Post-Sandy rebuilding will give much-needed lift to construction cos.

By Olivia Just

What many homeowners affected by Superstorm Sandy see as a catastrophe — trees upended on driveways, roofs buckled, basements flooded — has become an opportunity for construction and home remodeling companies.

Sandy, which bore down on Connecticut on Monday night, left a littered, chaotic wake of damage and debris, and local firms are scrambling to meet the demands of homeowners needing immediate repairs.

“In the last few days, we’ve probably had about three or four months worth of calls,” Robert Story, owner of Shelton-based Robert’s Tree Service, said, adding that he hasn’t yet been able to return some clients’ calls because of the workload.

Another company, ServPro in Stamford, which deals with water damage, among other problems, had phone lines backed up with calls on Thursday.

Wil Lazo, owner of Artizon Construction in Stamford, said that one client, dealing with unlivable conditions in his house, is moving ahead with reconstruction without the assessment of his insurance company. Lazo generally employs subcontractors for his jobs, and said he’ll bring in more independent workers as needed.

“I’m expecting more calls,” Lazo said. “This will close out the year with more work.”

Many business owners are admitting that the storm, while devastating to the community, has boosted their stalled workload.

“As terrible as it may sound, it’s going to be the highlight of the year for our business,” Grant Lang, owner of Aardvark Roofing in Danbury, said. “It was a pretty bad year. It’s going to be a significant increase. ”

Lang has seen some astonishing destruction; a house that his crews responded to on Beaverbrook Road in Danbury had its entire roof blown off onto the street. He’s also encountered trees smashed into roofs and shingles scattered by high winds, all of which the company has been out trying to fix for the past three days. Like Lazo, Lang plans to hire subcontractors to supplement his staff of 10.

Though local businesses are seeing a significant uptick in their economic fortunes from the storm, the wider effect on the economy may not be as strong. Donald Klepper-Smith, chief economist of New Haven-based DataCore Partners, said the overall impact from the storm on the economy will be negligible.

“What it boils down to is tradeoffs,” Klepper-Smith said.

For example, the recovery efforts should put idle construction workers back on the job before the holidays. But the loss of hours by some employees who couldn’t go to work for a few days, combined with paying for repairs they hadn’t budgeted for, will hamper spending by others.

In some areas, mostly Danbury and Ridgefield, residents seem keen to conserve the wood from the trees that have tumbled in their yard, saving it for future use in the fireplace, according to Tony Torcasio, owner of Torcasio Tree Services in Danbury. Homeowners in the Greenwich and Stamford areas, Torcasio said, weren’t as concerned about saving scraps.

Torcasio specializes in storm-damage response, and has been getting calls not just from homeowners and commercial properties, but from other disaster clean-up companies. He has “a couple of extra guys” working with the usual staff of 15. Though Torcasio Tree Services did well this year overall, they also expect to get a boost from the storm.

“Of course, it’s going to help quite a bit,” Torcasio said.

Rob Varnon contributed reporting to this article.