If you’re hearing scratching in the walls or finding droppings around your home, it’s not something you can ignore for long. Once rats get inside, they settle in quickly—and getting rid of them completely takes more than just setting a trap or two. This is why people wonders how to 100% get rid of rats.
At All City Animal Trapping, we’ve seen what works and what doesn’t. If you’re aiming to fully eliminate the problem, you need to approach it the right way from the start.
What It Takes to Guarantee Get Rid of Rats
Getting rid of rats for good isn’t about one step—it’s about doing a few key things together, and doing them at the right time. The Environmental Protection Agency recommends combining sanitation, exclusion, and trapping for effective long-term rodent control.
Find Where They’re Active
Before you do anything else, you need to figure out where the rats are spending their time.
Check along baseboards, behind appliances, inside cabinets, and in darker corners of the house. Look for droppings, smudges, or greasy marks—those usually point to their regular paths.
Once you know where they’re active, you’ll know where to focus your efforts instead of guessing.
Seal Entry Points Right Away
This part is more important than most people think.
When you start dealing with rats, you don’t want to wait days to fix entry points—you want to do it right away. Sealing cracks, holes, and gaps the same day you begin trapping cuts off their access to outside food and shelter.
That puts pressure on them fast. Instead of coming and going freely, they’re stuck dealing with what’s inside—and that works in your favor.
Set Traps Where It Matters
After sealing things up, traps become much more effective.
Place them directly along the paths you identified earlier. Don’t spread them out randomly—focus on the areas where you’ve actually seen signs of activity.
If the rats are limited in where they can go and don’t have easy access to food, they’re much more likely to go straight for the bait.
Clean Up Afterward
This step gets overlooked a lot, but it can make a difference.
Rats leave behind scent trails and signals that basically tell other rats, “this is a safe place.” If you don’t clean that up, you can end up attracting new ones later.
A thorough cleanup—especially in areas where there was heavy activity—helps remove those lingering signals and makes your home less inviting going forward.
When the Problem Is Bigger Than It Looks
Even if you do everything right, some infestations run deeper than expected.
Rats often nest in attics, crawlspaces, and inside walls—places you can’t easily access. At All City Animal Trapping, we’ve seen the kind of damage they leave behind: chewed wiring, ruined insulation, and contamination that builds up over time.
In those cases, handling it on your own can only go so far.
Why Professional Help Is the Most Reliable Option
If your goal is to get rid of rats completely, professional help is usually the fastest and most dependable way to do it.
At All City Animal Trapping, we take a full approach. We inspect the property to find hidden entry points, remove the rats safely, and then seal everything up so they can’t get back in.
It’s not just about getting rid of what you see—it’s about making sure you don’t have to deal with it again.
If you’re dealing with a rat problem and want a real, long-term solution, it’s worth bringing in a team that handles this every day.
With over 20 years of experience serving Los Angeles County, All City Animal Trapping is ready to help you take care of the issue quickly and properly. Reach out today for fast response and peace of mind knowing your home is protected.