Many who know me know that I do not readily advocate using
an insurance company’s preferred contractor, because I believe in large part
that they are utilized by the insurance company to reduce the amount of the
claim that would otherwise be paid. I may however, have to change my mind,
albeit reluctantly. My fiancé had a broken pipe in late December 2012. After
some difficulty determining where the water came from, we eventually determined
that the water was coming from a geo-thermal heating unit on the third floor of
her house. Suffice it to say water ran down hill, in our case into the upstairs bathroom and downstairs kitchen.
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| Investigative tear out done by the plumber |
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| Investigative tear out done by the plumber |
She has State Farm Insurance and after speaking with the
adjuster, we decided to use State Farm’s preferred contractor to effect
repairs. Troy Hardee, Hardee Construction came out to the house and met me for
our scheduled appointment. I showed him what I saw as the damage and he took
pictures. I was told he would be back once State Farm had provided him with the
assignment. I should note about now that we did not have standing water. We had
already poked holes in the drywall and the plumber who did the initial
inspection had pulled down a part of the kitchen ceiling to access the area
where we initially thought the water was coming from. We were wrong in our
initial assessment and it wasn’t until a few days later that we discovered the
true source of the water.
Here’s the funny thing. I’m a public adjuster. How many
photos did I take to document the loss in process? Not a one: didn’t even think about taking
photographs. It wasn’t until after the ceiling had been torn out by the plumber
that the idea of taking photographs even entered my mind. This just goes to
show you that even the professionals sometimes get caught up in the drama of
the loss and forget the basics.
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| Masking done by Hardee Construction - very professional |
Anyway Troy showed back up a couple of days later with a
crew to begin removing drywall that was wet. His people were very professional
and masked off the kitchen and the upstairs bath and took out the ceilings in
both areas. Before any work was started they did the best job of masking and
protecting the property I’ve ever seen. I took photographs of this. Compare the
prep done by the plumber with the prep done by the preferred contractor… not
even close.
As I write this we are still in the process of repairing the
property, however, everything is coming alone very nicely.
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| Ceiling and wall in the hallway |
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| Meter shows the ceiling was saturated |
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| Meter showing the wall was saturated |
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| Hall bathroom floor. Looked ok until I tested it |
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| Floor was saturated |
My training eventually kicked in after the first day of watching Hardee
Construction work and I followed up behind them with my moisture meter because
their workmen stated that they had removed all the wet materials. Turns out
they hadn’t. When Troy came by the next day, I showed him the wet areas from my
meter and offered to let him test the areas for himself. My point here is not
to try and say Hardee did anything wrong. Far from it. When he saw the results
from the meter he immediately expanded the scope to include the newly discovered wet
areas. The following day he returned with his own moisture meter and an
infrared camera to ensure that all the wet areas had been identified and removed.
He ended up placing a fan and a dehumidifier in the bath and hall area upstairs
to aid with the drying.
So here’s my advice, if your going to use an insurance
company’s preferred contractor, make sure they have moisture meters and
infrared cameras and that they do what Troy Hardee did and follow up to ensure
that all the wet material is found and removed because in our case both the
wall and the ceiling looked and felt dry. It wasn’t until after they had been
tested with the meter that we discovered how wet they were.
I'll post again during the repair process.
Bill
