My sister's house in Marianna FL just got hit with a tornado!

[acotton21 (Adam Cotton)]

Hey, I am reaching out to find out if anyone on here has experience with dealing with this devastation. Half of the house is destroyed-roof gone, maybe structural. Their insurance company quickly showed up and is trying to cut them a check and tell them the rest of the house is fine and livable. To me it seems like they should have an inspector evaluate it and be the one to determine if it is ok or what the extent of the damage is.
Does anyone have any suggestions, know of any good structural inspector/ engineer in the Marianna area? I am trying to help out from 1,000 miles away.

[jjonas (Jeffrey Jonas)]

Absolutely get an inspector (or two) out there!
I see tornado damage often in Minnesota. Most of it from after “repairs” have been made.
It’s amazing what gets overlooked.

Perhaps Jim Bushart @jbushart1 will see this thread and chime in with his expertise.

[lkage (Larry Kage, CMI)]

Adam, your sister would do well having assistance from a licensed public adjuster. A licensed public adjuster works for the insured.

Here is a recent thread noting that importance:

Florida regulators warned of insurance company manipulations

This is not just a Florida thing. It is routine for insurance companies to manipulate facts and policy language to deny and underpay insurance claims. Just last Thursday, my client’s denied insurance claim resulted in a $925,000.00 negotiated settlement. Two weeks before that, I settled another denied insurance claim for $534,000.00. So far this year, two and one half million dollars of insurance company denials have been reversed by my company, alone … and the year is not half over. And I’m…

Example:

Public Insurance Claim Adjuster Marianna, FL | Reliable Claims Adjusting

[jbushart1 (James Bushart, PA, SCLA)]

First, assume that the insurance company is acting in good faith but prepare the claim as if that could change.

Understand the most important thing about filing an insurance claim and things will go your way, which is … it is the duty of the policyholder to prove (1) that he has a covered loss, and (2) the amount of money it will take to restore him to where he was before the covered loss.

Most people will make the common mistake of “filing” an insurance claim and depend upon the company who owes them the money to tell them if their loss is covered and how much they are entitled to receive. They will be underpaid, at best. At worst, they can be improperly denied coverage. In 2023, alone, I personally overturned $3 million dollars of denied insurance claims into cash payments. Underpaid claims are most common, though.

What the insurance company will quickly offer, in good faith, is an amount of money that is calculated from a computer program which ESTIMATES what the costs MIGHT be. In bad faith, the insurance company will try to convince the policyholder that what they estimate the costs to be is what they should be paid, which is not true at all.

Immediately, (after she has tarped the roof and attempted to mitigate the damage from additional loss) have your sister call in a general contractor and request a BID to restore the home to its pre-storm condition. That amount will greatly exceed the first estimated amount paid by the insurance carrier and it represents what the costs ARE rather than what anyone ESTIMATES the costs to be. That is what she is owed.

Secondly, she should begin to compile a complete itemized inventory of all personal items that were damaged or destroyed. This is the most time consuming and difficult part and the insurance company profits most from policyholders who take shortcuts to save time and effort. Leave nothing out for they will only pay the depreciated value for each item until your sister replaces it and sends in the paid receipt. For $50,000.00 worth of lost personal items, she should expect a check for about $15K with the rest paid after she replaces each item.

If this is more than she can handle on her own, she can hire a public adjuster … which Florida has thousands of with varying degrees of competency and experience. I recommend that, if she feels she needs to, she should seek an adjuster from NAPIA.

I’m sorry for the loss and I hope it works out well for her.

[acotton21 (Adam Cotton)]

Thank you everyone. I passed along this great information to her. It is so overwhelming and scary for her, one minute life was normal, and literally minutes later they were clutching each other for their lives as the roof was being ripped off their house.
I want to give a shout-out to Michael Signorelli with IPA, an Internachi member. I cold called him asking him for help. He happened to live right down the road and was also dealing with his own devastation. He was able to walk away from his own disaster to swing by and help her understand what was salvageable and what needed to be torn down. Not sure if he is on this board- but thank you Mike.