Just made a claim for a hailstorm hitting my roof W/AUSA

[Averageman]

Any helpful hints to make this go a little smoother would be appreciated.

[THCDDM4]

Any helpful hints to make this go a little smoother would be appreciated.

Did you have the roof inspected for damage prior to making a claim? Find a reputable roofer (can be difficult) that you trust and ask them to take photos to show you of the damage.

Have them inspect your siding/paint, window sashes, glazing, glazing bead and frames, window screens, air conditioning unit fins, personal items in the yard, gutters, hot tub covers, yard furniture , garage doors, exterior access doors, deck and landscape lighting, etc. check everything out for damage and get photos of it all asap.

Don’t sign any contracts until you need to- most have a 72 hour rescinding clause or you may have to fight in small claims to opt out depending on how solid/legit the legal verbiage is on the contract.

[kerplode]

I wish you luck. I had to do this a couple times when I lived in CO and it was always a giant pain in the ass.

For the last claim the mortgage holder took payment from the insurance and held it in escrow until I submitted invoices for the work, at which they paid the contractor directly. Everything that was on the list of damages had to be repaired with invoices submitted. When I pressed them about that policy, they told me "Until you clear the mortgage, it's OUR house and we need to guarantee that all damage identified by the adjuster is fully repaired." Lol...

My only suggestion is this: If you live in an area that is currently, or is projected to be in the future, prone to damaging hail try to swing a replacement with Class 4 Impact Resistant shingles. We ended up with enough money in the total budget to get that done, thankfully. It got us a coverage discount and the roof shrugged off the storms that came later.

[chuckman]

We just had a new roof put on a couple weeks ago, covered by insurance. Not the same carrier. I contacted a roofer first, they said insurance might cover it so they did an inspection with the insurance guy, the insurance guy had a drone and took 600 pictures of the roof, and declared that there is enough damage to warrant paying for replacement (Even though the roof was over 20 years old).

It should go pretty easy, they'll send out the adjuster who will do a roof inspection, likely use a drone but will take a lot of pictures. Then they'll determine if it's coverable.

[Caduceus]

well we did it with USAA .... not sure if AUSA is the same.

Called USAA, they sent an inspector. He did his thing, sent a report. We forwarded his assessment to USAA, they cut us a check based on his estimate. Then we shopped around local and got some quotes. They actually just replaced it last week, haven't seen their bill yet. We had a little siding damage that got covered, and the inspector also wrote up our back deck (still waiting to get that worked on).

The deck is nice since it's wood and starting to have some age-related issues. In fact, I'd planned to sand off some moss and re-stain it this summer.

[tomme boy]

We had a lot of damage here in Iowa back a couple years ago when that derecho came through. It ripped all the gutters off the house and had several spots where branches hit the roof and dug little holes in the roof. They would not pay for the roof as there was not any branches on the roof. The wind blew them off. All of the vents had hail damage and they would not pay for them either as we did not have pics of the hail.

This was State Farm Ins. But they did pay for the half a cow we picked up the day before. Along with a bunch of other meat and stuff in the freezer. But we hit them with store prices on the meat. It was enough to replace it with almost a whole cow. It was 2 weeks before we had power back on. Luckily a friend came up from Kansas city and brought a new generator after about 5 days passed. But the meat was already thawed out.

[Averageman]

Sorry, got stuck in a time loop from 1983, AUSA, haha!
USAA.
I have about six estimates scheduled for today, my Agent from USAA is supposed to be here early and the roofers will start rolling in at about the same time.
Just want the best possible replacement roof.

[ChattanoogaPhil]

About a decade ago this area suffered a damaging hail storm. Roofing, siding, metal garage door. Allstate sent a claims inspector to assess damages. I hired a contractor to assess damages. Contractor contacted Allstate to advise what was actually required/cost for him to do the job. Allstate adjusted claim amount accordingly. I got the check from Allstate. Contractor paid by me. Of course after getting the insurance check you can do whatever ya want, including paying more to upgrade the roofing from what you had or not repairing damages and buy more guns with the money. A few folks around here who originally had 3-tab shingles decided to pay a few more dollars for architectural. When you say you want the best possible replacement roof... that's really up to you, but the insurance company is only going to pay to replace a comparable roof.

The Allstate guy was pretty good, even noting damages I hadn't noticed on various outside items like deck furniture.

[Averageman]

About a decade ago this area suffered a damaging hail storm. Roofing, siding, metal garage door. Allstate sent a claims inspector to assess damages. I hired a contractor to assess damages. Contractor contacted Allstate to advise what was actually required/cost for him to do the job. Allstate adjusted claim amount accordingly. I got the check from Allstate. Contractor paid by me. Of course after getting the insurance check you can do whatever ya want, including paying more to upgrade the roofing from what you had or not repairing damages and buy more guns with the money. A few folks around here who originally had 3-tab shingles decided to pay a few more dollars for architectural. When you say you want the best possible replacement roof... that's really up to you, but the insurance company is only going to pay to replace a comparable roof.

The Allstate guy was pretty good, even noting damages I hadn't noticed on various outside items like deck furniture.

Cool, I'm here with them now (Guy actually just left) and I may do as you suggested.
The Guy caught a lot of stuff, but I'm going with your plan. And I will handle the money and they (the contractors) I will pay off myself.

[kerplode]

And I will handle the money and they (the contractors) I will pay off myself.

That's definitely the way to go if possible. In my case, it was not. State Farm informed the mortgage holder of the claim and they demanded the escrow process. It was a giant additional layer of bureaucratic nonsense and paperwork on top of something that was already an ass-ache. I had no choice in the matter, though.