- Joined
- Jul 16, 2001
- Messages
- 385
I had this big plan.... I am not much of an internet guy, really, and I think the world was a much better place before the net, over all.
However, there are a few things that make the internet a wonderful thing, and Bladeforums is one of them. This is the first forum I ever joined. Earlier in the year, I was planning the make a post about how I'd been on this forum for 20 years and all the great people I'd met, friends made, etc. I wasn't going to make a huge deal out of it, but I wanted to commemorate the occasion. July 16th marked my 20th year here on Bladeforums! However, when the day arrived, my mind was on other things.
On July 9th, my house burned. No injuries to my wife, dog, horses or me. The house, however, is toast. Actual toast.... We ended up losing about 90% of our belongings, including most of our art collection's best pieces. But, all my knives, watches and guns survived! We found a house on a large ranch to rent while ours is being rebuilt, but our horses had to go back to the rescue we got them from as the cattle on this ranch had too many flies and it was driving our horses bonkers. After one contracted Pigeon fever from a fly bite, we had to get them to a better place. We are financially sound, and were very well insured so money is not an issue, thank God and hard work! But a couple of things I wanted to share with everyone:
1. Make sure you have enough Contents coverage on your home owner's or renter's insurance. That money goes fast. Like "lightning" fast. Granted I had some good art in our master bedroom, but when I listed the contents of the master I hit over 65K, and we still had the rest of the house to go through. About 25K was art, so you do the math.... And make sure you have the right contents coverage. We had well over 200K in contents coverage, but only $2500.00 in jewelry coverage. Well, most of my watches cost more than that so if I had lost my watches, I'd have been screwed out of all that money. In the end it is all just stuff, but we have worked hard our whole lives to build up what we had and I will be dammed if I am just going to kiss it goodbye.
2. Make sure you clearly understand how the insurance company pays out. From what I understand, most policies work like ours, which is you get paid a depreciated "actual cash value" for everything that was covered, then, when and only if you replace it and show a receipt, you get the rest of the money necessary to cover replacement costs. The insurance company is counting on you not having the time, willingness or energy to actually go out and do all this work to get paid. It is a lot of work.
3. And this one is only for the country folk or those on propane, make sure all unused propane values are not only turned off, but properly capped. The cause of our fire was an uncapped propane valve in our laundry room.
Here's what caused it: We moved out to the country, outside Paso Robles Ca about 2 years ago. We bought a 2 acre ranchette atop a hill overlooking vineyards and orchards, hills and mountains in the distance. We had a propane dryer and after we put solar on the house, we switched to electric as we put a giant array atop the house and electricity was now free. We had a local "big box" home improvement store who sold us the new dryer install it. When they did the work, they did not cap the propane valve. In the early morning hours of July 9th, about 2:00 am, our dog Abby, who was sleeping with us, decided it would be a great idea to break through our screen door, and kill the skunk walking by on the back porch. Well, the whole house was permeated with skunk. It was all we could smell. During a wash cycle to clean our bedding, as Abby has jumped back on the bed after getting skunked and tearing the skunk into pieces, the washer got off balance, and while it was bouncing around, it knocked into the propane valve and opened it up. My wife put the laundry into the dryer, unable to smell the propane due to the skunk smell, and when she turned it on, she left the laundry room, shut the door and took a few steps. The elements in the dryer took a few seconds to turn on and when they did, our laundry room exploded. The force of the blast ballooned out our garage door, blew doors off hinges and started a propane fed fire that torched our home. My wife thought our neighborhood was being bombed. When she heard a second blast she saw flames shooting out of the laundry room, she got Abby and got out. I was at the store when the fire happened, buying baking soda and deodorizing products....
4. Beware predatory companies. I am not sure how they find out, but all kinds of places will call you out of the blue, offering services for all kinds of stuff. THEY ARE ALL TRYING TO RIP YOU OFF. Even companies recommended by your insurance company are going to try to rip you off. For example; Our insurance adjuster recommended a company that cleans all your clothes after a fire. We were told they would come and take away our clothes and bring them back fresh and clean, all wrapped up and good as new. B. S. The company sent a young man who literally went into our house and grabbed anything and everything he could. Old rugs, dog toys, a TV, our printer, art work, and all our clothes. They took everything they could get their hands on. Then they charge you an astronomical fee to evaluate, inventory and restore what can be restored. Our bill was over 14K. Then, they will store all your stuff for another astronomical fee. We got our stuff back ASAP as we had a place to put it all, but if you are staying with friends or the Red Cross, you're SOL and the storage fees will be in the thousands. When all was said and done, we got a few shirts and coats back, but everything else was a total loss. This all comes out of your contents coverage. So make sure you have enough! And check out any company who shows up before you agree to or sign anything. Get written estimates. It is very hard to do all this when you're standing in the smoking ruin of your home, and that is exactly what they are counting on.
5. Dig in for the long haul. I read a statistic that said 90% of fire claims go to court. 90%! Clearly there is a huge problem in the insurance industry if that is in fact true. Statistics notwithstanding, though, it is going to take a long time to make things right, if they ever get back to "right" in the first place. At least a year, best case scenario. It took us a couple of months just to find a good contractor who'd take the job, and only through him could we get a good architect. Then the county permitting process, which is expected to take months, can only being once they have plans, which take a couple of months. And this goes on and on. If my house is completed in a year, I will be amazed.
So, a few things to consider, if you've made it this far in the post. I am grateful most of all that my wife walked away without a scratch, as did Abby, Winston and Cooper (horses). But, the recovery is a metric sh*t ton of work and we got away lucky compared to what a lot of people have to deal with. We only lost 90% of our belongings and had good coverage, some folks lose everything and have none. So do your due diligence, don't screw yourself by skimping on coverage. Check your home for safety, it only takes a short amount of time and really only needs to be done once, or once in a while. If you know of other safety pitfalls, please share them.
Hopefully, when I post for my 40th anniversary, I'll have a happier story to tell!
Be Safe!
However, there are a few things that make the internet a wonderful thing, and Bladeforums is one of them. This is the first forum I ever joined. Earlier in the year, I was planning the make a post about how I'd been on this forum for 20 years and all the great people I'd met, friends made, etc. I wasn't going to make a huge deal out of it, but I wanted to commemorate the occasion. July 16th marked my 20th year here on Bladeforums! However, when the day arrived, my mind was on other things.
On July 9th, my house burned. No injuries to my wife, dog, horses or me. The house, however, is toast. Actual toast.... We ended up losing about 90% of our belongings, including most of our art collection's best pieces. But, all my knives, watches and guns survived! We found a house on a large ranch to rent while ours is being rebuilt, but our horses had to go back to the rescue we got them from as the cattle on this ranch had too many flies and it was driving our horses bonkers. After one contracted Pigeon fever from a fly bite, we had to get them to a better place. We are financially sound, and were very well insured so money is not an issue, thank God and hard work! But a couple of things I wanted to share with everyone:
1. Make sure you have enough Contents coverage on your home owner's or renter's insurance. That money goes fast. Like "lightning" fast. Granted I had some good art in our master bedroom, but when I listed the contents of the master I hit over 65K, and we still had the rest of the house to go through. About 25K was art, so you do the math.... And make sure you have the right contents coverage. We had well over 200K in contents coverage, but only $2500.00 in jewelry coverage. Well, most of my watches cost more than that so if I had lost my watches, I'd have been screwed out of all that money. In the end it is all just stuff, but we have worked hard our whole lives to build up what we had and I will be dammed if I am just going to kiss it goodbye.
2. Make sure you clearly understand how the insurance company pays out. From what I understand, most policies work like ours, which is you get paid a depreciated "actual cash value" for everything that was covered, then, when and only if you replace it and show a receipt, you get the rest of the money necessary to cover replacement costs. The insurance company is counting on you not having the time, willingness or energy to actually go out and do all this work to get paid. It is a lot of work.
3. And this one is only for the country folk or those on propane, make sure all unused propane values are not only turned off, but properly capped. The cause of our fire was an uncapped propane valve in our laundry room.
Here's what caused it: We moved out to the country, outside Paso Robles Ca about 2 years ago. We bought a 2 acre ranchette atop a hill overlooking vineyards and orchards, hills and mountains in the distance. We had a propane dryer and after we put solar on the house, we switched to electric as we put a giant array atop the house and electricity was now free. We had a local "big box" home improvement store who sold us the new dryer install it. When they did the work, they did not cap the propane valve. In the early morning hours of July 9th, about 2:00 am, our dog Abby, who was sleeping with us, decided it would be a great idea to break through our screen door, and kill the skunk walking by on the back porch. Well, the whole house was permeated with skunk. It was all we could smell. During a wash cycle to clean our bedding, as Abby has jumped back on the bed after getting skunked and tearing the skunk into pieces, the washer got off balance, and while it was bouncing around, it knocked into the propane valve and opened it up. My wife put the laundry into the dryer, unable to smell the propane due to the skunk smell, and when she turned it on, she left the laundry room, shut the door and took a few steps. The elements in the dryer took a few seconds to turn on and when they did, our laundry room exploded. The force of the blast ballooned out our garage door, blew doors off hinges and started a propane fed fire that torched our home. My wife thought our neighborhood was being bombed. When she heard a second blast she saw flames shooting out of the laundry room, she got Abby and got out. I was at the store when the fire happened, buying baking soda and deodorizing products....
4. Beware predatory companies. I am not sure how they find out, but all kinds of places will call you out of the blue, offering services for all kinds of stuff. THEY ARE ALL TRYING TO RIP YOU OFF. Even companies recommended by your insurance company are going to try to rip you off. For example; Our insurance adjuster recommended a company that cleans all your clothes after a fire. We were told they would come and take away our clothes and bring them back fresh and clean, all wrapped up and good as new. B. S. The company sent a young man who literally went into our house and grabbed anything and everything he could. Old rugs, dog toys, a TV, our printer, art work, and all our clothes. They took everything they could get their hands on. Then they charge you an astronomical fee to evaluate, inventory and restore what can be restored. Our bill was over 14K. Then, they will store all your stuff for another astronomical fee. We got our stuff back ASAP as we had a place to put it all, but if you are staying with friends or the Red Cross, you're SOL and the storage fees will be in the thousands. When all was said and done, we got a few shirts and coats back, but everything else was a total loss. This all comes out of your contents coverage. So make sure you have enough! And check out any company who shows up before you agree to or sign anything. Get written estimates. It is very hard to do all this when you're standing in the smoking ruin of your home, and that is exactly what they are counting on.
5. Dig in for the long haul. I read a statistic that said 90% of fire claims go to court. 90%! Clearly there is a huge problem in the insurance industry if that is in fact true. Statistics notwithstanding, though, it is going to take a long time to make things right, if they ever get back to "right" in the first place. At least a year, best case scenario. It took us a couple of months just to find a good contractor who'd take the job, and only through him could we get a good architect. Then the county permitting process, which is expected to take months, can only being once they have plans, which take a couple of months. And this goes on and on. If my house is completed in a year, I will be amazed.
So, a few things to consider, if you've made it this far in the post. I am grateful most of all that my wife walked away without a scratch, as did Abby, Winston and Cooper (horses). But, the recovery is a metric sh*t ton of work and we got away lucky compared to what a lot of people have to deal with. We only lost 90% of our belongings and had good coverage, some folks lose everything and have none. So do your due diligence, don't screw yourself by skimping on coverage. Check your home for safety, it only takes a short amount of time and really only needs to be done once, or once in a while. If you know of other safety pitfalls, please share them.
Hopefully, when I post for my 40th anniversary, I'll have a happier story to tell!
Be Safe!
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