How we rank water damage restoration companies

Who appears on a list

A company appears on a town's water damage list if any of these is true:

• its office is in that town;
• its own website names that town as a place it serves; or
• Google Maps shows it for the search "water damage restoration {town} MI". We record that search, with its date, for every town we publish.

A county list includes every company that qualifies for a town in that county, or whose website names the county. A company must also offer water damage service: its own website says so, or Google Maps shows it for the water damage search. A list page exists only when at least 3 companies qualify.

The score, out of 1,000

Ratings and reviews for every company on a list are read on the same day, from each company's public Google Business Profile.

• Reputation, 300 points. The rating, adjusted so a handful of 5-star reviews cannot beat hundreds of reviews averaging 4.8:adjusted = (v / (v + m)) × R + (m / (v + m)) × CR is the rating, v the number of ratings received, C = 4.7922 the mean rating across the companies in our data, and m = 15. An adjusted 3.5 earns 0 points and 5.0 earns 300.
• Ratings received, 100 points. On a log scale. 500 or more earns full points.
• Last 90 days, 150 points. Up to 100 points for reviews in the last 90 days (15 or more earns full points), and up to 50 for their average rating.
• Water-damage fit, 150 points. The share of written reviews that mention a water job: a leak, flood, basement, pipe, sump pump, ceiling, toilet, water heater, dishwasher, extraction or drying. Half or more earns full points. This rewards companies customers actually hire for water damage.
• Owner replies, 100 points. The share of reviews the owner answered.
• 24/7 and IICRC, 200 points. 100 if the company's own website states 24/7 service, 100 if it states IICRC certification. We read the homepage; each company card links the page we read. "Not stated" means we did not find it there, not that the company lacks it.

Floor. A company with no rating, or a rating under 3.5, is not ranked. Ties go to the company with more ratings received.

The "Top Rated" badge

The top 3 companies on a list earn the badge for the year, but only with a rating of at least 4.5 from at least 20 ratings received. The badge is applied after the score runs and never changes a position. It is never sold and is recomputed each year. A company that holds it can add it to its own website with the code on its badge page; the badge links back to the company's profile here so customers can check it. A company that drops out of the top 3 at the next recompute loses the right to show it.

Reviews we quote

Company pages quote the three most recent written reviews, whatever their rating, shortened, with the reviewer's name and date. We do not choose which reviews appear. Counts of jobs customers mention come from reading every review we pulled.

Money

No company can pay to appear on a list or to move up.

Town facts

Each town page has facts about local rivers, floods, sewers and housing. Every fact links its source and the date we read it. We leave out anything we could not confirm from a public record, news report or official page.