Georgia Homeowners Insurance Claim Questions

Jotay

New Member
2
My Claim has many many facets that are causing me a lot of confusion and stress, so here goes. We had a tree fall on our rental house in Georgia during hurricane Irma last month. The tree damaged the roof, the deck, some interior damage and the garage door (also flattened the tenants truck, but that is not my policy's responsibility). My policy is in my maiden name so I worry that this will causing issues (I have tried to get SunTrust to change is 2x and paid the fee only to have nothing changed). The adjustor sent us the estimate last week and we were informed that anything over $10,000 will have to be endorsed by the mortgage company. Then we can deposit the check and start paying folks to do the repair work on our house. I checked with SunTrust and they said anything over $15,000 will have to be sent off if its less a branch manager can sign it. I called ST to see if there were anything that I could do to keep things moving being that we can't do the repairs out of pocket. It turns out ST has a policy that if it is over $20,000 that all monies have to go to an escrow account and we have to fill out all this paper work to get checks issued to the contractors. FUN! Here is where things get complicated. My husband and I are a small business doing home repair and specialty woodworking. He is wanting to do most of the work besides the roofing and somethings that are just out of his range. My first question is, how does the mortgage company feel about the homeowners business doing the work? We are an LLC and this is what we do. Would they try to give us less? The second question I have is regarding contractors licensing. We do not have a contractors license as we rarely contract work out. The Loss Draft dept informed me if after supplements start coming in and the total of the claim ends up being more than $40,000 more inspections will be required and contractors licenses will need to included. The work my husband will be doing won't be the area where we are worried about seeing supplements. So if the roofer finds that trusses and other serious components were damaged that puts us over the $40k limit, who will have to show their license? The roofer said that a contractors license isn't required for roofers in the state of GA. Right now we are already suffering financially due to this mess and anything that will prolong us getting paid will really put us in a bind, so its up to me to make sure we do everything right. I hope all this makes sense and that someone has some guidance for me.
 
Several things....

As an LLC, you are not the homeowner. You are the LLC. You are legally separate entities, which has its pros and cons in this situation.

Generally speaking, you can NOT profit from an insurance loss, so doing your own work is usually done so you can profit from the loss. Insurance companies tend to frown on this. The mortgage company may not care, you would have to ask them.

But you are an LLC, so you should be able to do it as a business, not as a homeowner. Keep in mind though, this does not comply with some companies requirements of arms length transactions, you are still personally benefiting directly from the repairs. At under $40K though, I doubt any of this is an issue. Just be upfront with the bank and let them know you will invoice under the LLC for payment at reasonable, standard industry rates. Odds are, this will be fine.

Never say you won't require a supplement. Almost all house claims of any size require them if for no other reason then to settle out actual cash value vs replacement cost (not 100% sure this is a supplemental payment in this context though).

Licenses, state registrations, building inspections, county contractor licenses, whatever..... it is whatever the law requires. It is unlikely they will require anything that the law doesn't. This isn't the same as saying they won't ask, but compliance with building codes and general licensing is what is required.

The bank is going to do whatever is required to protect their money. To that end, the money is in an escrow account for paying. They usually have no issue with writing checks when the work is completed or a pre-negotiated stage is completed. Inspections along the way may be required.

The maiden name thing will be a bit of a hassle but in the end, probably a total non-issue. The insurance company will write the check out in your maiden name, you'll have to work with the bank to deposit into the escrow account, then its never seen again.

Dan
 
Thank you for taking time to respond. I will read over this many times today and will let you know if I have questions. I am sure I will this stuff is so confusing!

My first thought is about the profit part. My business is profiting not me, it would make no sense to hire someone to do this when this is what we do. And we aren't doing all the work.
 
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