Editorial policy
Water Damage Papa is an independent information publisher. We do not perform mitigation or restoration, we do not dispatch contractors, and we do not sell leads. In this vertical that independence is the only reason a homeowner should believe a page explaining what the assignment of benefits the technician is holding actually does.
The two emergency rules
Rule 1 — water and electricity. Any page touching standing water renders a Do Not Enter block above the H1: if water is standing in a room with outlets, appliances or a panel, do not enter it; shut off power at the panel only if the panel itself is dry and reachable without stepping in water; otherwise call the utility or 911 from outside.
Rule 2 — a ceiling holding water. Any page touching a ceiling leak renders a warning: a bulging or sagging ceiling is holding weight and can collapse. Stay out from under it. Do not puncture it unless you are clear of the drop zone and have somewhere for the water to go.
Both blocks are opaque, carry no JavaScript, cannot be dismissed, and nothing renders above them — not a call-to-action, not an advertisement, not a navigation promotion. Our build fails if any of that is violated.
The category discipline
We never answer a water damage question without establishing the category of the water, because the category determines the answer. A page that says "you can dry that yourself" without qualifying it to Category 1 is dangerous, and our build refuses to publish drying, salvage or cleanup guidance that does not state a category.
We also never merge Category 1, 2 and 3 questions in our content pipeline, and we never merge mitigation questions with repair questions. They have different answers, and conflating them is the most damaging error available on this subject.
How we source
Tier 1 is FEMA and the NFIP, state departments of insurance, the EPA, the CDC, OSHA, state licensing boards and NOAA. Tier 2 is the IICRC, the RIA, ASHRAE, the Insurance Information Institute, and manufacturer technical documentation. Tier 3 is cost aggregators, restoration company blogs and public adjuster marketing — used for estimates only, always attributed as estimates.
Restoration company content is the dominant source in this vertical and it has a direct financial incentive toward larger scopes, longer equipment runs and signed assignments of benefits. We treat all of it as Tier 3, and we never source a coverage claim, a category determination, or a "this must be removed" claim from it. Public adjuster content has the mirror-image incentive and gets the same treatment.
What we will not publish
We do not publish Category 2 or Category 3 procedures, or mold remediation procedures beyond the EPA's small-area homeowner guidance. We do not instruct anyone to enter standing water with the power on. We do not publish procedures that require opening a wall assembly.
We do not predict whether a specific claim will be approved — we explain what adjusters evaluate. We do not advise readers whether to sign an assignment of benefits — we explain what it does and what to ask. We do not make claims about mold and health beyond what the CDC and EPA state, and we never diagnose.
Corrections and review
Every page carries a visible last-reviewed date. Every regulatory claim is recorded in our regulatory sourcing log with its source URL and verification date. If you believe something here is wrong, write to [email protected] and we will check it against the primary source and correct it publicly.
Some pages are drafted with AI assistance. Every factual claim, every figure, and every regulatory statement is verified against a primary source by a human before publication, and the sourcing log records that verification.