How much does crime scene cleanup cost?
A crime scene cleanup costs from about $1,500 for a small contained scene to $25,000 or more where blood and fluids have soaked floors and walls, with most residential jobs landing in the low thousands. Fixr reports biohazard cleanup at $3,000 to $5,000 with a national average of $4,000 for a 2,000 square foot home, a $1,500 low and a $25,000 high, and lists crime scene and after-death cleaning at up to $400 to $600 per hour and unattended death cleanup at $200 to $300 per hour.
| Scene or service | Published rate (Fixr) |
|---|---|
| Crime scene and after-death cleaning | $400 to $600 per hour |
| Unattended death | $200 to $300 per hour |
| Homicide or suicide cleanup, full job | Up to $25,000 to clean and restore |
| Odor control | $75 to $100 per hour plus supplies |
| Hoarder cleanup | $25 to $150 per hour, or about $1,000 per day |
| Virus decontamination | $1,500 to $3,500 per project |
| Sewage backup | $2,000 to $10,000 per project |
| Medical waste disposal | $2 to $20 per pound, or $200 to $300 per 20-gallon bin |
| 24-hour emergency response | $500 to $1,000 extra per visit |
Those per-hour figures look high next to house cleaning because they are not labor rates. They are fully loaded scene rates that carry two or three technicians, disposable PPE, EPA-registered disinfectants, regulated waste disposal, respirator programs, training, vaccination, pollution insurance and the on-call time between jobs. Biohazard cleanup cost is mostly overhead and consumables, which is why pricing by the hour alone misleads.
This page is about pricing and billing. The legal side (OSHA’s bloodborne pathogens standard, waste permits, state registration, insurance) is in our guide to running a crime scene cleaning business. Nothing here is legal, tax or insurance advice, and biohazard rules differ by state, so check your state.
Per hour or per scene: how biohazard companies quote
Most biohazard companies quote per scene after a walkthrough, using per-hour rates and per-unit costs underneath to build the number. Pure hourly billing is used for open-ended jobs (hoarding, large commercial decontamination) and for insurance work where the adjuster wants hours and rates on the invoice.
Per-scene pricing
- Built from a walkthrough or photos: rooms affected, surfaces (tile, carpet, subfloor, drywall), time since the event, odor, pests.
- One number for the family or property manager, with the lines shown so an adjuster can approve it.
- Includes a change clause: if fluids are found under the subfloor, you stop and re-quote.
Per-hour pricing
- A technician or crew rate per hour, plus PPE, waste and materials billed as used.
- Right for jobs where the scope cannot be seen in advance, and for commercial clients used to time-and-materials.
- Requires honest time logs; adjusters and families will question an invoice without them.
A practical hybrid: a per-scene price for the remediation you can see, a per-hour rate for anything beyond it, and separate per-unit lines for waste and materials removed. Fixr notes that biohazard professionals commonly earn $200 to $300 each per hour on scene work and that disposal typically runs $2 to $20 per pound, so a two-technician scene at $500 an hour with waste on top is in line with what clients find when they search.
What goes into a biohazard cleanup quote?
A biohazard quote has six cost lines, and a good estimate shows every one of them. Learning how to price biohazard cleanup is mostly learning what the lines are and what they cost you.
- Technician hours. Two technicians minimum for any scene with fluids; three for large or multi-room scenes. Count travel and the decontamination and doffing time at the end, which can be an hour.
- PPE and supplies. Suits, double gloves, booties, respirator cartridges, face shields, disinfectant (an EPA-registered product effective against bloodborne pathogens), absorbents, bags, sharps containers. Fixr estimates hazmat suits at about $80 each. Everything disposable is consumed per scene, not reused.
- Regulated waste. Priced by the pound or by the container by your licensed hauler; Fixr cites $2 to $20 per pound or $200 to $300 per 20-gallon bin. Mattresses and carpet soaked with fluids count as waste and weigh a lot.
- Materials removed. Carpet and pad, subfloor sections, drywall, cabinetry, a mattress or sofa. Quote the removal and disposal; refer the rebuild to a contractor unless you are licensed for it.
- Equipment. HEPA air scrubbers, foggers, ozone or hydroxyl generators for odor, ATP meters for verification. Charge a daily rate per machine.
- Timing. Nights, weekends and holidays, and emergency response within hours. Fixr reports 24-hour emergency hazmat teams charging $500 to $1,000 more per visit.
Underneath those lines sits the overhead that justifies the hourly figure. The OSHA bloodborne pathogens standard requires every employer whose employees have occupational exposure to establish a written exposure control plan, and to make the hepatitis B vaccination available after training and within 10 working days of initial assignment. Training time, vaccination, respirator fit testing and the medical records program are real annual costs, and they belong in your rate, not as a surprise line on the invoice.
How insurance billing works for biohazard cleanup
Most residential crime scene and unattended death cleanups are paid by the property owner’s homeowners insurance, and most commercial ones by the business’s property policy. The company that bills insurers well gets paid in weeks; the one that sends a one-line invoice waits months and settles for less.
What an adjuster needs
- A signed work authorization from the policyholder (not a tenant or a relative) naming you to perform the remediation, before you start.
- Photos before, during and after, with the affected materials marked, and a floor sketch with measurements.
- A line-item invoice: hours by technician and rate, PPE as units, waste by pound or container with the hauler’s manifest, materials removed by square foot, equipment by day, disinfectants by unit.
- Documentation of the standard you worked to, such as OSHA bloodborne pathogen compliance and the EPA registration of the disinfectant.
- A clear line between remediation and rebuild. Adjusters pay remediation to you and reconstruction to a contractor; mixing them delays both.
Three rules that protect you
- Confirm coverage exists before you start, but do not let the family wait for an adjuster to approve a scene that is a health hazard; document the urgency.
- Price the same whether an insurer or a person is paying. Adjusters compare your invoice with other companies’ in the same market.
- Be careful with assignment of benefits forms; some states restrict them. Check your state, and have your own agreement reviewed by a lawyer.
Deductibles are the client’s responsibility, and some families cannot pay them. Decide your policy in advance (payment plan, a hardship discount, a referral to victim assistance) so you do not negotiate it at the door.
Victim compensation programs and state rules that change the price
Every state runs a crime victim compensation program, and many will reimburse crime scene cleanup within limits, but the rules decide whether you can bill them at all. California is the clearest example. The California Victim Compensation Board may reimburse reasonable costs to clean the scene of a crime in a residence or vehicle up to $1,709, pays only for cleanup by an individual or company registered as a trauma scene waste management practitioner with the California Department of Public Health, and pays only for biohazard materials, not for damaged property.
That registration is its own step. The California Department of Public Health issues the Trauma Scene Waste Management Practitioner registration to applicants who submit form CDPH 8668A with the current registration fee, and lists registered practitioners publicly. Without it you cannot legally do trauma scene work in California, let alone bill the state.
How this shapes your pricing:
- Program caps are below your cost on most scenes. A $1,709 cap covers a small contained scene at best. Treat the program as a partial payer and name the balance payer in the agreement.
- Registration, permits and waste contracts are overhead that other states impose differently (some regulate medical waste haulers, some license biohazard remediation, some do neither). Check your state and price the compliance into your rate.
- Payer of last resort rules mean the program pays only what insurance does not. Bill the insurer first, document the denial or deductible, then the program.
- Property damage is not biohazard. Programs and some insurers pay to remove contaminated materials, not to rebuild. Keep those lines separate on every quote.
A worked per-scene quote (hypothetical numbers)
Say an unattended death in a one-bedroom apartment, discovered after about two weeks. Fluids on a mattress, through the carpet and pad into the subfloor in a 6 by 8 foot area, odor throughout, flies. Three technicians, one long day plus a return visit for odor verification. Replace every number with your own costs and your hauler’s prices.
| Line | How it is worked out | Amount |
|---|---|---|
| Technician labor | 3 technicians × 10 hours × $30 (including travel and decon) | $900 |
| Return visit | 1 technician × 3 hours × $30 | $90 |
| PPE and disinfectant | Suits, gloves, cartridges, absorbents, EPA-registered disinfectant | $320 |
| Regulated waste | Mattress, carpet, pad and subfloor section, 6 containers × $65 | $390 |
| Materials removal | 48 sq ft carpet, pad and subfloor cut-out, tools and blades | $180 |
| Equipment | HEPA scrubber and hydroxyl generator, 3 days at $60 each | $360 |
| Direct cost | $2,240 | |
| Price with 35% overhead and insurance, 20% profit | $2,240 ÷ 0.45 | about $4,978 |
| Equivalent scene rate | $4,978 ÷ 13 crew-hours on site (10 + 3) | about $383 per crew-hour |
The quote lands near Fixr’s $4,000 average for a typical biohazard job, and at about $383 per crew-hour it sits between Fixr’s $200 to $300 per hour unattended death rate and its $400 to $600 crime scene rate. Overhead is set at 35% because training, vaccination, fit testing, waste contracts, pollution insurance and on-call time are expensive; a company that sets it at 15% will discover the difference at renewal time. The profit calculator shows what a month of scenes leaves after those costs.
Trauma cleanup pricing for other scene types
The same cost lines price every trauma and biohazard job; what changes is the hour count, the waste volume and the equipment. Use the published Fixr ranges as the market check and your walkthrough as the estimate.
| Scene | What drives the hours | Market check |
|---|---|---|
| Suicide or homicide | Spread of fluids, number of rooms, materials removed, law enforcement release timing | $400 to $600 per hour; up to $25,000 full job |
| Unattended death | Time since death, odor, insects, subfloor saturation | $200 to $300 per hour |
| Hoarding with biohazards | Volume, animal or human waste, dumpsters, days on site | $25 to $150 per hour or about $1,000 per day for the hoarding phase |
| Vehicle | Upholstery and carpet removal, confined space, whether the vehicle is a total loss | Same hourly rates as a home, per Fixr |
| Sewage backup | Square footage, drying, materials removed | $2,000 to $10,000 per project |
| Infectious disease decontamination | Square footage, follow-up visits | $1,500 to $3,500 per project |
| Tear gas, fingerprint powder, meth residue | Testing, porous materials, state remediation standards where they exist | Quote from testing; check your state’s rules |
For hoarding jobs, the ICD level and dumpster math are covered in our hoarding cleanup cost guide; biohazard phases inside a hoard are priced with the lines above.
How to present the price to families, landlords and adjusters
Give a written estimate with the lines shown, explain who is likely to pay, and never pressure a grieving person to sign on the spot. The way you quote is part of the service in this trade, and it is also what keeps you out of disputes.
- Walk the scene once law enforcement releases it, with photos and measurements, and tell the family what you found in plain words.
- Write the estimate by line, with a change clause for hidden contamination and a separate section for anything beyond remediation (rebuild, contents cleaning, storage).
- Name the payer options: homeowners or commercial insurance, a landlord or property manager, the family or estate, a victim compensation program (with its cap and registration rules), or a business.
- Get the right signature: the policyholder or property owner for insurance work, the executor for an estate, the landlord for a rental.
- Set payment terms in writing: a deposit from private payers, direct billing to insurers with the deductible due from the client, and a date for the balance.
- Hand over a completion report with photos and the waste manifest; it is what the adjuster, the landlord and the family all need.
Workers’ comp and pollution coverage are part of the overhead you are explaining when someone asks why the number is what it is; NEXT Insurance reports an average of $116 a month for workers’ comp among cleaning businesses and $160 for construction, and biohazard crews are rated at the higher end. Our cleaning business insurance guide covers the policy types, and the estimate template is a starting point for the written quote.