Gatewood, King County
Repairs to a Gatewood chimney are quoted from $425. That opening figure fits a contained fix, say a handful of loose bricks relaid near the top or a cracked section of crown rebuilt. Anything bigger is split up, every defect priced alone next to its photo, so you can approve one item and postpone another. We would rather tell you a chimney can wait than sell work it does not need yet.
Typical investment
From $425
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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.
Level 1 examination of everything reachable, with a Level 2 camera pass when the reachable parts leave a question open
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Full-height brushing of the flue with a head sized to its shape and material
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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.
Seattle's chimneys have a track record in earthquakes, and it is not a kind one. After the Nisqually quake of 2001, the reconnaissance team of the Earthquake Engineering Research Institute found that wood-frame houses had come through well overall, with their damage mostly confined to chimneys. A USGS open-file report counts chimney damage at roughly one house in three among those FEMA's inspectors visited afterward. For a house on this hill the frame is rarely the worry. The brick column bolted to its side, or not bolted at all, is.
Detached houses account for 65.1 percent of dwellings across the Census ZIP code area surrounding Gatewood, nearly double Seattle's 36.8 percent, and where roughly half of all units went up before 1960, according to Census estimates for 2020 to 2024. Plenty of separate houses, then, and many of them past their sixtieth winter.
Repairing one of them is one thing. Rebuilding a section is another, because new masonry falls under today's rules. Seattle's 2021 residential code says fresh masonry on a lot in seismic category D0, D1 or D2 gets steel inside it: four No. 4 bars running unbroken up the stack, plus strap anchors fastening it to the framing wherever a floor, ceiling or roof crosses it more than six feet up. Which category your lot falls in is something we look up for the address, never guess.
Every chimney repair we do in Gatewood includes:
Smoke coming back into the room, or a smell that won't go? Book the inspection first.
Book nowRepair usually begins with something a homeowner spots rather than feels: a brick on the lawn after a storm, a crown with a crack you can fit a coin into, mortar sand gathering in the gutter, a stain spreading on a ceiling. Each one has a cause higher up. We find that cause before quoting, because patching the stain while the crown keeps letting water in only buys a season.
When the city wrote up its history of outages, West Seattle got its own mention for a 1958 gale, and the Columbus Day Storm of 1962 was ranked the Northwest's worst. The companion windstorm analysis explains why the peninsula keeps coming up: it is among Seattle's most heavily forested areas, and most wind damage comes from falling trees.
No source we read counts the trees on Gatewood's own blocks. Where one does stand over a roof, though, the chimney top is an easy casualty in a big blow, struck by a falling limb or worked loose by one rubbing against it. We check the top two or three courses, the crown and the cap after any storm call, and we photograph the damage before touching it so your insurer sees it as we found it.
A camera run and a look at the top tell us whether the damage is local or a symptom of something larger, such as a failed crown.
Every defect gets its own line and photo. Some items you will want done this month; others we can simply keep an eye on, and you decide which is which.
Repointing is exempt from a Seattle building permit; for anything structural we ask SDCI about your address before booking.
We cut out the spoiled brick, lay in the closest match we can source, and leave the top pitched to throw rain off.
You receive photos of each repaired area so the work is on record for insurance or a future sale.
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 Repair | From $425 | Masonry repair — brick and mortar, scoped after diagnosis |
| Chimney Sweep | $189–$449 | Full flue swept, Level 1 inspection included |
| Chimney Inspection | $99 plus tax | Level 1 visual; Level 2 adds a full camera scan |
| Chimney Relining | From $1,900 | Full-length stainless liner, sized to the appliance |
| 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.
From $425 for a contained job. Larger repairs are itemized so you see what each part costs before agreeing to it.
It depends on condition and use. A FEMA advisory on quake-damaged chimneys suggests a metal flue in a framed chase is often more robust than a like-for-like rebuild. We lay out both options with prices.
We can make a damaged top safe quickly. Permanent masonry needs a dry window, which we schedule as soon as the forecast allows.
We look at what we are fixing. A full camera inspection with a written report costs $99 plus tax for each chimney, an amount we take back off the repair once you sign our quote.
A $99 on-site inspection, a written quote before any work, and photos of every item we touch.
