The garage at a glance
- Typical layout here
- Two- or three-car garage attached at the kitchen, mudroom or laundry, sometimes with a bedroom or bonus room above
- What usually burns
- Stored fuel, paint and solvents, vehicles, chargers, workbench tools, cardboard
- Main path into the house
- The door to the house, attic space over the garage, and gaps around pipes, ducts and wiring
- Typical secondary damage
- Oily soot from plastics and tires, plus firefighting water on the garage ceiling and slab
Why garage fires behave differently
For its size, a garage holds more fuel than almost any room in a house. Gasoline cans, lawn equipment, propane cylinders, paint, tires and plastic storage bins burn hot and produce dense, sticky smoke. That smoke is the oily kind, which smears instead of brushing away and carries a sharp chemical smell.
Building codes generally call for a fire-resistant separation between an attached garage and the living space: gypsum board on the shared wall, and on the ceiling when rooms sit above, plus a solid or fire-rated door. In houses built in the 1970s through the 1990s, that separation has often been weakened over the years. Holes cut for a dryer vent or new wiring, an attic hatch left open, a door swapped for a hollow interior one, or a louvered vent added to the door all give smoke and heat a shortcut.
When the separation held, the garage can be a severe loss while the house mostly needs smoke cleaning. When it failed, fire can travel into the attic and run across the whole roof structure.
What to look at on the house side of the wall
Note these before anything is cleaned or torn out, and photograph each one.
- Soot or heat discoloration around the door to the house, especially along the top edge and the latch side
- Smoke stains at outlets, switch plates and any pipe or duct penetrations on the shared wall
- Ceiling stains or a smell of smoke in a bedroom or bonus room above the garage
- Smoke lines at the attic hatch and in insulation over the garage
- Water stains or soft drywall in rooms next to the garage, from hose streams
- Melted weatherstripping or a warped door frame
Sorting out the scope
- IfSoot is confined to the garage and the house door still sealsThenExpect garage demolition and rebuild, with smoke cleaning and odor work in the adjoining rooms.
- IfThe room above the garage smells of smoke or shows ceiling stainsThenAsk for the floor system and the attic over the garage to be opened and inspected, not just the room's surfaces cleaned.
- IfFire reached the atticThenExpect a structural engineer's review of trusses and a building permit for framing repairs before any finish work.
- IfA vehicle burned insideThenAsk your auto insurer and homeowner's insurer to coordinate, since the car and the structure are usually separate claims.
Questions for the restoration contractor
- Will you test whether smoke entered the attic and wall cavities, and how?
- How will the oily residue on the garage framing be handled before it is sealed or replaced?
- Does the rebuild restore the fire separation to current requirements, including the door?
- Who arranges disposal of fuel containers, chemicals and damaged batteries?
Common questions
Can the garage framing be sealed instead of replaced?
Lightly smoked framing is often cleaned and coated with an odor-sealing primer. Charred framing that has lost strength has to be replaced, and a building official or engineer decides where that line is.
Do I need a permit to rebuild the garage?
Structural, electrical and drywall repairs after a fire usually need one. Ask the building department for your address what applies.
General information for Centennial, not a quote or professional advice. In an emergency, call 911.