Need a licensed electrician to replace knob and tube wiring in your home or building in Seattle, Shoreline, Bothell, Lynnwood, Kirkland, Bellevue, Redmond, Sammamish, or Issaquah, Washington?
Give us a call or text at? (206) 914-3243 — use the form to set up your appointment.
CARROELC982BD
& insured
5.0 ★★★★★
North Seattle
Residential and commercial, small repairs to new construction — all of it priced up front and done to code.
Old fuse boxes and crowded panels replaced with clean, labelled service that handles what your house actually draws.
125A to 200A, meter base and mast included. We coordinate the utility shutdown so you’re not without power longer than six hours.
Kitchens, basements and whole-house renovations. Knob-and-tube removed, new circuits run, everything photographed before the drywall goes up.
Level 2 home charging on a dedicated 240V circuit. Sized for your car and your panel, permitted and inspected.
Tenant improvements, new builds, lighting and service work. After-hours scheduling so your floor keeps trading.
Breakers that keep tripping, dead outlets, flickering lights. We trace the fault instead of guessing at the drywall.
Not sure which one you need? Describe what’s happening and we’ll tell you — no charge for the answer.
Knob and tube was the standard way to wire a house from the 1880s through roughly the 1940s, which covers a large share of the housing stock in neighborhoods like Ravenna, Wallingford, Ballard, Greenwood, and Queen Anne. It was competent work for its era. What it wasn’t designed for is a modern household — no grounding conductor, insulation that grows brittle with age, and a system that assumed a fraction of the electrical demand a house carries today.
Carroll Electric specializes in complete knob and tube replacement: removing the original wiring, installing new grounded circuits sized for how the home is actually used, and bringing the system up to current code. We’re a family business and a small, hands-on crew, which means the person who walks your house and quotes the job is typically the same person on site doing it. You get direct answers about what needs replacing, what doesn’t, and what the work will involve.
Call or text us at (206) 914-3243 to talk through your electrical service.
“I highly recommend Carroll Electric. Cameron quickly responded and scheduled the same day visit while all the other electric companies were not available at 6pm. He is very knowledgeable, and he explained the cause of the issue, then he fixed all with a short time.”
Shinobu Y. ★★★★★
Carroll Electric was built around a simple belief: customers deserve honest communication, quality workmanship, and an electrician they can trust. As a family-owned company with a young, passionate team, we’re committed to making every project straightforward — from the first phone call to the final walkthrough.
We don’t believe in confusing estimates or unnecessary upselling. We believe in showing up when we say we will, keeping our work clean, and doing every installation the right way.
“We’d rather lose a job to an honest number than win one with a vague one.”
Tyler Carroll — Manager & Founding Member
Whether it’s a panel upgrade, remodel rewire, EV charger installation, commercial project, or troubleshooting a difficult issue, every job receives the same attention to detail, craftsmanship, and respect.
We’re proud to be a local family business serving our community with transparency, professionalism, and electrical work built to last.
Family
Owned
4
On the crew
Licensed
Bonded & insured
5.0★
Google rating
Cameron Carroll
Owner / Electrician
Tyler Carroll
Manager / Founding Member
Slater Bradley
Original Electrician
Michael Martinez
Apprentice
Many homeowners find out they have knob and tube during a home inspection, an insurance review, or a remodel — often at an inconvenient moment. Knowing the signs ahead of time makes the decision easier to plan around.
The wiring itself is recognizable once you know what to look for: individual conductors running through white ceramic knobs and tubes, usually visible in a basement, attic, or crawlspace, with cloth or rubber insulation rather than modern plastic sheathing. Other indicators show up inside the house — two-prong ungrounded outlets throughout, a fuse box or an undersized panel, no grounding at light fixtures or switches, warm or discolored outlets, lights that dim when appliances start, or breakers and fuses that trip regularly. Insurance non-renewals, failed inspections, and remodel plans that require opening walls also tend to bring it to the surface.
If any of that sounds familiar, an on-site assessment will tell you how much knob and tube is actually still active in the house. Some homes have been partially rewired over the decades and have far less remaining than the owner expects. We’ll tell you what we find either way.
Photography is one of Carroll Electric’s strongest branding assets. We showcase our real electricians, real homes, real commercial projects, and the quality craftsmanship behind every installation.
The same questions come up on nearly every rewire. Here’s how we answer them.
Is knob and tube wiring actually dangerous? In sound, undisturbed condition it can still function safely. The risk comes from age and alteration — brittle insulation, decades of amateur splices, circuits overloaded far beyond their original design, and wiring buried under later-added insulation.
Do I have to rewire the whole house? Not always. It depends on how much original wiring remains active and what your insurer or lender requires. We’ll scope it honestly rather than defaulting to the largest possible job.
How disruptive is this going to be? Less than most people expect. Most of the work happens through attics, basements, crawlspaces, and small access openings rather than by opening every wall.
Will my insurance company make me do this? Many carriers decline coverage or add surcharges for active knob and tube, and requirements vary by insurer. Your carrier can tell you their specific position.
What will it cost? You receive an itemized written estimate after a walkthrough, with labor and materials broken out separately, so you can see how the number was reached.
Same crew, same rates, same paperwork. What changes is how we schedule around you and who we send the invoice to.
Panel upgrades, EV chargers, dead outlets, breakers that keep tripping. You get a written number before anything starts, and a call before we spend more than it.
Rough-in and trim on the date we gave you. Inspections cleared without you chasing them, and a phone call the moment anything looks like it might slip.
Tenant calls handled the same day. Certificate of insurance on file, one invoice format across every unit you run, and photos of the work sent through each time.
Tenant improvements, new builds, lighting and service work. After-hours and weekend scheduling so your floor keeps trading while we’re in there.
Kitchens, additions, whole-house rewires. Clean installs, labelled circuits, and everything behind the drywall photographed before it’s closed up.
The people who just call us when something goes wrong. We keep a record of what we’ve done at your property, so we’re not starting from scratch every visit.
We’d rather be the electrician you call for the next ten years than the one who won a single job on price. If you manage more than one property, ask about an account.
Every project follows the same process, from first contact through follow-up.
It starts with a walkthrough. We trace how much knob and tube is still energized, check the panel and service capacity, look at access through attics and crawlspaces, and note where circuits will need to be added to meet current code. Older homes vary enormously — two houses on the same block can need very different scopes — so the assessment is what a real estimate depends on. From it you receive a written, itemized estimate separating labor and materials, with the scope described in plain terms before you approve anything.
We coordinate with your other trades when a rewire is part of a larger remodel, and we handle permitting and inspection as part of the project. Every rewire closes with a walkthrough of the new panel and circuits, documentation of the completed work, and an invoice that matches the estimate.
“My wife and I are very impressed with the service from Carroll Electric. I can honestly say they are hands down the best electric company I have ever worked with. We have called them for various projects in the past and will continue to use them for anything needed in the future.”
Brandon V. ★★★★★
Carroll Electric exists to provide high-quality electrical work while creating a customer experience built on transparency, communication, reliability, and craftsmanship. These principles guide every decision, from the first phone call to the final walkthrough.
01
Our rates are published on this website. You approve a written number before any work begins, and permits and parts are passed through at cost with the receipt attached.
02
Calls and messages answered the same working day. If we find something unexpected behind the wall, you get a phone call before we spend another dollar of your money.
03
We hold the date we gave you. Licensed, bonded and insured, permits pulled where they’re required, and we meet the inspector ourselves rather than leaving it to you.
04
Labelled circuits, dressed conductors, and a panel directory you can read at 6am. We photograph what goes behind the drywall so there’s a record long after we’ve gone.
We photograph every job as we go — partly so you have a record of what’s in your walls, partly because clean work is worth showing.
Old
New
Old
New
Every job gets photographed as we go. If you want to see work like yours before you commit, ask and we’ll send you the closest match we’ve done nearby.
We approach a knob-and-tube rewire tactically, almost like a military mission. We work through the home one area at a time so we can isolate the mess, stay organized, and restore power to each completed area at the end of the day.
We do not send someone into the attic or crawl space and tell them to start running wire without a plan. First, we identify the circuits, prepare the openings, establish the pathways, and make sure everyone understands exactly where the wiring needs to go. Once everything is ready, we brief the electrician handling the attic or crawl space and carry out the plan. The actual wire pull through those areas often only takes an hour or so because all the difficult planning and preparation has already been completed.
This keeps the installation simple for our electricians and helps prevent insulation, dust, and debris from being tracked throughout the home. We take the same approach with every part of the project: prepare first, perform the work efficiently, clean the area, restore power, and move to the next section.
We spend a lot of time protecting the home and finding ways to route wiring without unnecessarily removing drywall or plaster. We use specialized tools to determine where we are drilling and where the existing wall and ceiling cavities run. We do not make an opening unless it is necessary.
When we do need access, we normally use a carbide-tipped hole saw with a dust bubble. This captures most of the dust and leaves a clean, round piece that can be saved for easier patching afterward. We avoid cutting large squares out of the walls whenever we can.
For a small or medium-sized home of around 2,000 square feet, we can usually complete the rewire in about one week with two electricians. A larger home, a three-story home, or a house with difficult attic and crawl-space access may take closer to two weeks. There may be an occasional day when we need to pull the crew away, but once we begin, we stay focused on getting the project completed.
The new circuits receive the AFCI and GFCI protection required for their locations and uses. We test our work as we go and prepare everything for inspection. We pass the first inspection on nearly all of our knob-and-tube rewires because we keep the work organized and address issues before the inspector arrives.
These projects are personal because we are working inside someone’s home for a week or two. We get to know the homeowners, their schedules, and how they use the house. We try to keep the home as comfortable and functional as possible while the work is underway, and we normally develop a friendly, professional relationship with the people we are working for.
After the project is complete, we are happy to return for a small additional installation, address something that needs attention, or simply check that everything is working as it should. Our goal is to leave the homeowner with safe, modern wiring and a home that was treated carefully throughout the process.
Knob and tube is a two-wire system. A hot conductor and a neutral conductor run separately through a home’s framing, held away from wood by ceramic knobs and passed through joists inside ceramic tubes. Keeping the conductors apart and surrounded by open air is what allowed them to shed heat — the system was designed around air circulation rather than the sheathing and grounding modern wiring relies on.
Two things make it a problem today. There is no grounding conductor, which means no path for fault current and no legitimate way to serve the three-prong grounded outlets nearly every modern appliance and electronic device expects. And the original insulation — rubber, cloth, or varnished fabric depending on the era — becomes brittle with age and heat, eventually cracking away from the conductor and leaving bare copper.
The condition we most often find is not original installation failure but accumulated modification: extensions spliced in without junction boxes, modern outlets grafted onto ungrounded circuits, and single circuits carrying loads the original design never anticipated. Each addition was small. Together they add up.
Any licensed electrician can land the job to code. What people remember is everything around it — whether you called back, showed up when you said, and left the place clean.
01
Rates are on this website. You approve a written number before we start.
02
Calls and messages answered same day. You always know who is coming and when.
03
An owner is on site or a phone call away on every project. No account manager in between.
04
Real photos of your job, not stock images of someone else’s. You see what went in.
05
Itemised quotes, permits filed, inspections logged, invoices you can actually read.
06
Labelled circuits, dressed conductors, a directory you can actually read at 6am.
07
Thermal imaging and circuit tracing find the fault instead of guessing at the drywall.
08
Marked van, branded shirts, and the same crew each visit. No mystery truck in the drive.
09
If a repair will hold another five years, we’ll tell you that instead of selling a rewire.
Homes with knob and tube usually have electrical service sized for the era it was installed — 60 amps was common, and 100 amps was considered generous. A house running a modern kitchen, laundry, home office, and possibly a heat pump or an EV charger is asking considerably more than that.
Because of this, a rewire and a service upgrade frequently belong in the same conversation. New circuits need somewhere to land, and a fuse box or a full early-generation panel doesn’t have the spaces. We calculate the actual load the house will carry after the rewire rather than assuming, then tell you whether your existing service will support it.
Sometimes the answer is that the panel is adequate and only the branch circuits need replacing. Sometimes a subpanel resolves it. Often, in homes of this age, a service upgrade makes sense to do at the same time — the labor overlaps substantially, and doing it in one project costs less than doing it in two. We’ll lay out the options with pricing for each rather than bundling them and handing you one number.
The most immediate benefit of a rewire is grounding. Every new circuit includes an equipment grounding conductor, which means properly grounded three-prong outlets throughout the house — not two-prong receptacles, and not three-prong receptacles installed on ungrounded circuits, which is a common and misleading shortcut we find in older homes.
Current code also requires protection that didn’t exist when these houses were built. Ground-fault protection is required in kitchens, bathrooms, laundry areas, garages, basements, and outdoors, where water and electricity are most likely to meet. Arc-fault protection is required across most living-area circuits and is designed to detect the kind of arcing that damaged or deteriorated wiring produces before it starts a fire. Every new circuit we install receives the AFCI and GFCI protection required for its location and use.
A rewire is also the moment to correct how circuits are distributed. Knob and tube homes typically ran very few circuits for the entire house. New wiring means dedicated circuits for the kitchen, laundry, and bathrooms, and enough separation elsewhere that one tripped breaker doesn’t take out half the floor.
This is the issue most homeowners are surprised by. Attic spaces cannot be insulated while knob and tube wiring is present. The system relies on open air to dissipate heat, so burying it in thermal insulation defeats the design and traps heat against aging conductors. Current code prohibits concealed knob and tube in spaces filled with insulation, and it’s a frequent inspection finding in homes where blown-in attic insulation was added at some point without anyone checking what was underneath.
It matters practically as well as technically. Homeowners in older Seattle-area houses who want to insulate an attic or floor for energy efficiency can’t proceed until the knob and tube is dealt with, and weatherization programs and contractors will decline the work while active knob and tube remains in place. If insulation is your goal, the rewire has to come first.
The upside is that these same spaces — attics, basements, crawlspaces — are how we run most of the new wiring. A house with reasonable access can often be rewired with far less disruption to finished walls than owners expect, which is also what makes it practical to sequence a rewire ahead of an insulation project.
For many homeowners, this is what starts the conversation. Insurance carriers increasingly decline to write or renew policies on homes with active knob and tube, and those that will often apply surcharges or require documented replacement within a set window. Policies vary widely between carriers, so your agent is the right source for what yours specifically requires.
Real estate transactions raise the same issue. Knob and tube shows up in inspection reports, and it becomes a negotiating point, a lender condition, or occasionally a reason a sale doesn’t close. Sellers who address it in advance usually do better than sellers who discover it during escrow with a deadline attached.
We provide documentation of completed work and permit and inspection records, which is generally what insurers, lenders, and buyers’ agents are asking for. If you’re working against a specific carrier deadline or a closing date, tell us at the assessment and we’ll be straight with you about what’s achievable.
Published, not quoted on the doorstep. Builders and repeat clients pay less because the work is easier to plan — you’ll see exactly which rate applies to you before we start.
Residential
Builder / Contractor
$100/hr
Repeat Client
$110/hr
First Time
$125/hr
Emergency
$125–$250/hr
Commercial
Builder / Contractor
$125/hr
Repeat Client
$150/hr
First Time
$175/hr
Emergency
$150–$300/hr
Trip Fee One low trip fee. No surprises.
Within 10 miles
$50
Within 20 miles
$75
20+ miles
$100+
Not every house needs to be rewired all at once. What’s right depends on how much original wiring remains energized, the condition it’s in, what your insurer requires, and what you’re planning for the house.
A whole-home rewire replaces everything and is the cleanest outcome — full grounding, current code throughout, and documentation that satisfies insurers and buyers without qualification. A partial rewire targets the areas that matter most, which can make sense when previous owners already replaced much of the wiring or when a remodel is opening up part of the house anyway. The tradeoff is that partial work often satisfies an insurer only if no active knob and tube remains, so “partial” needs to be defined against what your carrier will actually accept.
If a remodel is already underway, that’s usually the most economical moment to rewire, because walls are open and the access you’d otherwise pay for is already there. We’ll tell you which approach fits your situation, including when the honest answer is that you can wait.
A low number is easy to say. These are the commitments that come attached to it, on every service upgrade and panel swap we do.
Your power is out for a maximum of six hours on the day of the swap. We plan the shutdown around your schedule.
We meet the inspector ourselves and clear the permit within five business days of finishing.
Any additional install or relocation the upgrade makes necessary is done free of charge. Not billed as a change order.
Bring us a written quote and we will meet it at minimum. In most cases we come in 25 to 50 percent lower.
Bonus
A free small install or troubleshoot with every upgrade.
A new light fixture, dimmers, outlets, or a fault you have been meaning to chase down — while we are already on site.
Carroll Electric also handles knob and tube replacement in commercial buildings, older apartment buildings, and multi-unit rental properties across Seattle, the north end, and the Eastside. Older commercial and multifamily structures carry the same aging wiring as houses of the same vintage, with the added complications of occupied units, shared circuits and common areas, and scheduling that has to work around tenants and business hours.
Property managers and building owners receive the same process as every other client: a walkthrough, an itemized written estimate before work begins, and code-compliant installations with permit and inspection records for your files. We can phase work unit by unit to keep buildings occupied, and for owners managing several older properties, we’re set up to be a consistent long-term partner rather than a one-time vendor.
We’d rather explain pricing than have you ask for it. Rewire costs come down to a few specific variables: the size of the home, how much active knob and tube remains, how accessible the framing is through attics and crawlspaces, the amount of plaster or finished surface that has to be opened, whether panel or service work is needed, and how many new circuits current code requires for the way you use the house.
Your estimate breaks those out in plain terms, with labor and materials listed separately, so you can see how the number was reached. When a service upgrade is part of the conversation, it’s priced as its own line rather than folded in. Nothing appears on the final invoice that wasn’t in the estimate.
Washington requires a permit and an inspection for essentially all new and altered electrical work, and a rewire is among the clearest cases. Which office issues that permit depends on where the property is. Seattle runs its own electrical permitting and inspection program through the Department of Construction and Inspections, and the work is held to the Seattle Electrical Code — the city’s own amended edition of the National Electrical Code. Outside cities that operate their own programs, permitting and inspection are handled by the Washington State Department of Labor & Industries. We work in both systems regularly and pull the permit from whichever authority governs your address.
Handling the permit isn’t a convenience we offer — it’s the law. When you hire an electrical contractor in Washington, that contractor is required to purchase the permit for the work they perform on your property. If someone offers to rewire your house and leave the permit to you, that’s a signal worth paying attention to.
On a rewire, the permit record matters long after the work is done. It’s what demonstrates to an insurer, a lender, or a future buyer that the knob and tube was properly replaced rather than simply disconnected or hidden — and unpermitted rewiring can create exactly the problem at sale that the rewire was meant to solve. Inspections also happen at the right moments, before new wiring is concealed and before it’s energized.
We prepare everything for inspection and address issues before the inspector arrives, and we hand you the records at the end.
Call or text us at (206) 914-3243 to talk through your electrical service.
Homeowners in older houses with original or partially replaced wiring. Buyers who received an inspection report flagging knob and tube. Sellers preparing a property for market. Homeowners facing an insurance requirement or a policy non-renewal. Anyone planning attic or floor insulation, an energy-efficiency upgrade, or a remodel in a period home. Property managers and owners of older rental and multi-unit buildings. And anyone with two-prong outlets, a fuse box, or a panel that trips more than it should.
Call or text us at (206) 914-3243 to talk through your electrical service.
Carroll Electric is a licensed electrical contractor serving Seattle, the north end, and the Eastside, and older homes are a substantial share of what we work on. We’re a small, hands-on family crew, and the person who walks your house is typically the person on site doing the work. You receive an itemized estimate before anything begins, we scope the job to what the house actually needs rather than to the largest version of it, we install to code the first time, and we hand you the permit and inspection records at the end. Our focus is on giving you the information to make a confident decision — not on selling you more than you need.
Call or text us at (206) 914-3243 to talk through your electrical service.
“Highly recommend Carroll Electric! Cameron provided outstanding service from start to finish. His pricing was incredibly reasonable, and he managed the entire project seamlessly — including coordinating directly with the inspector to ensure everything went smoothly. The work was completed exactly on time, and the quality is top-notch.”
Niket A. ★★★★★
And surrounding areas throughout King and south Snohomish Counties.
Whether it’s a failed meter base or a full electrical service upgrade with utility coordination, Carroll Electric has the licensing and experience to complete the work correctly. Contact us to schedule an assessment.
See real project examples and our straightforward hourly rates.
King County:
Seattle (98115, 98082, 98125, 98165, 98105, 98175, 98195, 98112, 98103, 98113, 98122, 98109, 98117, 98127, 98139, 98141, 98194, 98107, 98101, 98119, 98111, 98170, 98181, 98185, 98190, 98191, 98164, 98161, 98154, 98104, 98121, 98174, 98160, 98199, 98134, 98118, 98108, 98116, 98106, 98126, 98136, 98178, 98168, 98131, 98199, 98141, 98181, 98170, 98145, 98138, 98129, 98124
Bellevue (98004, 98005, 98009, 98015, 98007, 98008, 98006), Bothell (98034, 98011, 98041, 98021, 98012), Mercer Island (98040, 98118), Newcastle (98056, 98059), Issaquah (98029, 98027, 98075), Kenmore (98028, 98125, 98155), Kirkland (98034, 98033, 98133, 98102, 98114, 98124, 98129, 98138, 98145, 98144, 98083), Lake Forest Park (98155), Medina (98039, 98039), Redmond (98052, 98073, 98053, 98008, 98033), Renton (98056, 98059, 98055, 98057, 98058, 98178), Richmond Beach (98177), Sammamish (98074, 98075, 98008, 98029), Shoreline (98155, 98133, 98177, 98160), Woodinville (98072, 98077)
Snohomish County:
Bothell (98034, 98011, 98041, 98021, 98012), Edmonds (98020, 98006, 98026), Everett (98208, 98204, 98208, 98203, 98213, 98201, 98207, 98275, 98203, 98290, 98206, 98272), Lynnwood (98036, 98046, 98037, 98087, 98037), Mill Creek (98012, 98082), Mountlake Terrace (98043, 98043), Mukilteo (98275), Snohomish (98296, 98291, 98290)
Seattle Neighborhoods:
North Seattle: Ballard (98107, 98117), Broadview (98177. 98133), Bitter Lake (98133), Blue Ridge (98177, 98133), Bryant (98223), Crown Hill (98117), Fremont (98103, 98107), Green Lake (98103, 98115), Greenwood (98103, 98117, 98133), Hawthorne Hills (98105, 98115), Lake Union (98109), Laurelhurst (98105), North Beach (98117), North College Park (98103), Northgate (98125, 98133), Northlake (98103), Phinney Ridge (98103, 98107, 98117), Ravenna (98105, 98115), Roosevelt (98115), Sand Point (98115, 98105), University District (98105, 98115, 98195), University Village (98105), Wallingford (98103), Wedgwood (98115), Windermere (98105, 98115), View Ridge (98115)
Northgate: Haller Lake (98133, 98125), Lake City (98125, 98115), Maple Leaf (98115), Pinehurst (98125)
Lake City: Cedar Park (98125), Matthews Beach (98115, 98125), Meadowbrook (98125m 98115, 98155), Olympic Hills (98125), Victory Heights (98125, 98115)
Ballard: Adams (98107), Loyal Heights (98117), Sunset Hill (98117, 98107), West Woodland (98107), Whittier Heights (98117)
Central Seattle: Cascade (98109), Capitol Hill (98102, 98112, 98122), Eastlake (98102), Interbay (98119, 98199), Lake Union (98109, 98102, 98103), Queen Anne (98109, 98119), Westlake (98109)
Magnolia: Briarcliff (98199), Lawton Park (98199), Southeast Magnolia (98199)
Capitol Hill: Broadmoor (98112), Broadway (98122, 98102), Interlaken (98112), Madison Park (98112), Madison Valley (98112, 98122), Montlake (98112), Pike-Pine Corridor (98122, 98101), Portage Bay (98102, 98105), Roanoke (98102, 98112), Renton Hill (98057), Stevens (98112)
Central Seattle: Atlantic (98144, 98134), Central Area (98122, 98144), Central District (98122, 98144), Cherry Hill (98122), Denny-Blaine (98112), Downtown (98101, 98104, 98113, 98121, 98141, 98154, 98161, 98165, 98170, 98174, 98175, 98181, 98185, 98190, 98191, 98194), , Judkins Park (98144, 98122), Leschi (98122, 98144), Madrona (98122), Mann (98122), Minor (98122, 98144), Squire Park (98122, 98144), Washington Park (98112)
Downtown Seattle: Belltown (98121, 98101, 98109), Central Business District (98101, 98104, 98164, 98121, 98154), Central Waterfront (98101, 98104, 98121, 98134), Chinatown-International District (98104), Denny Triangle (98101), First Hill (98104, 98122, 98101), Pike-Market (98101), Pioneer Square (98104, 98134), West Edge (98101), Yesler Terrace (98104, 98122)
South End: Atlantic City Beach (98118), Brighton (98118), Beacon Hill (98108, 9811, 98144), Columbia City (98118, 98108), Dunlap (98118), Georgetown (98108), Harbor Island (98134), Hillman City (98118), Holly Park (98118), Industrial District (98134, 98108), Lakerridge (98178), Lakewood (98144), Mount Baker (98144), New Holly (98118, 98108), Othello (99344, 99327, 99332), Rainier Beach (98118, 98178), Rainier Valley (98118), Rainier View (98178), Seward Park (98118), SoDo (98134), South Park (98108), Van Asselt (98108)
West Seattle: Admiral District (98116, 98126), Alaska Junction (98116, 98126, 98136), Alki Point (98116), Arbor Heights (98146, 98126, 98136), Delridge (98106, 98126), Fairmount Park (9811, 98126, 98136), Fauntleroy (98136, 98116, 98126), Gatewood (98136), Genesee (98116, 98126), Mee-Kwa-Mooks (98116), North Admiral (98116), North Delridge (98106. 98126), Seaview (98136), West Seattle Junction (98116)
Delridge: High Point (98126, 98106), Highland Park (98106, 98108), Riverview (98106), Roxhill (98126, 98106), South Delridge (98126, 98106)
Most electricians won’t give you a number until someone is standing in your space, and there’s a reason for that — an honest price depends on what’s actually there. But that’s not much help when you’re trying to budget. So here are real quotes from recent work instead.
Look at what’s in them. Rough-in and trim-stage work priced separately, so you can see the two halves of the job. Every item listed individually, so if you add something, remove something, or change your mind, the number moves by a specific amount instead of becoming a conversation. And where existing circuits are safe and serviceable, they’re listed by name — the work we’re not charging you to redo, written down where you can check it.
That’s what a calculated price looks like. Nothing padded to cover a worst case, nothing priced low to get in the door. When you can see how a number was built, you can tell whether it’s fair.
Tap any quote to read it full screen
Your project will differ, and the assessment is what produces an accurate number — but this is how we build one.
Cost depends on the size of the home, how much active knob and tube remains, how accessible the framing is, how much finished surface has to be opened, and whether panel or service work is needed. We provide an itemized written estimate after a walkthrough, with labor and materials broken out separately. Call or text (206) 914-3243 to schedule an assessment.
It isn’t illegal, and existing knob and tube is generally allowed to remain where it was legally installed and is in sound condition. What drives most replacements is not a removal mandate but the practical consequences — insurance requirements, code restrictions on burying it in insulation, the absence of grounding, and its condition after a century of use and modification.
Many carriers decline to write or renew policies on homes with active knob and tube, and others apply surcharges or set a deadline for replacement. Requirements vary significantly between insurers, so your agent or carrier is the right source for your specific policy. We provide permit and inspection documentation of completed work, which is typically what carriers ask for.
Yes. Washington requires a permit and inspection for new and altered electrical work. Inside Seattle, the permit comes from the city’s Department of Construction and Inspections; in jurisdictions without their own program, it comes from the Department of Labor & Industries. Carroll Electric pulls the permit and schedules the inspections as part of the project, which is what state law requires of the contractor doing the work.
Usually not. We spend real time finding routes that avoid removing drywall or plaster, and we use specialized tools to locate cavities before drilling so we don’t make an opening unless it’s necessary. When access is needed, we normally use a carbide-tipped hole saw with a dust bubble, which captures most of the dust and leaves a clean round piece that makes patching easier. Plaster-and-lath houses and homes with finished basements or limited attic clearance need more openings, and we’ll identify where those will be during the walkthrough rather than discovering them mid-project.
For a small or medium-sized home of around 2,000 square feet, we can usually complete the rewire in about one week with two electricians. A larger home, a three-story home, or a house with difficult attic and crawl-space access may take closer to two weeks. We’ll give you a schedule with the estimate, and once we begin, we stay focused on getting the project completed.
In most cases, yes. We work through the home one area at a time and restore power to each completed area at the end of the day, so the house stays as functional as possible while the work is underway. There will be periods where specific circuits or rooms are down, and we’ll walk you through the sequence in advance so you can plan around it.
Sometimes. It depends on how much original wiring is still energized and what your insurer will accept — many carriers require that no active knob and tube remains, which makes partial work a partial solution. If a remodel is opening up one area of the house, that portion is often worth doing regardless. We’ll tell you honestly which applies.
No. Attic spaces cannot be insulated while knob and tube wiring is present. The system depends on open air to dissipate heat, and current code prohibits concealing it in spaces filled with thermal insulation. This is why rewiring has to come before an insulation or weatherization project — insulation contractors and efficiency programs won’t proceed with active knob and tube in place.
Frequently, yes. Homes of this era were commonly built with 60-amp service, and a fuse box or early panel usually doesn’t have space for the circuits current code requires. We calculate the load the house will carry after the rewire and tell you whether your existing service supports it. When an upgrade is needed, doing both in one project costs less than doing them separately, and we price each part on its own line.
Carroll Electric provides electrical service and meter upgrades to homeowners, contractors, and businesses throughout Seattle, Shoreline, Bothell, Lynnwood, Kirkland, Bellevue, Redmond, Sammamish, Issaquah, and surrounding communities across King and south Snohomish Counties.
Our approach to every project is the same: an honest scope, wiring installed to code, surfaces protected, work cleaned up, and documentation you can hand to an insurer or a buyer. We’re a small family crew, so you’re working with the people doing the work rather than being handed between a salesperson, a scheduler, and whoever is available. That’s what stands behind two brothers, one mission — do the job right, at the right price.
Reach out today to schedule your appointment.
