When someone was not found for a while
Unattended death cleanup in Oxnard
It happens to people who lived alone and kept to themselves. By the time a neighbor or a relative notices, the home needs specialist cleaning, and the person who found them should not be the one to do it.
Phone answered 24/7, day and night
What you are facing
Why this is not a job for household cleaners
After death the body releases fluids. Given days, they pass through bedding and upholstery into whatever lies underneath: mattress, carpet, pad, subfloor, sometimes the ceiling of the room below. What is visible on top is rarely the whole of it.
The smell is carried by that material and by the air that has moved through the home. Opening windows helps you breathe. It does not remove the source. Until the affected material is taken out and the surfaces beneath are treated, the odor returns.
Flies and other insects are often part of it. Dealing with them belongs to the same job, not to a separate call.
Your part
What to do, and what to leave
Let the Medical Examiner's Office finish
A death nobody witnessed is reported to the Ventura County Medical Examiner. An investigator attends, and the person is taken into the office's care.
Stay out of the room
Close its door, and close the vents if the heating or cooling is running. Do not strip the bed or lift carpet to look.
Find the essentials from elsewhere
Keys, the lease or deed, insurance papers. If they are in the affected room, tell the company; it can retrieve and bag them.
Decide about belongings later
You will be asked what to save. Photographs, documents and jewellery can usually be cleaned. Upholstered furniture near the spot usually cannot.
Questions families ask
How long does the cleanup take?
It depends on how far fluids travelled and how the home is built. A company can only judge that on site, which is why a careful one inspects before it quotes.
Can we go in to collect a few things first?
Wait if you can. If something cannot wait, cover your shoes, touch as little as possible and do not carry items from that room through the rest of the home.
The home is rented. Who calls?
Either the family or the landlord can. Agree between you who is hiring, because the company will want one person to sign. Notes for landlords.
Ready when the home is
Hold off until the police and the Medical Examiner's investigator are done with the property. After that, a single call puts a cleanup firm from the Oxnard area on the phone with you. Nothing gets booked unless you say so.
Talk it over with a cleanup company
Begin wherever you like. The story does not have to come out in order, and you may hang up whenever you want.
Call (805) 946-0050Phone answered 24/7, day and night
Your call may be recorded. Read how we are paid and what we keep.