{
  "title": "Mice in the Walls — Who Do I Call?",
  "description": "Scratching in the walls at night? The fix is exclusion — sealing the entry points — not a spray or bait contract. Who to call, what it should cost, and why poison in a wall makes it worse.",
  "category": "pests",
  "vertical": "pest",
  "tldr": "Call a pest control company that sells exclusion — physically sealing every gap wider than a pencil — rather than one selling a quarterly spray or bait contract. Trapping alone lowers the population without closing the door, which is why people fight mice for a year. Ask for a written exclusion scope with a warranty, and avoid poison indoors: a mouse that dies inside a wall becomes a second job.",
  "who_to_call": [
    {
      "who": "Pest control company that does rodent exclusion in-house",
      "when": "Scratching in walls or ceilings, droppings, gnawed packaging — you want the entry points found and sealed, not a spray schedule",
      "not_for": "They quote you a quarterly contract and never mention sealing anything"
    },
    {
      "who": "Wildlife removal / nuisance wildlife control operator",
      "when": "The exclusion work itself, or when the noise turns out to be squirrels, birds, or bats rather than mice",
      "not_for": "You only want trapping — many charge a premium for a job standard pest control does cheaper"
    },
    {
      "who": "Handyman, siding contractor, or roofer",
      "when": "After the inspection, to fix the physical defect the mice used — rotted soffit, gapped fascia, missing dryer vent flap, open rim joist",
      "not_for": "Instead of an inspection; a handyman sealing what he can see misses what he can't"
    },
    {
      "who": "Your landlord or property manager",
      "when": "You rent — rodent infestation is a habitability issue nearly everywhere, and exclusion is structural work you're not allowed to do anyway",
      "not_for": null
    },
    {
      "who": "Dead animal removal / wildlife company",
      "when": "Something poisoned dies inside the wall and you now have a smell instead of a noise",
      "not_for": null
    },
    {
      "who": "HVAC technician",
      "when": "Droppings are coming out of the supply vents or the noise is loudest in the ductwork, not the wall cavity",
      "not_for": null
    }
  ],
  "costs": [
    {
      "item": "Mouse extermination (typical job)",
      "range": "$450–$600, national average $525",
      "source": "Fixr",
      "source_url": "https://www.fixr.com/costs/mouse-exterminator"
    },
    {
      "item": "Mouse extermination, one-time visit",
      "range": "$300–$550",
      "source": "Fixr",
      "source_url": "https://www.fixr.com/costs/mouse-exterminator"
    },
    {
      "item": "Mouse exclusion — sealing entry points, priced separately",
      "range": "$50–$300",
      "source": "Fixr",
      "source_url": "https://www.fixr.com/costs/mouse-exterminator"
    },
    {
      "item": "Rat extermination (typical job)",
      "range": "$500–$750, national average $600",
      "source": "Fixr",
      "source_url": "https://www.fixr.com/costs/rat-extermination"
    },
    {
      "item": "Rat exclusion — sealing entry points",
      "range": "$175–$500",
      "source": "Fixr",
      "source_url": "https://www.fixr.com/costs/rat-extermination"
    },
    {
      "item": "Rodent inspection on its own",
      "range": "$75–$100 (mice), $100–$150 (rats), often free with service",
      "source": "Fixr",
      "source_url": "https://www.fixr.com/costs/mouse-exterminator"
    },
    {
      "item": "Quarterly pest contract — the thing you're usually offered instead",
      "range": "$450–$900 per year (mice), $500–$1,000 (rats)",
      "source": "Fixr",
      "source_url": "https://www.fixr.com/costs/mouse-exterminator"
    },
    {
      "item": "Dead mouse removal, if one dies in the wall",
      "range": "$100–$200",
      "source": "Fixr",
      "source_url": "https://www.fixr.com/costs/mouse-exterminator"
    }
  ],
  "faq": [
    {
      "q": "How do I get mice out of the walls?",
      "a": "You don't get them out of the walls — you make the walls stop being a route. Mice in a cavity are traveling between a nest and a food source, and the food source is almost always in your living space. Trapping along the runways they actually use catches the current population, and sealing every gap wider than a pencil stops the next one. Reverse the order and you're just running a mouse buffet with a body count."
    },
    {
      "q": "What are the odds of just having one mouse?",
      "a": "Low, and lower the later in the year it is. Fixr notes a female carries a litter for about 20 days and gives birth to between 4 and 12 babies, and she does that repeatedly. A single mouse seen in daylight in October usually means a population you haven't seen, because mice are nocturnal and you see the overflow, not the household. Assume more than one and you'll rarely be wrong."
    },
    {
      "q": "I caught 8 mice in 48 hours. Is that a lot?",
      "a": "It's a normal number for an established interior population, and it's good news in one narrow sense: your trap placement is right. What it tells you is that this is a colony, not a wanderer, and that trapping alone is going to feel like progress for about two weeks. Get the entry inspection booked while the traps are still producing — that catch rate is the strongest argument you'll ever have for exclusion."
    },
    {
      "q": "I've had mice for a year. Poison, traps, sealing — they keep coming back.",
      "a": "Then the sealing wasn't complete, or it was done in materials mice chew. This is the single most common version of this problem. Foam, caulk, plastic, and wood are all chewable; UC IPM specifies steel wool, wire screen, or sheet metal because rodents get through the rest. A partial seal also just reroutes them, so the noise moves to a different wall and everyone concludes the sealing failed. Get a written exclusion scope that lists every point, in metal, with a warranty."
    },
    {
      "q": "Mice in walls driving me insane — how do I deal with the noise at night?",
      "a": "Short term: white noise or a fan, and don't bang on the wall. Banging scatters them into other cavities and makes the noise less predictable, not less frequent. Mice are most active from dusk through the first few hours of darkness, so what you're hearing is the normal shift, not an escalation. It stops when the population drops, usually within days of correctly placed traps — not when a technician sprays a baseboard."
    },
    {
      "q": "Should I use poison?",
      "a": "Not inside a wall. A poisoned mouse dies wherever it happens to be, and in a wall cavity that means you trade a noise problem for a decomposition problem you have to cut drywall to solve. UC IPM makes the same point about exterior baiting — seal the building first so poisoned rodents don't come inside to die. Traps give you a body you can remove and a count you can act on. Poison gives you neither."
    },
    {
      "q": "Is it mice or rats?",
      "a": "Size of the sound and size of the hole. Mice are a light, fast scratching and skittering, often high in a wall or across a ceiling, and they get in through anything wider than a pencil. Rats are heavier — audible gnawing, thumps, sometimes a scrabble you'd mistake for a squirrel — and they need a gap around half an inch. Droppings settle it: mouse droppings are rice-grain sized, rat droppings are two to three times that."
    },
    {
      "q": "Are the droppings dangerous to clean up?",
      "a": "Treat them as a respiratory risk, not a touch risk. Hantavirus is spread when virus particles from rodent urine, droppings, and saliva become airborne, which is exactly what dry sweeping and vacuuming do. Washington State's health department is blunt about the method: do not stir up dust by vacuuming or sweeping, wet everything down with a 10% bleach solution, let it soak about 10 minutes, then remove it with a damp towel. Gloves and an N95."
    },
    {
      "q": "I rent. Is this my problem?",
      "a": "Report it in writing today, and keep the report. Rodent infestation is a habitability issue in most states, and more to the point, the actual fix is exclusion — sealing the building envelope — which is structural work a tenant has no right to perform. Set traps if you want relief tonight, but do not buy your own exclusion job. That's the landlord's building and the landlord's bill."
    },
    {
      "q": "Who do I call for a rat infestation specifically?",
      "a": "The same trade, with more urgency and a bigger budget. Rats chew wiring and plumbing lines, they're strong enough to enlarge an opening rather than just use one, and roof rats nest in attics and wall voids where the damage is out of sight. Fixr puts rat extermination at $500 to $750 against $450 to $600 for mice, and rat exclusion at $175 to $500. Ask specifically whether the company does roof rats — it's a different inspection from a ground-level Norway rat."
    }
  ],
  "sources": [
    {
      "label": "Fixr: Mouse exterminator cost",
      "url": "https://www.fixr.com/costs/mouse-exterminator",
      "accessed": "2026-08-16"
    },
    {
      "label": "Fixr: Rat extermination cost",
      "url": "https://www.fixr.com/costs/rat-extermination",
      "accessed": "2026-08-16"
    },
    {
      "label": "UC IPM Pest Notes: House Mouse (entry gap sizes, exclusion)",
      "url": "https://ipm.ucanr.edu/PMG/PESTNOTES/pn7483.html",
      "accessed": "2026-08-16"
    },
    {
      "label": "UC IPM Pest Notes: Rats (entry gap sizes, building them out, poisoned rats dying indoors)",
      "url": "https://ipm.ucanr.edu/PMG/PESTNOTES/pn74106.html",
      "accessed": "2026-08-16"
    },
    {
      "label": "Washington State Department of Health: Hantavirus (cleanup method)",
      "url": "https://doh.wa.gov/you-and-your-family/illness-and-disease-z/hantavirus",
      "accessed": "2026-08-16"
    }
  ],
  "updated": "2026-08-16",
  "url": "https://whodoicallfor.com/pests/mice-in-walls/",
  "json_url": "https://whodoicallfor.com/pests/mice-in-walls.json",
  "recommended_call": null
}