When someone was found days or weeks later
Unattended death cleanup in Santa Maria
A parent who lived alone. A tenant nobody had heard from. Finding out is hard enough. The condition of the home is a separate problem, and it is one you can pass to someone else.
Phone answered all day and all night, seven days a week
The Sheriff-Coroner comes first
Call 911 if you are the one who found the person. In Santa Barbara County the Sheriff’s Coroner’s Bureau looks into any death where the person had not been seen by a doctor in the previous 20 days, which describes most deaths discovered late. An investigator examines the scene and may speak with family and neighbours.
When it is needed, the person is taken to the coroner's facility in Santa Maria or Santa Barbara and later released to a funeral home. The Bureau's advice to families is simple: choose a funeral home and call it. The funeral home arranges the release with the coroner and orders the death certificates.
Cleanup can begin once the deputies or the investigator tell you the home is yours again.
Why this job is unlike other cleaning
Time is what makes the difference. Over days, fluids move downward into whatever is beneath: a mattress, a recliner, carpet and pad, and in some homes the subfloor. Odor settles into curtains, clothing and upholstery well away from the room itself.
So the work is mostly removal. The company takes out what has absorbed fluid, cleans and disinfects the structure underneath, and treats the air. Ask them to explain what they expect to remove before they start, and to tell you if they find more once the flooring is up.
Before the company arrives
- Stay out of the room. There is nothing in there that cannot wait a day.
- Make a short list of what must be saved: a will, bank papers, photographs, a wedding ring, a pet's records.
- Find a set of keys, and decide who will meet the crew at the door.
- If it is a rental, tell the landlord or manager that a company is coming.
Give the list to the crew lead. Things that can be cleaned are set aside for you. Things that cannot are shown to you, or photographed, before they go.
Property the coroner took for safekeeping
Investigators sometimes take a wallet, jewelry or medication from the home. The Coroner's Bureau releases such property to the legal next of kin, or to someone carrying written authorization from the next of kin, and often sends it along with the person to the funeral home. Property is released on weekdays between 8 a.m. and 4 p.m. The Bureau's number is (805) 681-4145.
What families ask
Will the smell be gone afterward?
Removing the source is what ends it, which is why soaked materials are taken out and not cleaned in place. Ask the company what it does about odor in the rest of the home and what it will say in writing about the result.
My relative rented. Who arranges this?
Talk to the landlord before hiring anyone. Either of you can make the call. Who pays in the end depends on the lease, the insurance on each side and the estate, which our payment guide walks through.
Nobody in the family lives nearby. Can this be done at a distance?
Often, yes. Someone local has to hand over keys, such as a neighbour, the landlord or the funeral home by arrangement. The scope and price can be agreed by phone and email.
Whenever suits you
Hand the room to people whose trade this is
Two sentences about the situation are plenty. You then hear how the firm would tackle it and what it would bill. Yes or no is yours alone to say, today or next week.
The number for Santa Maria and the valley
Whoever picks up belongs to a cleanup firm that takes jobs from Guadalupe up to Grover Beach. It is a separate business from this website. Name your town, say what sort of place it is, and ask anything.
Call (805) 362-1926Phone answered all day and all night, seven days a week
The call may be recorded. How this works is set out in the referral disclosure.