After a Houston flood, every wet lawn grows a contractor. Some of them are real. Some of them will be in another state when your drywall is half down.
You want a company that can extract today, document for insurance, and still answer the phone in three weeks. That is a higher bar than a logo on a polo.
Call two shops. Compare how they talk about moisture, not how they talk about your pain.
Do this now
- Search a company you choose. Do not hire the first door knocker.
- Ask for a physical Houston-area shop address and a Texas license or registration they can show.
- Call your insurer and ask whether that firm is on a preferred list, then decide if that helps you.
- Refuse a large cash deposit for ‘holding a crew’ on day one.
Questions that sort the adults
‘How will you measure moisture in this slab-on-grade house?’ ‘What category do you put this water in?’ ‘Who pulls permits if you open walls?’ ‘What happens if the adjuster cuts your scope?’
If they cannot answer those without insulting you, keep calling.
Ask who will be the superintendent tomorrow, not who owns the franchise in another city.
Paper that protects you
Emergency authorization for extraction and dry-out is normal. A contract that assigns your entire insurance benefit to them before anyone has seen the house is not a requirement of physics.
Keep a copy. Photograph it. Do not sign in the rain on a phone you cannot read.
If two companies want to start, pick one. Split crews in one wet house is how equipment disappears and blame multiplies.
Written scope or it did not happen
Houston restoration threads after Harvey kept landing on the same ask: written scope, moisture readings, and who pays if the adjuster cuts the line item. Street water is contaminated. Porous materials usually leave. Do not sign an assignment of benefits on the porch so a stranger can run your claim.