The fire was outside. The smoke wasn’t.
The loss
A vehicle caught fire outside a home in Pompeii in July 2024. The fire never reached the house, but its smoke did.
We were brought in at the start, before there was an offer. When the insurance company’s offer came, it was $15,462 for the building.
The first pass
- $15,462 replacement cost for the building ($11,680 actual cash value).
- No testing of the smoke inside.
The full claim
- Environmental testing of the smoke inside the house.
- Photos, DocuSketch and a full contents inventory.
- Appraisal.
- $127,548 replacement cost for the building, and contents paid to the $142,800 limit.
What we did
Smoke from an outside fire is easy to underestimate because nothing inside looks burned. We had the house tested by an environmental lab, which measured how far the smoke had actually traveled and what it left behind. We documented the home with photos and DocuSketch and inventoried the contents.
With the test results behind it, the claim went to appraisal.
The outcome
Appraisal settled the claim about ten months after we were engaged: $127,548 replacement cost for the building, and the contents paid to the policy limit.
Identifying details are limited to protect client privacy. Figures are the insurance company's documented position and the final settlement on that claim. Every claim is different, and past results don't predict the outcome of any future claim.
Related
Let's find out where |your claim stands.
Tell us what happened and we'll tell you honestly what your policy covers and what we would do next. It costs nothing to ask.
