Wildfire Insurance Recovery Webinar - August 15th, 2024

From August 15th, 2024. The Greenspan Co./Adjusters International's Vice President, Richard Villanueva, hosts a Wildfire Insurance Recovery Webinar. Topics discussed include rebuilding vs buying. Do I rebuild? Do I buy elsewhere? Do I downsize? 

Welcome, everyone. We'll go ahead and get started. Thank you very much for joining us this evening for the Wildlife Insurance Recovery webinar. My name is Richard Villanueva, and I will be your host this evening.

My goal is to share some knowledge and information that you can walk away with and take down your journey as you travel this difficult road of insurance recovery. I am the Vice President and a licensed insurance public adjuster. Our firm, The Greenspan Company Adjusters International, has been representing losses for 78 years. We have just finished our 65,000th claim represented. We are the largest firm west of the Mississippi, and we bring a level of expertise to these events, unfortunately, that is unmatched by others.

When you enter into one of these firestorm situations, there are a lot of moving parts, a lot of different carriers, a lot of different adjusters, and unfortunately, a lot of misinformation as well. So my goal for this evening is to give you a better understanding of how to understand your policy, how your policy should respond to this event, what your options are, and then answer any questions that you folks may have.

I'll also give you some tips and tricks about your personal property because that can be quite daunting, as I'm sure some of you are already starting to experience. With that, we'll go ahead and get started with some common misconceptions that we typically see in these types of events.

And I hear this often, often with every single event: "I have a policy. I've paid my premiums on time. I've never filed a claim. My limit on my policy is X. This is what the insurance company is going to pay me, correct?" Folks, I think it's important that you frame your policy in a very specific light. Your policy in our world is not a policy—it is a contract. It is a contract between you and your insurance carrier. They are contractually bound to make you whole, and you are contractually bound to adhere to certain conditions in the policy as well.

And if you don't understand how to navigate that contractual language, you are at a disadvantage, and it is by design, unfortunately. And the California Department of Insurance, which oversees all of the insurance activity in the state of California, has us in the private sector. They regulate what we do and how we do it, and our only role is to prepare, present, and negotiate the settlement of claims.

So with that, we look at these policies a little bit differently than most, and I think we should start with your declarations page and the limits that you see as it relates to the different coverages. Make no mistake, folks, it's not that the insurance company owes you the dollar amount that you have under your coverage A because your home is a total loss. Yes, they owe it, but that dollar amount is what they owe you up to, and that is the key word, folks: it's "up to."

The problem is, how do you get up to that coverage? Well, there's a couple of different ways that that happens. One, depending on your carrier, I can tell you if you're one of the lucky ones, if there is such a thing in this event, to have USAA or Horace Mann as an insurance company, those two carriers are paying policy limits. If there is another carrier out there that we just have not had contact with as of yet that is paying policy limits, please let us know in the chat so that we have a better understanding as to who's performing and what they're doing out there. It just helps us better help others.

But the chances are you are dealing with a State Farm or a California FAIR Plan or an Allstate or Farmers in this particular event, and they are just providing advances. And these advances can lead you to believe that there's a false sense of security because you're getting advances. And let's address those because that's the second common misconception.

Your insurance company is being really cooperative, and they've cut you some pretty large checks already. So let's define what that means, folks. California requires that the actual or the undisputed amount of a claim should be paid within the first 30 days. Now, what the undisputed amount means is nothing more than what the insurance company believes they owe you at least—nothing that drives the number. It's just what they believe they owe you at least. The advances are to be given within the first 30 days.

The Department of Insurance strongly encourages insurance companies to pay limits in these types of events, especially on personal property. However, they don't follow suit because the insurance companies, folks, are private entities. And even though the Department of Insurance provides the guidelines for which the insurance companies are to operate within, they cannot dictate how they run the private entity.

So that's why you see insurance companies offering advances, sometimes 30%, sometimes 50%, depending on who it is you have for an insurance carrier. Just because they're giving you these advances does not mean that they're cooperating with you and that they're being great and they're being attentive. Just because they're putting you in your temporary housing does not mean that they're being cooperative and attentive. They are obligated to do that, and they're obligated to do that within the first 30 days.

It's what starts to happen now after the advances are issued, after you get into your housing. What is your obligation, and what do these advances mean, and how do you prepare and position yourself as you start to navigate this claim moving forward? It is not the insurance company's obligation, folks, to determine the value of your loss and be accurate. There is no statute in California that mandates that they need to be accurate. It's quite the opposite. It is your obligation to prove to the insurance company the value of your loss because you are filing the claim against them, but you are at a major disadvantage because you don't speak the language.

And it doesn't mean you're not incredibly intelligent people, and it certainly doesn't mean that you're not capable if you had the right information. It's by design so that you're always off-kilter and you don't know how to move your claim forward and take control. So the goal for these webinars is to give you a little bit more information, give you a little bit more knowledge so that you can have higher-level conversations with your adjuster as the days go on.

Let's go ahead and move on to the policy. I think it's important that we address your coverages. All of you basically have the same coverages; you just have different carriers. And your declarations page, which is the one page in your policy that gives you kind of the 30,000-foot overview of your coverages, is what you really want to be paying attention to because it does give you a snapshot of what you're entitled to.

But understanding all these different buckets—and we're going to refer to them moving forward, folks, as buckets—it's better that you understand how these buckets respond to this peril, and that way you have a better understanding of what the insurance company's trying to do and, more importantly, potentially recognize the red flags as they start to appear.

So we're going to start with the dwelling. The dwelling is your Coverage A typically in your policy. Every single policy has a Coverage A, and most of your policies have what's called an extended replacement cost endorsement. And it's something, folks, if you've never heard that term, you're going to want to get familiar with, and you're certainly going to want to ask your adjuster if you, in fact, have an extended replacement cost endorsement, or otherwise known here as an extended limit. What an extended replacement cost endorsement is, is just that—if your loss should exceed your policy limit as it's stated and as it's measured, it will unlock a secondary bucket of money that you have available to you to help in your reconstructive efforts.

And we're going to get into that a little bit later because you're going to start to notice some of the tactics of the insurance companies and what they do to prevent that from happening. Personal property is on everybody's policy except for some of the California FAIR Plans. Some of the California FAIR Plan policies do not have personal property coverage or very, very little, which prompted many to go out and get a secondary policy just to cover their personal property in the event of a major fire like this.

Unfortunately, you're going to hear terms like ACV, which is actual cash value. You're going to hear the term replacement cost value. And I'll briefly explain what that is because we're going to get into it a little bit more as we go along. Most policies are replacement cost for your personal property. And it is also a misunderstanding with the way some of these adjusters explain it, that, "Hey, I had a couch that was worth a thousand bucks, and I lost my couch, and so I expect a thousand dollars." And that would be your replacement cost for that couch. Unfortunately, folks, that's not how it works.

And the policy clearly states that they only owe you the actual cash value, which is replacement cost minus depreciation equals actual cash value. And we'll get into that a little bit more as we get into your personal property. Separate structures, which is typically either listed on your policy or your declarations page as Coverage B as in "boy," and separate structures is where we find in a lot of these types of wildfire events, a lot of people, unfortunately, are heavily underinsured.

A separate structure would consist of a shop detached from the home, a detached garage, a pool, an outdoor kitchen, decks, walkways, fences, and that separate structure coverage typically is represented by a percentage of your dwelling. So if you were to take a look at your declarations page, typically your separate structures are represented by either 10% or possibly 20% of your dwelling. Most policies have code upgrade coverage. Some policies build in their code upgrade coverage into the dwelling, and the language is specific, and it will say that you can use up to a specific percentage of your dwelling towards code upgrade-related expenses.

And I'll get into code a little bit later. Some of your policies have an additional coverage, which is additional, in addition to your dwelling, which is available to you to cover any code-related items or expenses that you incur as you rebuild or purchase. AL, as I'm sure all of you know, is your living expenses. We'll get into that specifically. And then, of course, there's debris removal built into your policy and then simply your trees, plants, and shrubs, which we'll get into as well.

Going on to the next—alright, so let's talk about your dwelling because that seems to be quite a topic for a lot of people. When you look at the policy, folks, you're going to see a base limit or otherwise known as a stated limit, and that is the dollar amount that your insurance company is contractually bound to pay you up to. But there is a lot of ways that the insurance companies try to determine what they owe you.

And I'm going to put this in some pretty simplistic terms for you to better understand. Your entire financial recovery—I mean your entire financial recovery—is solely dependent on that one individual's interpretation of your loss as they interpret the information you give them and translate that to the software system that we use. That's a fairly dangerous position to be in, folks, when there's somebody else who may have potentially even flown in from another state who is a catastrophe adjuster that doesn't even live in the state of California trying to determine what the replacement cost of your property is in a state that they don't live in. That can become problematic.

Built into your Coverage A dwelling, you also have debris. And debris is going to become quite a topic in the days to come because some of which you may want to have done on your own, and you get outside bids, and your policy should cover a majority of those expenses if not all of those expenses. And the state may step in and take care of some of these expenses as well, which I think it's a little early to determine what they're going to be doing just yet.

Your landscaping will always be 5% of your dwelling, which is your trees, plants, and shrubs. However, the insurance companies have learned a lot of lessons over the last eight to ten years with wildfires that have ripped through California, unfortunately. And some of your policies might be specific, and they may state that trees, plants, and shrubs for your landscaping are planted trees, plants, and shrubs and may exclude natural trees, plants, and shrubs.

Well, for some of you who have five, six, seven, ten acres, it would be pretty easy for you to get your 5% of your trees, plants, and shrubs. But you must read the policy. I would also encourage everyone here listening to ask your adjuster in writing, folks, for a certified copy of your policy. It is not something that you get from your agent or your broker. A certified copy is a copy that comes directly from underwriting.

And the reason that that is so critically important—as one of my colleagues once said, "It's the rulebook to the game that you're in, and if you don't have the rulebook, you're not in the game." The certified copy is the latest version of the contract that you are in with your insurance company. Any changes made by the Department of Insurance over the last 12 months or any changes made by your insurance company over the last 12 months will be represented in your certified copy. So in writing, make sure you please request that you want a certified copy, and they can send you an electronic copy via email through your adjuster.

So when you have a loss like this, we're going to talk at a high level here because each one of your situations is going to be a little bit different depending on whether you have a mortgage or you don't. So we're just going to cover some basics, and there are three to four basics that apply to your dwelling in these events: You don't rebuild, you purchase a replacement property, or you rebuild on-site. There is a fourth, but it only applies to a certain few, and that is you can rebuild anywhere else in the country. There are some restrictions to that, so I'll touch on that lightly for the interest of time.

If you have an extended replacement cost endorsement, folks, it's important to know that even if you see that percentage and you see that you are entitled to that dollar amount, the most you will ever get as a check in your hand from your insurance company is the stated limit. Again, if you can prove that you're entitled to the full replacement cost of your policy limit, that secondary extension only comes into play when you perform.

Well, what does "perform" mean? Perform means buy another property or rebuild another property. If you folks choose not to rebuild your property, the most you will get—again, that's if it's measured correctly—will be the stated limit in your Coverage A. Now, there are several of you out there, and I've had many conversations over the past few days with many unfortunate people that are suffering. Some of you have gotten policy limits, but there's a reason behind that. It's probably because you may have been heavily underinsured with your property.

I would also encourage you to be careful about the conversation you have with your neighbors and your friends and Facebook and all the other different social media sites that people are subscribing to that give a lot of information. And the problem is that your claim is not the same as anybody else's. Your loss is not the same as anybody else's. Your coverage is not the same as anybody else's.

So be careful when you start hearing the advice of others and what they're experiencing because that does not necessarily mean that that applies to you. And just because one insurance company is doing something and yours isn't, and they've gotten limits and you haven't, you don't know what their particular situation was and if they were properly insured or not. But getting back to your extended replacement cost endorsement, if you purchase a replacement property and your loss has been measured above that stated limit, remember that only kicks in after your loss has been measured through an estimate to exceed your policy limit, will it unlock that extended replacement cost endorsement.

Well, what if you choose not to rebuild and you want to buy another property? Well, that's a discussion that needs to be had early on with your adjuster so that you can properly prepare and set the tone for how they intend to release the monies to you for the purchase of your new property. What I would recommend strongly, folks, is if you have questions—and I don't want to get into the deep details on this because it literally can take us into two hours—I am more than happy to spend one-on-one time with each and every one of you and explain your options as it relates to your claim, as it relates to your policy, so that you are informed enough to make some better-educated decisions as you move forward.

If you choose to rebuild on-site or choose to rebuild elsewhere in the country, then that extended replacement cost does come into play. It is an extension of coverage that you are entitled to. But again, it all depends on how your loss is measured by the insurance company. And if you think about it from a tactical standpoint, and from a business perspective, if the insurance company does not measure your loss up and over policy limit, they don't have to open that extension of coverage, which is an additional liability to them.

So, folks, don't be surprised if, when you finally get your estimate or you finally get your final settlement offer from the insurance company and it's not policy limits, you understand why now. There's a little bit more behind it. They're trying to keep themselves out of opening that extension of coverage, which in many cases in some of these policies is a pretty big number for many of you. And it's also important to note that all of you folks, unfortunately, have gone from the asset side of the ledger to the liability side of the ledger. And the adjuster's job is to support their employer's financial position, not yours. They are not your advocate. They are not on your side. They are representing the insurance company in their position, and they're doing their job the way their employer expects it done—no different than anybody else who has a job and their employer expects them to do their job that certain way.

So understand, when they are giving you these, "Hey, we're going to take care of you," and—and State Farm does it well—they have great commercials where, you know, the adjusters are hugging those who have lost their homes to a tornado, and they lead you to believe that they're going to be there for you. I wish, folks, that the insurance companies did what we all hoped that they would and should. But unfortunately, that's just not how this industry works. You have to prove to the insurance company what you are owed.

And it's difficult when you don't get your policy limits, and how to get them to move that needle becomes increasingly difficult. Additional increase due to declared catastrophe—now, this is not a declared catastrophe, but in some cases with previous wildfires, some of your policies have endorsements that change the language yet again. If it is declared a catastrophe, it can up your policy limits by 50%, in some cases up to 100%. That is a rare endorsement, but it is an endorsement, and only a few carriers offer that endorsement.

And then, of course, getting back to the code, if you have code upgrade coverage, it is also representative by a percentage of your dwelling. So in this example here, if you had a million-dollar base limit on your policy, and 10% of your code coverage would represent $100,000 that you would have available to you for code-related items. And I'll briefly explain what code-related items are.

If your home is 20 or 25 years old and it was built back then, and now you're rebuilding now, the code and the building department provisions and requirements back 25 years ago are not going to be the same as they are today. So if you had to put sprinklers in your home when you rebuild your home, if you had to put solar on your home that you didn't have before, any cost that you incur that is driven by an entity of authority that requires you to add to your home as a code-related item—which your contractor would take care of as they lay the plan out—that additional cost, instead of it coming out of your dwelling coverage, would come out of that separate bucket of money specifically related to code-related items.

That bucket, folks, is a use-it-or-lose-it bucket of money. It is not something the insurance company will ever just cut you a check and hand to you. You must perform, and you must incur the cost in advance before the insurance company will typically reimburse for that expense. If you have a contractor and you are building a home, and the contractor has to put sprinklers in, typically they will have to put the sprinklers in, and then you would send the invoice to the insurance company to cover that expense, and they would pay that separately.

In this—in this example here, for purchasing a replacement property, if you're buying a home of equal value and it requires certain upgrades, you may be able to transfer some of those proceeds for your code upgrade coverage into your new home to bring your new purchase up to code. But again, folks, I encourage you, the language of your contract is specific, and you must read how it performs so that you know how to strategically position yourself as you go along and start communicating with your adjuster.

And we'll go into the next slide here, which is your other structures. Other structures, folks, is pretty simple. It's basically—here's a simple example: If you took your home and you plucked it off the property, anything left remaining on the property falls under other structures. And as I mentioned in the beginning, a lot of you are typically underinsured in this particular coverage because some of the brokers and agents don't have conversations with their insureds about adding those structures as scheduled line items with their own values instead of that particular, let's say, a 1500 square foot shop being included in your standard policy for a small percentage. You would have the value of that added as a separate line item to cover that particular structure in the event of a loss.

But what you can typically see under your other or separate structures would be detached garages, workshops, fencing, retaining walls, walkways, driveways, patios, sprinkler systems, exterior lighting that are hardscapes, pools, I even like to throw in outdoor kitchens and, of course, cabanas. Some of your policies may extend your extended replacement cost endorsement into your other structures. Very rarely do they do that, but there are some cases where that is applicable.

And again, folks, gotta get that certified copy of your policy so you understand what you're working with, so you know how to navigate what you're entitled to. Debris removal is built into that as well. It's an addition to your base limit, so you typically will always have 5% for debris removal, and code upgrade also applies to your other structures. So if you had a shop and you're rebuilding a shop, and now you need to bring that shop up to code, you would be able to potentially transfer some of your code upgrade expenses when rebuilding your shop.

I think going into the next, which is your personal property, I think this is the one where most people have the hardest time as they challenge themselves over the next three, four, five, six months. Now, the insurance company pushes pretty hard, and they want you to come up with your own personal property. We're going to talk about that for a second because I want you to understand a deeper tactic as to why the insurance companies do this and what these advances mean that you're receiving.

Statistically, if an individual who has suffered a major catastrophic loss like this, total recreation is required to determine what the value of your loss is. The insurance company puts the burden on you to recreate what you've lost. Well, folks, you have to ask yourself why—why do you think they do that? Well, number one, you have no system in place. Number two, it's an emotionally taxing, time-consuming, burdensome, overwhelming, just emotionally disturbing task.

And they know that while you mean well and are going to list your personal property, the chances of you leaving things on your list is incredibly high. But what they're really banking on, folks, is this—if I'm the insurance company, and I give you an advance, and I know based off your policy and all the information attached to your policy and your application, how old you are, if you're retired, if you work, they have all the data. They know. They're rolling the dice, folks, that if they give you an advance, that that task is going to be so overwhelming to you—not only in the amount of time that you have to spend to get it done, but the emotion that it brings out in you and the burden that it places upon you—you're more likely to give up and take that advance and walk away from what you're really entitled to.

So if you think about the number of people who have lost their homes, you think about the number of people who are given advances, and then you think about the number of people who walk away from what they're actually entitled to because they're overwhelmed, and they just say, "Forget it, I'm done. I don't want any part of this. I can't do it. It's just too much, and I just can't do it any longer." That is why they give you an advance and not pay you policy limits, folks. It's so that they hope and roll the dice that you are not going to dig your heels in and do all the research and provide all the documentation that they require in order to pay you your limits.

And they continue to keep putting these requests upon you. They want pictures, and they want receipts, they want this, they want that, and it's all gone. So it just adds another layer of stress on you to try to perform and come up with the documentation that they're requesting, which is just unnecessary. And you don't have to provide all that, folks, in general, because there's nothing for you to draw from. It's all gone. So it's important to understand how that works and how your advances work.

So I'm going to spend a little bit more time on personal property because I think it's very important. When you look at your base limit, again, in your policy for your coverage for personal property, remember, folks, that's the dollar amount that they owe you up to. But most of your policies, in fact, all of your policies will have sublimits. And a sublimit is a limit that is applied to a specific subject or product.

In this particular case, when you see BPP in this example, that's business personal property. The insurance policy covers your personal property, not your business personal property. I bring that to your attention, folks, because if you happen to have a business that you run out of your home, you must be careful about the conversation you have with the insurance company because if you are trying to include business personal property in your personal property product that you're presenting to the insurance company, they can question all of the property in your personal property product if they find out that you're running a business because they don't cover that. And there's sublimits, and typically, it's about $5,000 for most.

Sublimit watercraft will have sublimits, cash will have sublimits, stamp collections will have sublimits, coin collections will have sublimits. Again, folks, I encourage if any of these things apply to you, it's important for you to get into that policy—that contract—and understand what the sublimits are so as you're preparing your document, you understand how to navigate around that language. It's important to your overall recovery.

You must use and leverage the language of your contract against the carrier by way of how you prepare your product and ultimately present it to the insurance company for the purpose of negotiating your final settlement. Some of you may have what are called scheduled items. An example of that would be, let's say you had a 50-year-old baby grand piano that was worth $100,000. Well, you would not typically have that as part of your standard personal property coverage because that one line item might consume one-third of your entire coverage and leave the rest of what you have in your home to be covered under the two-thirds.

So the chances of you being underinsured in that example are pretty high. So most will then have what's called a scheduled line item, which applies a specific value to a specific line item, be it jewelry or a piano in this case, or even firearms. It just depends on the value of what it is that you're insuring.

Now, getting back to what I said earlier about the ACV versus RCV and depreciation and how that all plays a role—so we're going to go back a little bit. We're going to discuss your advance. When you get an advance, folks, you have to understand what that means. What the insurance company is saying to you is, "We will give you X," whatever that percentage is. We'll just, in this case, use a $300,000 policy, and they're going to give you 30% of an advance. They're going to give you $100,000 upfront, and they make it known that you don't have to come up with anything—you don't have to provide a personal property list, and you don't have to recreate. And they really drive that point home for the reasons I mentioned earlier because they're hoping you're going to take that advance and walk away and save the insurance company two-thirds of what they owe you.

In your policy, it states that the insurance company owes you actual cash value first and replacement cost value once you replace the personal property that was lost. We're going to get into that right now. Some of you have just actual cash value policies, which, as I mentioned, is replacement cost minus depreciation. That's what equals actual cash value.

Here's an example of that: If you have a couch, and that couch is five years old, and you spent $1,000 on that couch, and the insurance company starts asking questions because they want to know how old the couch is, and when you put down that that couch was five years old, and you paid $1,000 for that couch, they're going to look at the database and say, "Huh, this particular couch—and wherever they get their data, who knows—has a 10-year lifespan. And because it's five years into its 10-year lifespan, and because you spent $1,000 on the couch, we're going to depreciate that couch by 50%, and we're going to give you $500 now. And when you replace that couch and give us the receipt that you've spent $1,000 to replace that $1,000 couch, we will give you the other $500 in depreciation."

It is important, folks, to understand when you get these advances what that means. When you prepare your personal property and submit it to them, you first have to justify the advance that they've given you. So to put it in perspective, if you have a $100,000 advance, in order for you to justify that advance, you must submit to the insurance company a replacement cost list of about $170,000, sometimes maybe even $180,000, just to justify the advance. I'll say that again—you have to prepare and submit a replacement cost value because, remember, you're entitled, folks, to what it takes to replace the personal property, not what you paid for it back then, but what it would take for you to replace it today.

In order for you to get that $100,000, you have to go so far over that $100,000 because you know they're going to apply depreciation. Well, many insurance companies will just wave their depreciation magic wand, and it will be from 35% to 75%. You will probably fall within that range. So you must prepare in advance using that same example. If you have a $300,000 policy limit, you will need to probably prepare an inventory replacement cost value of around $500,000. I won't go into the deep, deep details of how to determine whether you think you had that or not. Again, I am more than happy, folks, to spend personal time with you and discuss your specific situation because everybody's is going to be different. And I encourage you to reach out so that I can give you a little bit more information as it relates to your particular situation.

But overall, that is how personal property works. That's how actual cash value works. That is how replacement cost works. The insurance company only owes you the actual cash value first, upfront, and when you replace it, if you have a replacement cost policy—which again, folks, you have to know because you want to be preparing the appropriate document and submitting it to the insurance company under the proper pretense so you know what you expect back from them.

With that, we'll go into a little bit more of some common inventory questions and examples. And this is where we kind of get into some of the tips and some of the tricks that may help you as you move forward in this particular part of your claim. Do you need to list every item? Well, I don't know. That's a great question. The more you list, folks, the more you're entitled to recover.

Now, if you have $300,000—I keep using that number because it's a simple number—if you have $300,000 in coverage and you have incredibly high-end artwork, you have a beautiful baby grand, you have extremely expensive jewelry, you have incredibly rare antiques—whatever may apply—if you start from the big items and work your way down, the chances of you getting to your policy limit is greater than if you start from the small items and work your way up. So do you need to list every item? Every household is different, folks. It depends on what you had and what you believe the value of what you lost is, and that will determine whether you should really list everything or start at the big, high-end expensive items and work your way down and see if you can get to where you need to be so that you don't have to get into the weeds, as we say, and start counting spoons and spices in your spice rack and toothpicks because these are all things we typically count for a client.

There's nothing that we leave off the list. We go all the way and make sure we capture everything, but that may not necessarily be what you need or want to do. What is a holdback, and how does it work? Well, again, I kind of addressed that in the previous slide. Depreciation is held back. But if you think about it again, folks, from another tactical perspective—and this is a business transaction, and you are in a negotiation with your insurance company—if I'm the insurance company and I only give you an advance, and I hope you walk away, and then you don't walk away, now I'm betting on the fact that you are not going to prepare a detailed enough product to capture everything that you are owed.

And so I'm still going to apply heavy depreciation to the list because what I do know is that you are not going to replace 100% of the line items that you've lost because the reality, folks, is by the time you end up either getting into your new home or going through the rebuild process—if you decide to buy another home and that's the path that you choose, that's certainly going to be a fast-track path to get you back into some sense of normalcy—but if you intend to rebuild wherever you intend to rebuild, you know that that's probably going to take a year and a half to two years, right? That's kind of the standard timeline. In some cases, it can take up to three, but nonetheless, you know you're committed to at least two years.

Well, during that two-year period, folks, your lifestyle has changed, and the things that you may have accumulated over the last 40 years or 30 years you're not going to need any longer. And so as you make your list and as you submit it to the insurance company, and as they pay you for what they believe they owe you, the chances of you replacing all the items is rare. Which means who gets to keep all the depreciation? The insurance company does.

So if you look at this example here, I'm going to, I'm going to kind of point you in a direction that you should have your mindset dedicated to because it really is going to be what's going to be required of you to get you to the finish line to hopefully get you to your policy limits on your personal property. What I offer all of you joining us this evening is the following: Please email us your email address, and in doing so, I will send you the following—we have prepared over our 65,000 residential losses an item called a Whole House Guide.

It is a product that we find our standard normal items you typically find in a home, and it has about 4,000 different line items. Now, this product, when we present it to our clients, typically as our team works with them to recreate what they've lost, it's really to help jog your memory. So it's not just about looking at the list and saying, "Oh, I had this, and I had this, and I had this, and I had this." What it's meant to do is prompt you to think about associated items that might apply to that line item. Because when you start looking at your personal property through a different lens, and you have a system in place, it makes it easier for you to navigate and be more effective and more efficient with the use of your time.

So I'm happy to send that to you because it will be very helpful. What I'm also going to send to you, if you would like, is a sample of what we produce for a client. Because as I mentioned earlier, we represent the insured. And in doing so, we have an entire team of professionals that are experts in each one of their disciplines, and one of which is our personal property division. And our team sits with families, and we literally go through and recreate through a very systematic system what you've lost and get you into the 90th plus percentile of items that you've lost in the home.

But that's not where it stops, folks. And this is where the hard part comes in for you—you must do the research to prove to the insurance company the value of the line item that you are presenting to them so that they understand what it's going to take to replace that item. What I mean by that is the following: If you are submitting a line item, we strongly suggest—it is what we do, and I suggest that you do it—you find the item online, you screenshot the item, and then you add that as part of your personal property product that you are going to be submitting to the carrier because that supports the value and becomes an exhibit to support that line item's valuation.

Because remember, it's not the insurance company's obligation—it is your obligation to prove to them what you are owed. So in order to get your policy limit, we encourage you to do the following: Do not do your personal property in pieces. Don't submit it to them in pieces. Wait until you have your entire product, and you've gone through it again and again and again, and make sure that you've not missed anything. Make sure you have the appropriate pricing because there is no rush, folks, and don't let them push you into submitting something earlier than you feel comfortable submitting it.

Because the faster you submit it, the chances of you leaving something off that list is very high. Take your time. Don't rush. And I encourage people to change their mindset when it comes to their personal property. And I would explain it to you like this: If I were to say to each and every one of you, "Client A" or "prospective client A" or "insured A," if you have $300,000 in personal property, and I were to say to you, "Hey, do me a favor. If you would put in two hours a night, five nights a week—take the weekends off—for two months, just two months, that's it. I just want you to work two hours a night, five nights a week, for two months. I will pay you $300,000." Folks, that's how you have to look at this piece of your claim.

The more effort you put into it, the more money you are paying yourself. And so don't give up. Never give up. If you feel like you're overwhelmed, put it down. But when I give you these samples, I think you'll find them very helpful. It'll give you a format to follow. You do not have to use the insurance company's format that they give you—that's what they want because it's what best represents them. You can put your personal property together in any format that you'd like. But if you request a sample of what we produce, you should use that format as your baseline. It'll be far more effective.

So getting into inventory tips and tools—and I know I'm spending a little bit more time than I normally would, but I think it's important—keep a pad and paper next to you, folks, always. Next to the bed, in your car, and as you start to think about things, just get it out of your brain and get it on paper. It doesn't have to have any rhyme or reason. It doesn't have to be in any particular order. Just get it on paper and then circle back to that, and then you can start to put it in a more comprehensive order as it relates to what you've lost.

Draw each room out. Now, you are used to walking through your home through a very—you have a pattern. You walk in a certain door when you come home from work, you go out a certain door when you go into the backyard, you go out a certain door when you're taking the garbage out. You have a pattern as you walk through your home. So as you're trying to walk through your home with your mind's eye, your mind's eye is taking you down that same pattern.

We encourage you to change the way you're looking at your property. Look at it from the top down and draw an aerial perspective of your home, which changes how you are looking into your home. And it kind of removes you from getting into that structured path. And then we encourage you to separate each room by quarters—just draw an X across the room. And as you look down into that room, folks, jump into that one corner of that room, that one little square with your mind's eye, and go clockwise in that one little segment of that room, up the wall, down the wall, across the floor. And as you're doing that and as you outline the aerial view of your home, please make sure that you're visualizing where the drawers and the bureaus and including the shelves and linen closets.

And as you systematically go through each room, instead of you being overwhelmed with your mind's eye walking into that and everything jumping out at you, you have a much more controlled, systematic approach to how you are capturing your personal property. Don't forget what was under the beds. Don't forget what was in the closets on that shelf that we always put things up there that we always forget.

Use family and friends, folks. If you've ever had a Christmas or birthday or an Easter or a Thanksgiving and other family members joined and they took pictures, start putting together a Dropbox account and have all your friends and family look through all of the photos over the years and drop those photos into your Dropbox. For those of you that didn't take videos prior to the loss or don't have pictures, everything in the background of those pictures, folks, is your personal property. And it does help when you're trying to recreate what you've lost when you're stuck.

And of course, again, anything that you can pull from the cloud and anything that you've ever saved with these smartphones is going to be very helpful. Because again, the fit, the finish, the materials that you use for your home and the personal property is all captured in these photos, and it can be very helpful when it comes time to trying to determine what you've lost.

Next, we're going to jump into loss of use. I'm taking a little bit more time than I normally would, folks, because it's—I've had so many questions regarding personal property, so I apologize for spending so much time on that. But it really is critical because that's the hardest part of your entire claim.

So all of you have loss of use and/or AL and/or fair rental value. So your policy may have different language, but we'll explain what the difference is. Your loss of use is your housing. Now, folks, it's important that you understand how your contract is expected to respond as it relates to your housing. You are entitled to maintain your normal standard of living. That is how the language is worded in your contract—you are entitled to maintain your normal standard of living.

If you lived in a 3500 square foot home, you are entitled to rent a 3500 square foot home. What you don't want to do is think you're doing the insurance company a favor by trying to find something for less than what you had. Because remember, folks, this is going to be something you are going to be in for the next 12 to potentially 24 months, and you want to make sure that that environment in which you are going to be living in temporarily will allow you to maintain whatever EV you would typically enjoy throughout the course of the year.

If you have family that come during the holidays and stay with you, you want to make sure that your temporary home has the ability to accommodate that. You just want to try to get to some sense of normalcy as best you can, given the situation. So additional living expense covers your temporary housing. It will cover the furniture rental, it will cover increased mileage. And there is an app if you have smartphones, folks, it's called MileIQ. Again, I'll repeat that—Mile, M-I-L-E, the letter I, the letter Q.

I encourage you to download this because you are entitled to increased mileage traveling from point A to point B. Example: If you are working and you still work, and it was 15 miles from your home to your job, and now with your temporary home, it is 25 miles from your home to your job, you are entitled to be reimbursed for that additional mileage. But this app, MileIQ, tracks every time you get in the car, and at the end of the day, you can either swipe one direction if it was business and swipe the other direction if it was personal. And it catalogs and logs all your mileage.

And so if you want to submit your mileage at the end of the month, or you want to submit your mileage at the end of the year, or you want to submit your mileage at the end of the week, whatever you prefer, it is documented so that you can be reimbursed. Now, it might not be much, folks, but if it's another $1,500 at the end of the year, that's your money and you're entitled to it, so you should be paid it, as long as you can record what you've incurred.

Animal boarding—most of you that I've talked with have animals, and many of you are staying with friends and family. But the insurance company is obligated to cover the expense of housing your animals—a doggy hotel, a kitty hotel, whatever that might be. But if you're staying with friends and family, they should too be paid for housing your pets because remember, that AL is a use-it-or-lose-it bucket as well.

You must incur the cost. You must prove to the insurance company what you're entitled to in order to get them to pay. So if you don't submit invoices or you don't submit lease agreements between you and your family or you and your friend, they are not going to get paid, and they are entitled to be paid. You want to make sure that you're operating within the boundaries of your policy limits, folks, because your limits are going to be defined by either a dollar amount or an amount of time.

If it is a dollar amount, it is important that you make sure that you are not spending more per month that will not allow you to stay in temporary housing for 18 to 24 months. If you have $120,000 in your AL or your loss of use coverage, you certainly don't want to be spending $10,000 a month because you're going to be out of those proceeds in a year, and you may not be able to get back into your new home within that time.

And you certainly don't want to find yourself paying a mortgage and being stuck in a lease where that could start to harm you financially. So it's very critical that you amortize that money out. You're making smart decisions as to how much you're spending each month and not exceeding a dollar amount so that you have that money to sustain you for however long you believe you're going to be displaced. I would encourage 24 months.

Some of you may have what is called fair rental value. Fair rental value is when the insurance company will pay you every month for what your home would have rented for at the time of the loss. If your home would have rented or could have rented for $3500 at the time of the loss, they will pay you $3500 per month, and you can then do what you choose with that.

Caution—if you get $3500 a month, and you're staying somewhere for $1000 a month, the insurance company has every right at 90 days potentially, or even six months, to ask you to show them proof that you have been spending $3500 per month. Now, folks, these coverages here, you can get incredibly strategic with how you navigate through these coverages. Again, I encourage you to reach out, talk to me about your specific situation so I can give you some options to consider, and there are a lot to consider.

But at face value, for AL and fair rental value, as it stands now, that's how those two play a role in your claim. The carrier is also entitled to pay an increased cost for limited housing, right? I have a client right now, the closest applicable property was in Sacramento, and there was a single property that was available locally. And that particular property is pulling a much higher value because of its availability in the market than it normally probably would if there were multiple products available in the market.

A lot of the real estate agents in the community are working with their clients to pull properties off the market and then allow some of these homes that were originally up for sale to be repurposed for rentals. So if you have a friend that's a real estate agent, we encourage you to reach out and see if you're having a hard time finding housing, explore that option and see if it's worthwhile for someone to pull a home off a market and provide that to you.

Many carriers will give you a 90-day advance against your personal pro or your housing coverage. That doesn't mean anything other than they're just giving you an advance against your housing and allowing you to kind of figure out where you intend to go. It gives you a little bit more money for your deposits. Most carriers will not advance deposits because you get those back at the end of the lease term.

Moving on to how do you ensure that you don't leave any money on the table? Well, folks, do not talk to the insurance company about your goals. That's all I can say. You're telegraphing your position, and you're giving your strategic position away by giving them the ammunition to put the roadblocks in front of you. Those conversations should be kept to yourself, and you should navigate your contract and understand how each option that you are considering is going to play out.

And how do you strategically prepare your claim so that you can achieve that goal? Again, folks, this—this is about education, but I implore you to reach out to me. I will give you suggestions, and I can give you things to think about as you strategically position yourself with achieving your goal. You don't want to step on the landmines, and the problem is that you don't understand where the landmines are. And the insurance company is going to take you down a very scripted path. And I don't care if there are 15 homes that were lost that are all with State Farm—every single adjuster is treating every one of those homes the exact same way because that's the way State Farm has trained their adjuster to do and handle their claim.

By design, folks, there is a reason the insurance companies do what they do, and there is a reason the insurance companies ask what they ask. Problem is, you just don't understand the reasons behind that. Again, meet with a claims consultant, explore your options, understand if an attorney is what's best for you or a public adjuster, which is what we are. We're intimately familiar with negotiating the settlement of these claims. We've had every possible scenario under the sun, and we can give you incredible feedback that might apply and give you a different strategic approach to how you intend to move forward.

It's not as cut and dry as you might think, and you've got to be careful about how you approach your claim. Do I rebuild? Well, that's the question, right? It depends on what your overall goal is. Typically, we sit with a client, we understand what their goal is, and then it's our job—or your job if you're doing this on your own—to understand how to navigate that contract, prepare the appropriate path to achieve whatever the goal is, and put the appropriate game plan in place to achieve that goal.

So it is important that you reach out and take advantage of, of, um, you know, getting that advice and getting that information because all it does, folks, is help you be better prepared so that as you go into battle with the insurance company, you are better armed, uh, with the right tools for what you are getting ready to, uh, experience. These advances always set a false sense of security. They always make people feel like the insurance company is working with them, folks. It's the second half—it's getting beyond that advance that becomes the hard part.

Uh, do you have a mortgage? If so, the bank owns the property, folks. It's not yours until you pay it off. And many people make this mistake that they pay their mortgage off, uh, when they get their advances for their, their structure. I would encourage you to consider looking at that payment like this: If you have a $100,000 or a $150,000 or $200,000 balance on your mortgage and you have two or three acres, the question you want to ask yourself is under normal circumstances, would you spend $150,000 to $200,000 for the land your home was on? And would you pay $150,000 or $200,000—or insert whatever the balance of your mortgage is—to buy the land in the condition it's in today?

That's the question you ask because it does not make fiscal sense, folks, for you to pay three, four, five, six times what you would normally pay for that land just to pay your mortgage off when really all you're paying for is—I hate to say it like this—the scorched dirt, which is not a use of the insurance proceeds. So take a step back before you start paying off your mortgage and ask yourself if it's the right move.

Now, typically, the bank will hold on to that money that they receive from your insurance company, and they will hold on to that until you move into a contract with the contractor. And then they will release that money back to you typically in thirds or in sometimes quarters. It is important, folks, that you reach out to the institution that holds the note, uh, and ask them what is their protocol for releasing funds above their insurable interest.

Their insurable interest is the balance of the mortgage. Example: If you have a $150,000 balance and you're getting a $500,000 check from your carrier, what do they do with the balance that they have no interest in, and how quickly do they rebate that back to you? Because that money, folks, should be working for you, not them. Uh, and so you want to know what their protocol in releasing those monies is so that you can prepare accordingly because that's going to play a role not only when you enter into a contract with your contractor, but potentially if you're moving forward with a purchase.

Um, do you, uh, uh, what, what are your restrictions, if any? Well, again, it goes back to the mortgage. If you have a mortgage, it's going to be difficult for you to buy another property because you have to pay that first note off and then purchase another property, uh, because you're still going to have a financial obligation to your mortgage. Uh, code—does it transfer if you don't rebuild? Uh, is that important, and how might that affect your recovery?

Well, again, folks, each contract is different. Sometimes the contractual language in your policy will clearly state that code is not transferable and that it's only applicable if you rebuild on-site. So I would encourage you again—get your certified copy, go into the area that defines what code upgrade coverage allows and what it excludes, and understand how to navigate that language because it will help you determine what your overall goal may be.

Should you buy instead? Folks, that's a great question that we get all the time. It's, it's not one that we can even answer. It really depends on what makes best fiscal sense for you and if the scenario as a whole, um, would support that path. Again, having a high mortgage may not. If you have a small mortgage and you get a nice large advance from your personal property, the fact is you're never going to replace 100% of your personal property.

So maybe you repurpose some of the money from your personal property, pay off that mortgage, get the bank's name removed from the paperwork, and that way when the insurance company is cutting you checks for your dwelling, they are unencumbered and they only have your name on them and not yours and the bank's because that can become problematic when the bank is controlling the money.

Uh, if I buy instead of rebuild, how do I structure the deal? What upfront commitments are needed? Folks, it is incredibly, uh, important that you get a commitment upfront in writing from your adjuster what, uh, will be required if you intend to move down the path to buy instead of rebuild. Um, because that extension of coverage will come into play because you're not getting it as a check in your hand. You have to understand how they intend to allocate your extension potentially towards the purchase of your property.

It is a, uh, complex negotiation that must take place at the beginning of your claim. So again, if you are considering purchasing a property instead of rebuilding a property, you have to understand how to potentially structure that deal. And you might not necessarily want to give that information up right away to the adjuster until you understand how your policy is going to respond to that option because it may not respond favorably. You may not have an extended replacement cost endorsement. There could be many factors that might hinder you, uh, buying instead of, um, uh, rebuilding.

And again, folks, I encourage you, please reach out because there are some complexities with that, uh, part of the claim that you should be aware of, uh, depending on what you intend to do. And I'm more than happy to go into those details with you, uh, privately as it relates to your particular, uh, claim.

Moving on, I think it's important to understand that in the state of California, it's important to know who can represent you. Uh, folks, again, whether you decide to manage this claim on your own or you feel that representation might be best for you, that's a personal decision that can only be made by you based off how you feel about controlling your claim. And if you believe that you are going to be able to navigate, uh, those muddy waters on your own.

Attorneys can certainly represent you, uh, in a claim. However, folks, this is not a legal issue. Yes, you are in a contract, but it is not a legal issue unless the insurance company says they are not covering your claim. Then it becomes a legal issue. Public adjusters, uh, in the state of California are licensed to do just that—represent you. We are licensed to prepare, present, and ultimately negotiate the settlement of your claim. Uh, and we hold the insurance companies accountable.

And the Department of Insurance has us in the private sector primarily, uh, to balance that scale of power and knowledge between the billion-dollar, uh, entity and the homeowner who may have never suffered a loss previous to this. Contractors, insurance agents, and brokers are not allowed to get involved in the negotiations of a claim. Uh, the Department of Insurance views their position as self-serving. And folks, I would encourage you, uh, be careful if you're going to be engaging with a contractor and having a contractor communicate with your insurance company.

They cannot negotiate your settlement. They can only negotiate what it is they intend to consume, uh, which may not be in your best interest. Uh, you may want to make sure that there's a clear separation between you and the insurance company. And the broker, your insurance agent, and your broker are licensed by the Department of Insurance just like we are. Their licensing allows them to sell you the product. Our licensing is for negotiating the settlement of that product.

Just like I cannot sell you an insurance policy, they cannot negotiate the settlement of a claim. The reason I bring that to your attention, folks, is because if you are relying heavily on your agent, who may be a very close friend of yours, and I certainly mean no disrespect when I say this, and/or a broker, uh, you might be putting, um, yourself in a position where you're going to be let down because those individuals will not engage, uh, to any level, uh, and, uh, represent you in your claim.

Uh, so it's important to understand what to expect. Uh, if in fact you folks want to reach out, um, privately and you choose to schedule time, I am more than happy to, uh, spend that time with you, go through your specific policies, go through your specific situation, uh, and, uh, schedule whatever time you'd like. This is not about representation, folks. Not everybody needs it. And quite frankly, if you can do this on your own, I encourage you to do it, uh, because, uh, you learn a lot going through the process. That's for sure.

I'm going to open it up now for some questions that I've seen coming in, uh, and it looks like we have one here. Uh, there is a resource—is there a resource providing a lot of self-help information and making it seem like we can manage claims on our own, but I'm finding the communication difficult. What can I expect moving forward from my insurance company? Well, folks, you have to understand who you're dealing with. Your insurance adjuster is not licensed by the Department of Insurance. Let's start with that. Uh, that individual is an employee or a third-party vendor of the insurance company.

Why is that important? Well, they are not regulated by the same guidelines we are. They are employees of the insurance company, and they fall outside the guidelines of what are required by the Department of Insurance. To put it in perspective, like your agent and your broker, we are FBI and Department of Justice background-checked. Our curriculum is issued through the Department of Insurance, and our licensing is issued directly by the insurance commissioner for the state of California. Our only role is to act as an advocate and, uh, navigate your claim.

But because we have to have continuing education in order to maintain our licensing status, as does your agent and broker, our knowledge base is 10 times what the adjuster's, uh, knowledge base is. And so I encourage you: ask questions, reach out to the professionals. I can't speak for everybody else, but I can speak for Greenspan specifically. We are here to act as a resource. We're here to make sure that you have the right information.

And because there isn't a particular area where you can go and get all of this self-help information, it can become very difficult for you to prepare, uh, your path moving forward.

Uh, the next one: Can you talk a little bit about the rebuild process as it relates to developers coming into our neighborhoods? How do we weigh our options when considering rebuilding or purchasing? That's a great question, folks. I'll give you an example. It is virtually impossible for you to enter into a contract with a contractor until you understand what the budget is you're working with. So how can you enter into these contracts with contractors when you don't know what the insurance company is committing to just yet?

And you certainly don't want to get yourself in a position where they give you an advance and then they say—they being the insurance company—when you start moving forward, and when you start the building process, if it costs more than what we've come up with, we'll address it then. Folks, that's like going to a car dealership, having them drop a car off in your driveway, you have no idea how much it is, and waiting for that payment in the mail and hope that when you get it, you can make the payment. It is ludicrous to enter into that kind of an arrangement, and the insurance companies do it by design because they want to control the flow of the money.

The game is—and the goal is—to get them committed to your overall budget within about 95% of what they owe you because then you can responsibly move into an agreement with whomever you choose to hire to build your home, number one, or to replace the property by purchasing it. And again, it goes back to what I said earlier: if that is what you were choosing to do and purchase another property, folks, you must understand how to structure the deal on the front end and how to communicate properly with that adjuster so that you are getting them committed in writing—I'm going to say that again—in writing to what it is you are needing.

Folks, do not text with your adjuster. That communication does not make it into your file. If you have a phone conversation with your adjuster, I encourage you strongly to memorialize that conversation in an email recapping what was discussed because it is more common than not that your adjuster, who's made all of these amazing financial commitments to you and told you, "Don't worry," and patted you on the back, "and we're going to get you limits," may be reassigned.

And if that person does not document your file internally and the new adjuster comes in, and you're sitting around waiting for a check because the first adjuster said that they were going to be giving you this nice big fat advance, and there's nothing in your file—it doesn't exist. So please recap your discussions in writing, memorialize your conversations to make sure that you're protected and to make sure that your file is documented appropriately.

Uh, another question here—it says: My adjuster said he can't show me the copy of my estimate yet until it's approved. What does that mean? Isn't it my estimate? Folks, you will not have any access to that estimate that that insurance adjuster is writing until it is approved by upper management. So let me explain the process. For those of you who have already had the time to sit with your adjuster, my guess is they asked you a lot of different questions about the home, the finishes, the materials, and they're trying to recreate what you lost.

Well, there's a very specific software system that's used in the industry that you're going to hear quite a bit about. And if you haven't, let me explain it—it's called Xactimate. It is the language of insurance. It is what the insurance adjusters use in the industry. It is what we use. It is not—I repeat—it is not what standard contractors use. Uh, they do not understand how to read this unless they are in the insurance industry.

The Xactimate software creates a forensically accurate estimate. If I were to compare one of our estimates versus a contractor's estimate looking at the exact same home, a contractor's estimate might be 25 pages—ours might be 65 pages, and that is literal. It's because the details, uh, that lie within the body of that estimate—the greater the detail, the greater the financial recovery, uh, which means you have to be forensically accurate as you approach, uh, the estimating process.

So the reason you don't see it is because the insurance company is paying that individual to write that estimate, which means that that product is the product and is the property of the insurance company, not yours because you are not presenting a product to them. You're allowing them to control your narrative by way of how they assess what they believe they owe you. It is a dangerous position, folks, when you allow the adjuster just to continue to go down a path, uh, and it's not challenged because once they come back to you and they say, "This is what we think we owe you, Mr. and Mrs. Insured, and if you think you're entitled to more, prove it," it's very, very difficult for you to prove something when you don't understand how to use that language, uh, of insurance and how to navigate that software. It becomes very problematic, uh, and that delays your ability to recover what you're entitled to, uh, in many cases by months.

So that's why you're not entitled to it. Uh, another question here: If someone were to consider representation through an advocate, what is the downside to waiting for the insurance company's offer? What would you recommend? Boy, that's the million-dollar question, folks. I'll tell you, uh, I try not to get into the representation side of this thing because it kind of takes away from what we're trying to do here, but I will answer this question.

Uh, if you're considering representation, the reason you would want to consider representation is for the following: Uh, A, you just don't have the bandwidth to properly manage a claim. Uh, B, it potentially—your claim might be large enough where it requires a different level of attention. In many cases, uh, when people lose their home, it is their most valued asset. It is, uh, the largest negotiation that they will ever, uh, endure throughout their lifetime, uh, next to purchasing the home. And in many cases, your retirement and there are other implications, uh, if this doesn't go well, and it limits your ability to continue on with your life's plan if it's not managed appropriately.

So I say this to every person considering representation, and it's a legitimate question. If you can do what a professional firm can do and do it 90% as well as the firm, then you don't need representation—do it on your own. Also, if your loss is of a certain dollar—the value add that a firm like ours would bring might be limited. And I will just tell you, folks, if somebody is pursuing you, and they are a public adjuster, and you have a $300,000 loss or $400,000 loss, I would have you take a hard look at the value add that that firm or that individual is telling you that they are going to be able to bring.

Because typically, losses under $300,000, $350,000, $400,000—there isn't enough meat on the bone for a firm like ours to generate enough value add to justify our fee. And first and foremost, for our firm, I will tell you, we have a moral obligation to our clients and to the public in general, uh, and the last thing that we ever want to do is harm somebody financially. So for me personally and for the other members of our team, I would much rather spend a lot of personal time giving you the expertise that you may need to help you achieve your goal.

Uh, but everybody's bandwidth is different, folks. So I can't—I can't recommend one over the other. I would always say this: There is a reason people hire attorneys when they go to court. There is a reason people hire real estate agents, uh, when they are purchasing a home. And there is a reason why people hire public adjusters when navigating, uh, complexities that are insurance claims as a whole.

Uh, I see another question here: The insurance company wants to send me checks. How does that impact me moving forward? Should I accept the checks the insurance company is giving me? Does that mean I'm settling for that amount? Folks, anytime the insurance company offers you money, I encourage you to take it because the more money you have in your possession is less money that they have to hold hostage and leverage against you at the tail end of the claim.

As long as you are not signing something that states that you are finalizing the claim and that you agree to that dollar as a settlement and a final settlement, then I encourage you—always take the advance and get that money into your account. And speaking of accounts, I also encourage you to open separate accounts for your insurance proceeds so that you are not co-mingling your personal funds with your recovery funds because there will be a lot of interaction as you start getting into, uh, start getting confused with monies coming and going and invoicing and paying this vendor and paying this contractor. It can be, uh, quite confusing.

So do yourself a favor and open, uh, a separate account. That way, you can manage those expenses. And, uh, Jay—I don't know who Jay is, but—excellent webinar and information. Thank you, I appreciate that. And thank you folks very much. Uh, that looks like there—that is the end of, uh, the questions as I see them.

Uh, folks, I thank you for your time. And again, uh, please feel free to reach out to me directly, email me, uh, if you would like a Whole House Guide and a sample of a personal property that we would prepare so you can see the format. Uh, if you'd like to schedule some one-on-one time specifically to address your personal—uh, more than happy to really dive into your, uh, policy and give you a, a forensic-level overview of what you should expect and how you may want to position yourself.

And, uh, happy to give anybody, uh, the advice that they seek. I thank you very much. It's with a heavy heart we even have to have this, but I hope that you found it helpful. And, uh, we are having another seminar next Thursday, very similar to this—in fact, if almost not exact. Uh, so please feel free to share if you found some value. Uh, our goal is to make sure that we spread the appropriate information and give you something that you can take away and use as you move forward, uh, down your claims, uh, recovery path. Thank you very much, and, uh, you folks have a great evening.