Gatewood, King County
Each chimney we inspect in Gatewood is billed $99 plus tax. For that, a technician sends a camera the length of the flue, climbs to the crown, cap and flashing whenever the roof is safe to stand on, looks over the firebox and damper inside, and leaves you a written report with the photos attached. When the report leads to work and you approve our quote, the $99 is subtracted from that job. A healthy chimney gets a report saying exactly that, and nothing is pushed on you.
What we charge
$99 plus tax
Book an inspection
Book your $99 inspection
$99 plus tax, deducted when you approve the repair
Not sure where to start
Pick what you're seeing at your Gatewood home — we'll point you to the right fix.
What we do
The same crew, the same written quote — for Gatewood homes.
Full-height brushing of the flue with a head sized to its shape and material
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Assessment of the stack from roofline to crown, with a photo of each defect
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Camera survey and measurement of the existing flue before anything is ordered
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Measurement of each flue tile, or of the whole crown for a multi-flue cap
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Burner, pilot assembly and firebox cleaned; logs or media put back in the layout the manual shows
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Joints cut back to firm mortar and repointed (tuckpointing) to match the existing profile
Learn moreRanges shown for orientation — the exact figure is written up on-site, after the inspection.
Gatewood has its own lesson in what an engineer can find that a passerby cannot. Gatewood School opened in September 1910 as a nine-room, three-story brick building by the architect Edgar Blair. In the 1980s, HistoryLink recounts, an engineering study concluded it would be unsafe in an earthquake. Neighbors petitioned to keep it, the city made it a landmark in 1988, and a renovation from 1989 to 1991 took off the 1922 wing and built a new one. The building looked fine from the street the whole time. A brick chimney can be the same: solid at the top, broken where nobody looks.
Census estimates for 2020 to 2024 give the ZIP code area that covers Gatewood, Fauntleroy and the south end of the Seaview waterfront the oldest housing of any West Seattle ZIP area: close to a third of its 8,345 units date from 1939 or before, and once the 1940s and 1950s are added, about half predate 1960. Those are area figures, not a count for Gatewood alone.
For an inspection, the age points to the questions we ask on camera. Under Washington's current residential code, clay flue tile has to meet ASTM C315, or the liner has to be a listed system. A stack laid up generations ago may have no tile at all, or tiles that have cracked and slipped since. A chimney may also have gained an insert or a metal liner in a later decade. The camera tells us which of these you have.
Every chimney inspection we do in Gatewood includes:
Smoke coming back into the room, or a smell that won't go? Book the inspection first.
Book nowThe damage pattern on this peninsula is uneven, which is the main argument for looking at your own flue rather than your neighbor's. After the 1965 earthquake, HistoryLink reports, surveyors counted 5,005 chimneys on 188 West Seattle blocks and found 34 percent damaged. A USGS-published study of the 2001 quake found the worst West Seattle damage lined up with strands of the Seattle fault zone, not with soil or slope, and dropped off within a block or two. Two houses on the same street can have very different chimneys after the same shaking.
The city's landslide study, prepared by Shannon & Wilson, finds more documented slides in West Seattle than in any other part of Seattle, confined to the edges of steep hills, and it says water played a role in nearly all of them. West of Gatewood the land drops toward Beach Drive SW, where Seattle Parks restored the beach at Lowman Beach Park in 2022, removing the last section of seawall and opening up a remnant of Pelly Creek.
Brick does not bend along with a wood frame, so the stack is often where movement under one corner shows up first. On a sloping lot we sight along it for lean, check whether daylight has opened between masonry and siding, and trace any crack that climbs the mortar in steps. None of these proves a slide; each is written up so you can decide whether someone should look at the soil.
You pick a time; we confirm by phone and ask how many chimneys and appliances the house has, since each chimney is billed on its own.
We open the damper, light the smoke chamber and run the camera up, recording what we see at each joint.
Where the roof can be walked, hands go on the crown, the cap and the flashing. On a roof we cannot walk, we photograph them from the ladder or report what could not be seen.
Before leaving, we play back the footage and sort the findings into three piles: fine, aging, and fix soon.
The written report follows with the photos. If repairs are listed, the quote sits beside it, item by item.
What this work is quoted at for Gatewood homes — the exact figure comes from the $99 on-site inspection, credited toward the work.
| Service | Price in Gatewood | What that covers |
|---|---|---|
| Chimney Inspection | $99 plus tax | Level 1 visual; Level 2 adds a full camera scan |
| Chimney Sweep | $189–$449 | Full flue swept, Level 1 inspection included |
| Chimney Relining | From $1,900 | Full-length stainless liner, sized to the appliance |
| Chimney Repair | From $425 | Masonry repair — brick and mortar, scoped after diagnosis |
| Chimney Cap Installation | $235–$850 | Stainless cap fitted; multi-flue and custom at the top |
Ranges are what these jobs are quoted at in Gatewood. The exact figure is set on site after a $99 inspection (credited toward the job if you go ahead), and you approve it before any work starts.
Gatewood is a hilltop neighborhood named for Carlisle Gatewood, the developer who financed its streetcar line in 1907, with older homes, about three in ten of those in its ZIP code area built before 1940 and half before 1960.
GatewoodKing County, WA · 47.545, -122.386
Before and after
Illustrations of what each repair changes on a typical chimney — not photos of a specific job.
Before
After
Before
After
Before
After
Four steps, each one on paper — so you always know what happens next.
Choose a genuine opening on the crew's calendar. Confirmation is immediate.
Liner, crown, cap, flashing and masonry examined in order — each finding photographed.
One document, plain numbers, covering only the work your chimney genuinely needs.
The repair is completed, then handed over with before-and-after photos of every item.
$99 plus tax for each chimney, so two stacks on one roof means two fees.
It is applied to work you approve from our quote, so a repair or relining you go ahead with costs $99 less. Turn the quote down and the $99 simply pays for the inspection you received.
Not in anything we have read. The 2001 study was read in summary only, and no published table gives Gatewood by block. That is why we look at your flue instead of guessing.
We prefer to, for the crown and flashing. If the pitch or the drop on a sloped lot makes it unsafe, we say so in the report and inspect from inside and from the ladder.
A $99 on-site inspection, a written quote before any work, and photos of every item we touch.
