Home Maintenance

 

So remember around last Halloween when the remnants of Hurricane Zeta came tearing through Atlanta and dropped a huge tree on my house? Well, funny thing - despite my best, most valiant efforts, the repairs  didn't finally get started until today, some 10 weeks later.

It's not like I wasn't trying.  I was without power for three full days after the tree fell, but despite a lack of electricity, I still managed to file a claim with my insurer (Allstate), flag down a passing tree-contractor truck and convince them to remove the tree from my house and to put tarp up on my roof, all before the lights even came back on Halloween evening.

That's a lot of progress for three dark days, but things slowed down after that.  The problem was that the hurricane caused so much wide-spread damage, from the Louisiana coast into the Carolinas, that all of Allstate's claims adjusters were badly backlogged, inspecting claims all over the Southeast, and it took a full week (Week 1) before someone even so much as came over to look at the damage.

And then, because the guy who finally did come over was himself personally backlogged, it took another full week for him to determine the cost of the damage and send me a settlement payment (Week 2).

Now that I had a scope of work and a budget, my next step was to get a contractor who could do the repairs.  I contacted three different firms.  

The first was very prompt and timely, and quickly sent me a ridiculous contract that I wouldn't sign under any circumstance (it basically said they would do however much or as little as they wanted and I wouldn't question them, and if there was a disagreement I would waive my right to litigate in favor of third-party arbitration). It was also poorly written, as if they had asked a high-schooler to write it for them.  Even though it was so bad it probably wouldn't have held up in court, it's a telling sign that they never even followed up to ask if I was going to hire them and sign their daft contract.  In fact, after getting the contract, I never heard from them again.

The second firm was more professional but also slower to respond.  Their manager told me there had been a death in his family and he'd been out of state, but he eventually came by for his own inspection. Long story short,  for various mealy-mouthed reasons, they declined to take the job.  But thanks for playing, boys.

The third firm also wanted to send their own inspector over, but he was out of state doing inspections on all those other storm-damaged properties.  It took him three weeks to finally make it over here (Weeks 3, 4, and 5) while I was dealing with the other two firms.  But he finally did arrive, and was the first to notice that the damage to my house was far more extensive than the Allstate adjustor indicated, and that a new scope and budget would be needed.  However, he also insisted that I get an asbestos inspection performed before we proceeded any further.

By now, we were into Thanksgiving week, which slowed everything down as both my contractors and my insurer took time off to spread covid-19 among their families.  I got the asbestos testing done on December 7 (Week 6).  I passed the tests - no asbestos-containing materials in my house - but I didn't finally get the new scope and budget from the contractor and over to Allstate until December 16 (Week 7). 

Naturally, since the revised budget was three times higher than Allstate's original estimate, they had some questions and wanted more documentation. We went back and forth on Weeks 8 and 9, which included the Christmas and New Year's holidays, which slowed everything down.  But in early January (Week 10), I finally got approval and it wasn't until today that my contractor finally was available to start the job.

It was a long tedious process, and for 10 weeks my house was the neighborhood eyesore.  Every time I exited or entered the house, I had to duck under dangling rain gutters by the front door.  A neighbor told me he just assumed that I had grown accustomed to the damage, deciding to keep the settlement money for myself.  

But at least we're now finally started.  They're up on what's left of the roof right now, hammering away and scaring the cats.  It's kind of spooky and more than a little shocking to see my house without a roof (it's sitting there topless, exposed for the elements and all the world to see), but at least we're underway.