I need to get in the insurance business!

Thursday afternoon we had a storm that went through parts of the Chicago metro area and it decided to pick my house to create more than the normal damage. Some of the tops of the still standing trees in my yard are twisted off so it seems that a tornado touched down. I was able to find a tree guy, so on a emergency basis he come in and at least removed the tree blocking my drive way. He will be back later to do the remaining $8500.00 of tree removal!! The bad thing about this is finding out that very little is covered under my homeowners insurance! I've had the house for 33 years and have probably paid close to 100K and this is the first claim I have ever put in! Now I find out that a tree needs to hit your house to be covered and then only the removal and not the hauling is covered! I haven't even gotten to my garden/yard shed yet!

I was without power for over 72 hours. My battery backup sump pump ran because of the VERY heavy rain, continuose for 14 hours and then the battery voltage dropped to the point that the pump wouldn't lift the head. At 6AM with a small camping generator that wouldn't start (I could have plugged in the battery charger) my alternate was to run a 100' wire from my truck to the sump pump. The voltage drop in the 100' was about 2 volts but that was getting about 11.5 to the pump which was enough to pump. I only ended up with about 1" of water in the lower spot around the sump in the basement.

Now the latest that The Hartford insurance wants, is proof of purchase for my garden/yard shed and the contents: mower, snow blower, roto tiller, walk behind blower, chipper/shreader, and all the misc. etc. things!!

Trying to get to the shed! This is a shot of after I got the chain saw out to remove some of the trees so I could look inside the shed!

Insurance companies aren't in the business because they care about the people they insure. I can't remember where, but I saw an advertisement for an insurance company that specialized in fallen tree coverage since most home owner policies don't cover all the expenses involved. Kinda like the flood insurance.

Too bad about your damages. Hope you get things back to normal soon.

They (insurance) suck a little more down here in hurricane country.

Sorry about all your mess Pete; we had a similar situation here in KC a few years ago with ice damage, power loss, and huge number of downed trees. Same stories about insurance.

I'm glad you are personally not hurt; and I assume the boats are safe!

Chuck

time to buy a reciept book

Lawyers never lose....they still get paid

It's a big game. Don't be in a hurry to settle. They start low, so be sure you start high. You'll meet in the middle when they decide it's time to make it go away.

Glad your boats weren't there. That would have been a horrifying picture to see one of your nice boats under all that mess, especially the Atom.

Pete if your policy is a replacement type coverage then they cannot depreciate your items they have to replace them at what ever the cost is, provided it doesn't exceed the policy limits. Just argue and bitch with the claims adjuster a few times then say,

"well it doesn't look like we are going to come to an agreement on this, so give me the name and number of the VP of claims and I'll work it out with them"

By law they have to provide you this information, on the spot right then and there, in person or on the phone doesn't matter. Actually do it over the phone and record the conversation, you don't have to tell them you are recording the conversation, you just can't be a third party recording it, you have to be part of the conversation for it to be legal and addmissable in court.

Screwed Allstate, State Farm and a couple others over the years with knowledge my friend, a claims adjuster, told me about.

In Indiana that is way the law is written or atleast that's the way it was when I was going through my custody battle with the ex-wife.