Home lost in Palisades fire

[Allen Trent]

Allen,
I have a great deal of respect for you and your insurance and annuity knowledge.

You talked to me in a thread here a long tine back about extending respect to posters over various issues one might be critical of.

While I can't remember your words, I remember the concept and as a result over the intervening time, I have:
Not made some posts.
Deleted some other posts. (I have probably abused STI's delete box.)
Tempered my language in other posts from what I would have done had you not spoken with me.

Because of your past comments to me, I hesitated before making that post, coming back to this thread 3 times before I did so.

This time, in this instance, I am not backing down from what I said.

Yes, this person lost their house in a fire.
However their first post here:

was not why does the insurance company need receipts and how do they evaluate the reasonableness of "place to stay" cost reimbursement requests in a market where there are going to be a lot of people needing that replacement housing and the costs may be higher than "normal", and what sort of documentation am I going to need for claim filing, and so on;

rather

He started out with a post that has "how much can I take the insurance company for?" as the underlying post concept.

He needs to be accountable for that.

but you are making some assumptions. what if he has a 3,000 square foot house 3 miles from work & less than a mile from kids school in a great neighborhood. But he has found temporary housing of 1500 sq foot house 20 miles from work, 5 miles from school & a slightly worse neighborhood. He appeared to be asking, in my opinion, should he sacrifice comfort/lifestyle/time to save the insurance company money or should he find exact replacement cost housing that he is owed via the policy.

I am the last to be able to lecture, I have middle school humor or worse & make lots of questionable (albeit pretty damn funny if you ask me) comments. I just thought this one was a bit soon. Imagine a poster coming on & saying they have to put their spouse in a nursing home tomorrow & have 2 choices. 1 that is $5k per month & 1 that is $10k per month & the insurance company will pay either under the limit, but wont pay for longer than 1 year. Would you still say "quit trying to scam the insurance company, it is people like you that cost me more for my insurance premiums half way around the world" ---maybe not the same, but that is how it came across to me.

 

[straightnochaser]

Caveat, not an agent.

As a homeowner who has been paying steadily increasing home insurance premiums each year I don't particularly care for the attitude expressed in your post.

You are trying to turn a coverage maximum limit into a mandatory payout which will in turn raise premiums for each of us other homeowners covered by your carrier.

Give it a ***ing rest jesus christ

 

[LostDollar]

My home was lost in a fire. My loss of use is 115K. Why do they ask for receipts (hotel, rent)? Is that 115K not a fixed payout? Am I shortchanging myself if I rent a cheap place during reconstruction? I found a place that I can rent for 3.5K per month. If it takes 2 years to rebuild, that's only 84K + my 2K in hotel stays. Am I shortchanging myself of 31K?
One article claims that these types of fires get expidited. Homes are built in 4 to six months instead of up to 1 1/2 years before a shovel hits the ground. IF true, I might be shortchanging myself on quality of stay by a LOT.

Caveat, I am NOT an insurance agent.
I have carried home owner insurance of my own for over 30 years.
(And I have made modifications to both my home and auto insurance based on agent comments I have seen here.)

As at least one other agent has said, please check your policy. Assuming the paper copy was burned in the fire, you should be able to see a copy online if you create an account with your carrier. My experience is limited to my current carrier, but I have an online account so I can make my payments that way. When I am logged in, I can access my auto and home policy documents as well as make payments and get replacement auto cards.

This situation has to have a level of stress for you which I cannot even begin to imagine. Here for example, I don't know exactly how I would cope with a loss of my home in a tornado.

But the thing here is, somehow backup, take a deep breath or two, and don't take a rash action about renting that may not be covered and will amplify your financial problems in some way.

I have looked at two homeowner policy contracts, and I think the key for what you are considering is "normal standard of living". the stuff is too lengthy for me to quote in full, but here is what I think is relevant. These quotes relate to a Coverage D on the homeowner policies I have checked.

Additional Living Expense, meaning the necessary increase in living expenses you incur so that your household can maintain its normal standard of living.

So, as I see it, your task here would be to figure out how to document your "normal standard of living" and then relate that to the cost, quality, and location of the place(s) you are looking at. I would also figure you are likely to have some leeway here about dollars because of the large quantity of people being displaced.

The other relevant quote:

payment shall be for the shortest time required, not exceeding 24 months, to repair or replace the damage or to permanently relocate.

I saw that language in both policies, as a starting hypothesis, I would expect your contract language to be similar.

I hope that helps a little bit for you in formulating your initial plans for your situation and recovery from it.

 

[LostDollar]

He paid for it, he deserves the maximum benefits it allows him to receive.

No problem with that. The problem I have is one automatically assuming that the upper limit of coverage D in the policy is what one SHOULD be allowed in any situation.

See the post above I made to him and look at your own homeowners policy.

He asked this:

Is that 115K not a fixed payout?

As far as I know (as a non-agent) the answer to that question for coverage D on a homeowner's policy would be "No".

If you guys want to define for him exactly how long his home repair will take and then help him figure our how $115K divided by that number of months is "normal living expenses" for him. I'll be quiet because that is a different approach to the problem.

 

[scagnt83]

No problem with that. The problem I have is one automatically assuming that the upper limit of coverage D in the policy is what one SHOULD be allowed in any situation.

See the post above I made to him and look at your own homeowners policy.

He asked this:

As far as I know (as a non-agent) the answer to that question for coverage D on a homeowner's policy would be "No".

If you guys want to define for him exactly how long his home repair will take and then help him figure our how $115K divided by that number of months is "normal living expenses" for him. I'll be quiet because that is a different approach to the problem.

Dude.....

 

[straightnochaser]

No problem with that. The problem I have is one automatically assuming that the upper limit of coverage D in the policy is what one SHOULD be allowed in any situation.

See the post above I made to him and look at your own homeowners policy.

He asked this:

As far as I know (as a non-agent) the answer to that question for coverage D on a homeowner's policy would be "No".

If you guys want to define for him exactly how long his home repair will take and then help him figure our how $115K divided by that number of months is "normal living expenses" for him. I'll be quiet because that is a different approach to the problem.

OP's house just burnt to the ground and you think he needs to justify anything to you? Pathetic. Go find a hobby dude.

 

[WinoBlues]

If you guys want to define for him exactly how long his home repair will take and then help him figure our how $115K divided by that number of months is "normal living expenses" for him.

Chastised the insured, now the agents.

I'll be quiet because that is a different approach to the problem.

As opposed to who's approach.

You seem like a nice guy. But maybe it is time to put the shovel down.

 

[Allen Trent]

Chastised the insured, now the agents.



As opposed to who's approach.

You seem like a nice guy. But maybe it is time to put the shovel down.

This image came to mind

 

[Policy Monkey]

My home was lost in a fire. My loss of use is 115K. Why do they ask for receipts (hotel, rent)? Is that 115K not a fixed payout? Am I shortchanging myself if I rent a cheap place during reconstruction? I found a place that I can rent for 3.5K per month. If it takes 2 years to rebuild, that's only 84K + my 2K in hotel stays. Am I shortchanging myself of 31K?
One article claims that these types of fires get expidited. Homes are built in 4 to six months instead of up to 1 1/2 years before a shovel hits the ground. IF true, I might be shortchanging myself on quality of stay by a LOT.

To quote @adjusterjack's mantra, RTFP (Read The F'ing Policy). All the coverages, limits, exclusions and exceptions specific to you will be found there.
With that said, Additional Living Expense (aka Loss Of Use, or Coverage D) is typically not a flat payout. (If your water heater leaked and you stayed in a hotel for 2 days while they dried out the house, you wouldn't expect a check for $115k, right?) Rather, it is designed to cover temporary housing of "like kind and quality" (look for that or similar language in the policy) for up to $X or X amount of time. This means if a guy lives in a shack, he shouldn't expect a stay at the Ritz Carlton. Or a guy in a big McMansion doesn't have to be stuck in a Motel 6. The carrier will ask for receipts because this coverage it typically on a reimbursement basis.
I would advise to find something big enough for your family and close enough to work/school, but not so ultra-lux that you burn through the coverage before the house is rebuilt.

 

[Policy Monkey]

I did not assume the OP was trying to defraud his carrier. But if he were to willfully inflate the costs in an effort to "get what he paid for" or not "shortchange" himself, that could easily drift into fraud territory.