Hi everybody! This Tracy Bookman owner of Homestead Roofing and recently we've
done a couple of videos about denied claims and what to do if you have a
claim that's been denied but yet you have valid damage on the roof and we
talked about just calling in for a re-inspection, well today on this cabin
behind me we want to talk about a dubious denial of an insurance claim.
So very briefly the history on this was we got called on this boy last spring
came out in May took a look at it and there was damage on it and there was
insurable damage on it at the time it had a shingle roof on it asphalt shingle
roof and it did have some hail damage. However the damage was not it wasn't
significant although it was insurable damage it just didn't seem that
significant to file a claim for and have the owner end up with a claim on his
record and having to pay a deductible payment so we advised the owner at that
time. Yes you have damage let's keep an eye on it check it regularly once a year
or something like that just to make sure that there's nothing that is happening
that's going to cause you a problem in the future.
Well then in the fall this homeowner got a notice from the insurance company
saying that they were going to either double his insurance premium or they
were going to cancel his insurance he didn't want to pay twice the amount for
his insurance and so he shopped around to get new insurance. Well since there
was hail damage and he had to disclose that. He couldn't get new insurance on
this cabin. So at that time we conferred and decided that the best approach would
be to go ahead and file a claim with the insurance company that he had at the
time that the hail damage occurred which would have been a summer of 2018. So
remember this homeowner did have insurable hail damage on this cabin back
in May. So now the insurance company was going to drop him or double his
insurance payment not because there was hail damage but just because they were
increasing the rates and basically they wanted to get rid of this customer. He
shopped around couldn't find insurance that would cover him because
there was existing hail damage so he filed a claim. The adjuster came out
looked at the roof and said he agreed that there was insurable damage on the
back slopes but denied coverage for the damage that was on the front slopes. Now
there was damage on both sides of this cabin so the fact that the adjuster was
denying coverage for the front slopes was a disservice to this homeowner who
was insured with that company. So I came back out and did a video showing exactly
what was wrong with the adjusters inspection. Now an adjuster is supposed
to draw a square that's 10 foot by 10 foot on every major slope and then he's
supposed to count the number of hail hits inside that square. It's supposed to
be 10 feet by 10 feet, 100 square feet. Well this adjuster had drawn out a
square that was eight and a half feet by eight and a half feet so less than 80
square feet said there was zero hail dents inside that square. So when I came
up not only did I demonstrate I mean I actually videotaped me measuring his
square to show that it was not the right size and then showed that if he had
drawn his square the correct size he would have picked up at least seven more
hail hits just below his square but I also counted seven to eight hail hits
inside his square showed that on video which the homeowner then sent to the
insurance company the adjuster came back out and said yes he was mistaken and he
accepted the claim for the whole roof. So it doubled the amount of payment from
the insurance company to the homeowner to replace his roof. So the point of this
is not to say hey we at Homestead Roofing did something amazing and got
this homeowner a total claim when he wasn't do a total claim the
point of this is that insurance adjusters are human they make mistakes
and if you're a homeowner and you've had a denied claim on your property that is
actually damaged by a storm then you deserve your insurance company to pay to
repair what has been damaged. You don't have to accept what the adjuster says
especially if he's wrong now if there is no damage and maybe your contractor is
just trying to roll the dice and see if he'll get and accept a claim or he's
throwing spaghetti against the wall to see what sticks then you've got no right
to expect that your insurance company is going to take care of you but if you
have valid damage you don't need to simply just lay down and accept what
your insurance company is telling you. So if you've got questions especially if
you've gone through this process and your insurance company is you think not
doing right by you please give us a call in our office right up here
719.433.6991 you can also visit our web site right
down here HomesteadRoofingColorado.com. We've got a ton of information out there
lots of other videos to help you as a homeowner know how to navigate this
whole insurance claim process thing. I'm Tracy Bookman owner of Homestead Roofing.