How Mission Flue Line works

Mission Flue Line is a free referral service for homeowners in the San Antonio metro. We are not a chimney company. When you send a request, we pass it to an independent local chimney company that serves your area, and they contact you to sweep or inspect the chimney, price any repair and schedule it.

1. Tell us what you need. Use the form or call us. A photo of the fireplace or the top of the chimney helps.
2. A local chimney company calls you back. They set a time to sweep or look at it. Ask what the visit costs before they come.
3. You get the price in writing before any repair. Ask for photos of what they found inside the flue. You decide.

How we make money

The chimney company pays us for the introduction. You never pay us anything. We don't sweep chimneys, we don't set prices, and we don't inspect anything ourselves.

Who we refer you to

Texas does not license chimney sweeps or chimney masonry work: none of the 41 programs the Texas Department of Licensing and Regulation runs covers chimneys or fireplaces. So there is no state license for us to check. What we ask of the chimney company instead: general liability insurance, a written price before any repair, photos of what they find inside the flue, and a plumber licensed by the Texas State Board of Plumbing Examiners for any gas line work. Some sweeps also hold the Chimney Safety Institute of America's Certified Chimney Sweep credential, a national industry certification; you can ask. How to check a sweep.

What we will never do

We will never tell you a chimney is safe or unsafe; only an inspection can. We won't push a repair, and we won't ask a sweep to disturb a chimney swift nest, which federal law protects. If your experience with a chimney company falls short, tell us at (726) 224-4483.

Our sources

You'll find the sources for each guide at the end of it. The weather and housing numbers are our own analysis of public data from NOAA's National Centers for Environmental Information and the US Census Bureau. See the method.

Photo credits

Photos are from Unsplash, used under the Unsplash License: Stephane Juban / Unsplash, Phil Hearing / Unsplash, Ronan Furuta / Unsplash, Kyle Opperman / Unsplash, Clay Banks / Unsplash, Clay Banks / Unsplash, Clay Banks / Unsplash, Matthew LeJune / Unsplash, weston m / Unsplash. None of the pictures is of a specific contractor's work.