Lakewood, Pierce County
Lakewood's chimneys come in two broad kinds. Most belong to houses from the 1960s and 1970s spread between the lakes and the highway; a smaller number sit on older homes along American Lake and Gravelly Lake, where Tacoma families first built lodges in the late 1800s. The same visit covers both: we look at the whole chimney, from the firebox to the top of the stack, photograph what we find and give you a written quote before anything is touched.
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 Lakewood home — we'll point you to the right fix.
What we do
The same crew, the same written quote — for Lakewood homes.
Top-to-bottom brushing of flue and firebox under drop cloths, with a HEPA vacuum pulling the dust
Learn more
Level 1 or Level 2 as needed; Level 2 includes a camera run through the entire flue
Learn more
A full-length stainless-steel or cast liner, firebox to chimney top
Learn more
Loose or damaged brick, open joints and firebox panels repaired
Learn more
A stainless cap sized to your actual flue dimensions
Learn more
Crown patched, or recast entirely if it can't be saved
Learn more
A breathable repellent that lets masonry release moisture
Learn more
Resealing of flashing that's still sound; replacement where it isn't
Learn more
Burner, pilot assembly and valve cleaned and adjusted
Learn more
Staging of the buildup, from flaky Stage 2 to glazed Stage 3
Learn more
Cleaning of the full duct run, dryer to exterior hood
Learn more
Supply and return ductwork cleaned end to end
Learn moreRanges shown for orientation — the exact figure is written up on-site, after the inspection.
Service-area map — Lakewood, WA. Map data © OpenStreetMap contributors.
Lakewood is a young city with an older landscape. It incorporated only on February 28, 1996, and at the time it was the seventh-largest city in Washington and the second-largest in Pierce County. The lakes that give it its name, American Lake first among them, along with Gravelly, Louise, Steilacoom and Waughop, are freshwater, not Puget Sound shoreline. Housing here is mostly from the second half of the twentieth century: the median home was built in 1975 and about 59% of units predate 1980. Add the South Sound's long rainy season, and a Lakewood chimney spends a good part of every year simply keeping water out.
A chimney on a lakeside lot catches the wind across open water, and in the stormy months that wind arrives carrying rain. An exposed stack on the water side of a house takes that weather on its crown and flashing first, so on those properties we spend longer on the roof and photograph the upper courses of brick closely.
Away from the lakes, the typical Lakewood chimney is a single brick flue on a ranch or split-level house from the 1960s or 1970s. The questions there are more about the inside: whether the clay liner is still sound, and whether the appliance connected to it today is the one it was designed for.
You choose a slot on the calendar, the crew arrives in the window given, and the inspection covers the firebox, damper, flue by camera, crown, cap and flashing. You see the photos on site.
Inspection on site: $99 plus tax, deducted from the bill for any work you sign off on in the written quote. Should nothing need doing, the report is yours and the bill stops there.
Lakewood's housing is younger than Tacoma's and older than the plateau towns. Census estimates put the median home at 1975, with about 22.3% of units built before 1960 and about 58.9% before 1980. That places most of the city's masonry chimneys at forty to sixty years old, old enough that the original clay flue tiles deserve a close look, joint by joint.
The exceptions are the lake houses. HistoryLink records that wealthy Tacoma families built lodges and then homes on American, Gravelly and the other lakes from the late 1800s, so a few Lakewood chimneys are far older than the city itself. On either kind, when a wood insert or a gas unit has replaced the open fire, we check that the liner matches what is connected now.
Lakewood sits close to where the Nisqually earthquake struck on February 28, 2001: a magnitude 6.8 event about 52 km deep under Anderson Island, just offshore in Pierce County. FEMA's post-quake records, summarized by the USGS, showed chimney damage at a third of the 30,000 homes it looked at, and $15 million in aid paid for chimney repairs.
NFPA 211 and CSIA each list an earthquake among the events that justify a closer, Level II look, and that level means running a camera the length of the flue. If nobody has examined your Lakewood chimney that way since the ground last shook, the footage is where hidden liner cracks turn up.
Inside the Tacoma-Pierce County Smoke Reduction Zone, a wood stove or insert without EPA certification has been off-limits since October 1, 2015: it cannot be run, sold, handed on or put back in after a move. Puget Sound Clean Air Agency expects such a unit to go to a recycler or be disabled for good, for instance with its doors snapped off or its firebox holed. Before relying on an old unit in a Lakewood house, check your street on the agency's zone map.
There is help with the cost of changing. The agency pays $500 to Pierce County homeowners who recycle a working uncertified stove or insert, and Washington Ecology reported in 2019 that about 5,000 Tacoma-Pierce County residents had already removed uncertified stoves since 2012.
Rebuild the top of a Lakewood chimney and Washington's residential code decides where it has to finish: 3 feet or more above the spot where it comes through the roof, and 2 feet or more above any part of the house within a 10-foot radius. Indoors, framing must stay 2 inches away from an interior chimney and 1 inch from an exterior one.
The code itself is about to move. The State Building Code Council's schedule sets May 3, 2027 as the date the 2024 editions of the residential, mechanical and fuel gas codes take effect, so a rebuild planned for late 2027 may be judged against the newer text. We note the edition that applies on the written quote.
The grid we quote from for Lakewood homes — the $99 inspection comes first, the written quote before any work.
| Service | Price in Lakewood | 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 $375 | Masonry repair — brick and mortar, scoped after diagnosis |
| Chimney Cap Installation | $265–$750 | Stainless cap fitted; multi-flue and custom at the top |
| Masonry Repair (Crown / Repointing) | From $425 | Crown work, repointing and tuckpointing by surface area |
| Chimney Waterproofing | $320–$795 | Breathable sealer — reapplied every 3–5 years in this climate |
| Chimney Flashing Repair | $330–$1,500 | Reseal at the low end, full flashing replacement at the high |
| Gas Fireplace Service | $189–$475 | Annual service and tune-up; repairs quoted after diagnosis |
| Creosote Removal | From $245 | Priced by creosote stage — glazed stage 3 is the heavy end |
| Dryer Vent Cleaning | $105–$260 | Full run cleaned; roof or upper-floor terminations at the top |
| Air Duct Cleaning | From $535 | Whole HVAC system — trunks, branches and every register |
Ranges are what these jobs are quoted at in Lakewood. 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.
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.
No. Book the work and the $99, plus its tax, is taken off the Lakewood repair total. Turn the quote down and the inspection is the only charge; the report stays with you.
It mostly changes where we look hardest. Wind across the lake pushes rain sideways into the crown, the mortar near the top and the flashing at the roof line. It is fresh water, so the concern is plain moisture and wind, and we photograph those spots closely.
Start by hunting for the EPA label, normally fixed to the back or one side of the stove. According to Puget Sound Clean Air Agency, a stove with solid steel doors, or with a pair of glass doors, is probably not certified, and a UL listing does not count as EPA approval. We can look over the stove and the flue behind it on the same visit.
Yes. Some houses from that period were built with a factory-built chimney rather than masonry. The checks differ, since there is no mortar to repoint, but the cap, the joints of the pipe and the clearances around it still matter, and we inspect them the same way.
Plan on about two hours on site for a single chimney. A house with two fireplaces or a hard-to-reach roof can take longer, and we tell you when booking if we expect that.
Choose a genuine opening on the crew's calendar. We inspect, quote in writing, and hand over a photo record of every repair.
