In that same vein, I used a public adjuster once after a small electrical fire torched a room in my house. The insurance adjuster was great, his manager was awful and made a difficult experience much worse.
Without getting into details, the moment I realized that he was being intentionally obtuse I started looking into options.
First contacted an attorney who essentially said, “Yes, I can do it but I’m going to cost a lot and the insurance company won’t reimburse you for my time.”
Kept looking and discovered public adjusters were a thing. Did some research, found one who was reputable and he took me on for free. Pretty sure we used net, about 2-4 hours of his time.
He told me exactly what was going to happen, how the insurance company was going to react and it played out exactly as he said.
1. He requested a process to take the valuation of everything damaged in the fire to a 3rd party arbiter.
2. Insurance company will send you a letter saying it’s not time for that yet. We will proceed anyway. And we did.
3. He will nominate 3 arbiters and the insurance company will nominate 3 arbiters. Neither will select either of the others nominees and an independent 3rd party will select one instead.
4. The moment the insurance company realizes the valuation of your things will be outside of their control, they will become extremely agreeable. And they did.
And honestly the only thing I really wanted was another week in a hotel for my family because the company cleaning my house of smoke was short staffed over the holidays. Would have cost them likely $1,000 but instead he escalated the situation dramatically.
Without getting into details, the moment I realized that he was being intentionally obtuse I started looking into options.
First contacted an attorney who essentially said, “Yes, I can do it but I’m going to cost a lot and the insurance company won’t reimburse you for my time.”
Kept looking and discovered public adjusters were a thing. Did some research, found one who was reputable and he took me on for free. Pretty sure we used net, about 2-4 hours of his time.
He told me exactly what was going to happen, how the insurance company was going to react and it played out exactly as he said.
1. He requested a process to take the valuation of everything damaged in the fire to a 3rd party arbiter.
2. Insurance company will send you a letter saying it’s not time for that yet. We will proceed anyway. And we did.
3. He will nominate 3 arbiters and the insurance company will nominate 3 arbiters. Neither will select either of the others nominees and an independent 3rd party will select one instead.
4. The moment the insurance company realizes the valuation of your things will be outside of their control, they will become extremely agreeable. And they did.
And honestly the only thing I really wanted was another week in a hotel for my family because the company cleaning my house of smoke was short staffed over the holidays. Would have cost them likely $1,000 but instead he escalated the situation dramatically.