{
  "title": "Power Is Out at Just My House — Who Do I Call?",
  "description": "Neighbors have power, you don't? Call your utility if the whole house is dark — the fault may be theirs. If the main breaker trips, call an electrician.",
  "category": "power",
  "vertical": "electrical",
  "tldr": "Call your utility if you have no power at all and the neighbors do — the fault may be on their service drop, which they repair at no cost to you. Call an electrician if your main breaker trips again immediately; stop resetting it. Check your main breaker and any GFCI outlets first. The dividing line: the utility owns up to the meter, you own everything after it.",
  "who_to_call": [
    {
      "who": "Your electric utility",
      "when": "Total loss of power, or half your house is dead (a lost 'leg' of the service) — their line, their repair, at no cost to you",
      "not_for": "One circuit is out and the rest of the house is fine — that's yours"
    },
    {
      "who": "Licensed electrician",
      "when": "A breaker trips repeatedly, the panel is warm or smells burnt, or the fault is after the meter",
      "not_for": "The whole neighborhood is dark — that's a utility outage"
    },
    {
      "who": "911",
      "when": "Burning smell from the panel, sparks, smoke, or a downed line on your property",
      "not_for": "Simply no power with no other symptoms"
    },
    {
      "who": "Your landlord",
      "when": "You rent — electrical faults are the landlord's repair",
      "not_for": null
    },
    {
      "who": "Your utility's billing or account line",
      "when": "Before you pay anyone — a remote disconnect for non-payment looks exactly like a service fault from inside the house",
      "not_for": "The account is current and in good standing"
    }
  ],
  "body_markdown": "## Work through it in this order\n\n1. **Are the neighbors dark too?** If yes, [it's a normal neighborhood outage — report it to the utility](/power/outage-whole-street/) and skip the rest of this page.\n2. **Check the main breaker** in your panel. It's the big one at the top. If it's tripped, flip it fully off, then firmly on. Once.\n3. **Check individual breakers.** A tripped one usually sits between on and off rather than fully off.\n4. **Check GFCI outlets** — bathroom, kitchen, garage, exterior. Press reset. One GFCI can control several outlets you'd never associate with it.\n5. **Still nothing, or only half the house works?** Call the utility.\n\n## Stop if you see or smell any of this\n\nA **burning smell**, scorch marks, a panel that's warm to the touch, buzzing, or visible sparks means stop troubleshooting and call 911 or the fire department. Same for [any downed wire on your property](/power/downed-power-line/) — assume it's live, stay at least 35 feet away, and keep others back.\n\nThese are the situations where the cost of being wrong is a house fire or electrocution, and no amount of saved call-out fee is worth it. If you can trace that burning smell to one outlet or faceplate, [killing that circuit at the breaker comes before any troubleshooting on this page](/power/burning-smell-from-outlet/).\n\n## The meter is the boundary\n\nThis is what determines who pays. The **utility owns the line running to your house and the meter itself** — faults there are their repair, at no cost to you, at any hour. **You own the weatherhead** (where the line attaches to your house), the mast, the panel, and every circuit inside.\n\nHelpfully, utilities will come out and determine which side the problem is on at no charge. If it's theirs, they fix it. If it's yours, they'll tell you what to give the electrician — which makes the electrician's diagnostic visit shorter and less expensive.\n\n## What's dead tells you whose it is\n\nWork from how much of the house is out, not from what the lights are doing.\n\n**Nothing anywhere, neighbors fine** → utility. Their service drop, their connector, their fuse. No charge, and they come at night.\n\n**Half the house dead, lights dimming and brightening, 240V appliances behaving oddly** → a lost leg or an open neutral, and usually utility-side. Call them today, not next week: unstable voltage quietly kills electronics and is a fire risk. Unplug what you can in the meantime.\n\n**One circuit or one room** → yours. Breaker or GFCI first, electrician second.\n\n**Power drops only when a specific appliance starts** → yours, and it is that circuit. Electrician.\n\n**Meter itself cracked, scorched, buzzing, or pulled away from the wall** → utility, plus 911 if there is smoke or a burning smell. Do not touch it, and do not let anyone else touch it.\n\n**The wires have been pulled off the side of the house, or the mast is bent** → both of you, in a fixed order. The utility de-energises and disconnects, an electrician repairs the mast, weatherhead, conductors, and meter base, usually under permit, and the utility reconnects — in many territories only after an inspection sign-off. Call the electrician first and they cannot start.\n\n**Underground service, no overhead wires** → ask. Ownership of a buried lateral varies genuinely by utility, and it is one of the few places where \"check first\" beats any rule of thumb.\n\n**Whole neighborhood dark** → nobody's fault but the weather. Report it and stop reading.\n\n**You rent** → the landlord, in writing, and let them dispatch. Electrical faults are their repair and their contractor choice.\n\n## When each one says it's the other's problem\n\nThe most common dead end here is the loop: the electrician says the fault is on the utility's side, the utility says it is on yours, and you are paying for one of those opinions. Break it by taking the one you are not billed for first.\n\nGet the utility out before you book anyone. When their technician is there, ask for three things, and ask for them on the ticket:\n\n1. **Which side of the meter is the fault on?**\n2. **Have you de-energised or pulled the meter, and is it safe for an electrician to work?**\n3. **What has to be done, and inspected, before you will reconnect?**\n\nThat ticket is what turns a two-hour electrician diagnostic into a twenty-minute quote. It is also the thing that stops the second contractor from telling you a different story than the first. Storm damage that rips the service mast off the roof produces the same loop with a third party added — [naming the boundary is how you end it](/home/nobody-will-take-the-job/).\n\nOne check before any of this: **look at your account.** A remote disconnect for non-payment presents from inside the house exactly like a service fault, and no electrician can fix it.\n\n## Nobody legitimate knocks on your door after a storm\n\nOutages generate door-knockers, and the pitch is usually a panel replacement or a no-charge \"electrical safety inspection\". Two things worth holding onto: an outage is not by itself evidence that your panel needs replacing, and service and panel work is permitted and inspected in nearly every jurisdiction.\n\nSo before any deposit: get the specific fault named in writing, get an itemised quote rather than a lump sum, confirm a permit is being pulled, and check the license number against your state board. A contractor who tells you no permit is needed for panel or service work is telling you they cannot pull one.\n\nFor scale, Fixr puts an electrician's service call at **$176 to $327 per visit** ($70-$131/hour) and a circuit breaker replacement at **$52 to $97**. A four-figure number attached to a same-day outage should come with a named failed component and a permit, or it should come with a second quote.\n\nThe post-storm door-knock is an industry with a documented script, not a coincidence — [the full playbook, and the deposit caps that beat it](/home/storm-chaser-roofers/). The license and insurance checks take [about five minutes](/home/vet-a-contractor/).\n\n## The one that catches people out\n\nIf your power flickers, dims, or lights brighten oddly across the house, don't wait it out. Unstable voltage — often a loose neutral connection — damages appliances and electronics quietly and can be a fire risk. That's a call to the utility today, not a \"watch it for a week\" situation.",
  "costs": [
    {
      "item": "Electrician service call",
      "range": "$176–$327 per visit ($70–$131/hr)",
      "source": "Fixr",
      "source_url": "https://www.fixr.com/costs/electrician"
    },
    {
      "item": "Circuit breaker replacement",
      "range": "$52–$97",
      "source": "Fixr",
      "source_url": "https://www.fixr.com/costs/electrician"
    }
  ],
  "faq": [
    {
      "q": "Half my house has power and half doesn't — what is that?",
      "a": "Classically a lost leg: US homes get two 120V legs, and losing one kills roughly half your circuits while 240V appliances behave strangely. It's frequently a utility-side fault, so call them first — and unplug sensitive electronics, because voltage can be unstable in this state."
    },
    {
      "q": "My breaker keeps tripping. Can I just keep resetting it?",
      "a": "No. A breaker trips because it detected an overload or a short — it's a safety device doing its job. Repeated resetting on a genuine fault is how electrical fires start. Reset once; if it trips again, leave it off and call an electrician."
    },
    {
      "q": "There's a burning or hot-plastic smell from an outlet, switch, or panel, but the power still works.",
      "a": "Treat that as a live fire risk, not a scheduling problem. Kill the breaker for that circuit — the main breaker if you can't tell which one — and stop using the outlet or switch entirely. Hot plastic means a connection is arcing, and arcing behind a wall doesn't warn you twice. Call an electrician the same day; this outranks any visit you were already waiting on. Smoke, sparks, or scorch marks: 911 first."
    },
    {
      "q": "Who pays — me or the utility?",
      "a": "The meter is the boundary in most service territories. Utility side: the line to your house, the meter itself. Your side: the weatherhead and mast where the line attaches, the panel, and everything downstream. The utility will diagnose which side the fault is on at no cost to you even if the repair turns out to be yours."
    },
    {
      "q": "It's just one outlet or one room.",
      "a": "Look for a tripped GFCI — the outlet with the test/reset buttons, usually in a bathroom, kitchen, garage, or outdoors. One GFCI often protects several downstream outlets, so a single tripped device can kill a whole room. Press reset."
    },
    {
      "q": "The utility says it's my side and the electrician says it's the utility's. How do I break that?",
      "a": "Get it in writing from the utility first, because the utility does not charge for their visit and the electrician does. Ask the technician for three specifics before they leave: which side of the meter the fault is on, whether they have de-energised or pulled the meter, and what has to be done before they will reconnect. Ask for it on the ticket or in a note. An electrician quoting from that ticket knows what they are walking into; an electrician quoting from 'the power is out' has to rediscover it on your dime."
    },
    {
      "q": "The wires got pulled off the side of my house. Who fixes that?",
      "a": "Both of you, in a fixed order. The utility owns the line up to the attachment point and will de-energise and disconnect it. You own the mast, weatherhead, service entrance conductors, and meter base, and a licensed electrician repairs those — often with a permit and an inspection. The utility then reconnects, in many territories only after the inspection is signed off. Calling the electrician before the utility de-energises just means they cannot start."
    },
    {
      "q": "Someone knocked on my door after the storm offering to fix my panel. Should I use them?",
      "a": "No. An outage is not evidence that you need a panel replacement, and door-knocking after a storm is a sales method, not a trade. If you want the work done, get the fault named in writing, get an itemised quote, and confirm a permit is being pulled — service and panel work is permitted and inspected almost everywhere, and a contractor who says otherwise is telling you they are not licensed to pull one. Check the license number with your state board before any deposit."
    }
  ],
  "sources": [
    {
      "label": "Fixr: Electrician rates",
      "url": "https://www.fixr.com/costs/electrician",
      "accessed": "2026-08-11"
    },
    {
      "label": "ESFI: Home electrical safety",
      "url": "https://www.esfi.org/home-electrical-safety/",
      "accessed": "2026-08-09"
    }
  ],
  "updated": "2026-08-24",
  "url": "https://whodoicallfor.com/power/outage-just-my-house/",
  "json_url": "https://whodoicallfor.com/power/outage-just-my-house.json",
  "recommended_call": null
}