Seaview, King County
Seaview runs down the west face of the peninsula to Beach Drive SW, and a good number of its roofs are pitched toward the water on ground that falls away fast. That shapes the price of a sweep more than anything inside the flue. We charge $189 for one open fireplace that we can reach from the hearth or from a walkable roof, and up to $449 when the stack is tall, the roof is steep or an insert has to come out before the brush can go up.
Typical investment
$189–$449
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 Seaview home — we'll point you to the right fix.
What we do
The same crew, the same written quote — for Seaview 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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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.
Wikipedia draws Seaview's edges as Puget Sound to the west, Alki and Genesee to the north, Fairmount Park to the east and Gatewood to the south. No census is counted on those lines. The Census splits the neighborhood between two ZIP code areas: the northern part shares one with Alki, Admiral and Genesee, the southern waterfront shares another with Gatewood and Fauntleroy. Neither tally says which Seaview houses have a wood fireplace, which have gas, and which have none, so before we load the van we ask you what is at the bottom of the chimney.
Seattle Parks describes the 500-foot seawall at Emma Schmitz Memorial Overlook, 4503 Beach Drive SW, as a 1920s structure that had taken significant erosion and storm damage before the Army Corps of Engineers replaced it in 2020-2021. A concrete wall at the waterline is not a chimney, but it does tell you how much weather reaches this side of the peninsula.
Wind is the part of that weather a fireplace notices. For Seattle, WeatherSpark marks a blustery stretch that opens in the middle of October and closes near April 24; December posts the strongest monthly average, and outside high summer the air comes up from the south. Gusts that sweep across a flue top can stall the draft or push smoke back down, and a cap screen half blocked with soot makes it worse. So a Seaview sweep ends at the top of the chimney: the mesh is cleared and the cap is checked for fit.
Every chimney sweep we do in Seaview includes:
Smoke coming back into the room, or a smell that won't go? Book the inspection first.
Book nowIn the ZIP code area covering north Seaview, the Census estimate for homes heated mainly by wood is zero (margin: 25 either way). That number only covers the main heat source. A fireplace lit on weekends and holidays does not show up in it, and that kind of use is exactly what leaves a flue sooty: short, cool fires that never get the masonry hot. The deposit is soft and dull at first. Left for a few seasons it hardens, and then a brush alone may not move it.
On the phone we find out what you burn, how often, and whether the roof can be walked, so the visit is priced before anyone climbs.
The hearth is covered and the vacuum runs at the firebox the whole time, which keeps loosened soot out of the room.
Rods go up the flue from below or down from the roof; the smoke chamber and damper ledge are then cleared by hand, since a brush skips those.
We photograph the firebox, the damper and the top, and tell you plainly whether anything needs attention before your next fire.
Nisqually, on February 28, 2001, was a magnitude 6.8 quake whose source lay 52 kilometers deep, per the seismic network that monitors the Pacific Northwest. Thirty-six years earlier, a HistoryLink essay recounts, a block-by-block count over 188 West Seattle blocks found roughly one chimney in three damaged by the 1965 shaking.
Those totals are for West Seattle and the region, not for Seaview in particular. What they mean for a sweep is simple. A chimney that came through one of those mornings may carry a crack in a flue tile or an open mortar joint that has been coated in soot ever since. Brushing exposes it, and that is the moment we look and photograph.
What this work is quoted at for Seaview homes — the exact figure comes from the $99 on-site inspection, credited toward the work.
| Service | Price in Seaview | What that covers |
|---|---|---|
| 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 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 Seaview. 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.
Seaview is a west-facing neighborhood south of Alki and Genesee that runs down to Beach Drive SW, on Puget Sound, with homes of mixed ages, pre-1940 houses making up between 23% and 30% of the two ZIP code areas it straddles.
SeaviewKing County, WA · 47.556, -122.390
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.
Mostly access. A walkable roof and a single open fireplace sit at $189. A tall chimney on the downhill side, a steep pitch, or an insert that must be pulled first moves the job toward $449.
Not always. Many flues can be brushed from the firebox. We go up when the cap needs clearing, when the flue has a bend, or when the top is where the trouble is.
We tell you and show the photo. A closer look means booking the camera inspection, $99 plus tax; sign our repair quote afterward and the $99 is subtracted from it.
A $99 on-site inspection, a written quote before any work, and photos of every item we touch.
