Hurricanes and Coverage on Home Owners ?

[Gulfman]

I was talking with a friend about Hurricane coverage (we had a big scare in Fla). I mentioned that "alot of people" were "hoping that their roofs would get blown off" so that they could get a new roof.

My buddy told me that was a BAD PLAN. He also said, when your roof is blown off, the Ins.companies generally have a loop-hole clause that allows them to get out of paying for mold damage. Apparently, water damage to the house is usually catastrophic. ALSO, he said that when rain gets behind drywall, it usually ends up causing "mold damage" which is NOT COVERED under your avg. PC plan. Hence a home owner is stuck fixing the drywall damage AND repairing MOLD damage (meaning changing all the drywall) which would not be covered.

Any truth to what he's talking about?

Thanks for your input!


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[Gulfman]

Ok...so i found this option.

Looks like a rider might exist.

Is mold damage covered by homeowners insurance? | Insurance.com

 

[djs]

The question has to many moving parts. Keep in mind, CA doesn't have hurricanes, so I'm sure they have unique issues to deal with that I am not knowledgeable in.

In a storm, in CA, a roof getting blown off would be covered. The resulting water damage from the rain entering the house through missing roof would be covered. Mildew removal would be covered, mold would not be. If you deal with this quickly, you normally are not dealing with mold, just mildew.

Now, there are a ton of oh-by-the-way's to go with this. I've seen water damage from storm claims denied because of roof problems, especially with tile roofs. I never really agreed with this denial, but basically if the roof leaked because of a known, non-maintained problem, then it is not covered. If the roof blows off, this is a non-issue.

If there is mold, it is usually from a previous problem, not the current one. I've seen this a lot of times, where the current issue simply exposes an old problem, in which case, it may not be covered, i.e., mold. I assume this is mostly what your friend was referring to.

Drywall that was good before the storm and damaged due to the storm would normally be covered. Again, hurricanes may be different.

Here in CA, earthquakes have a different set of rules then most other losses. Could be the same issue in FL for hurricanes. I don't know.

Dan