoke event? Real humans on the line 7 AM to 12 AM every day — replies in under 2 minutes. Tech dispatch within 2 hours during business hours, subject to crew availability after-hours.
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