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Originally Posted by Raywatkins
We are Brits with a second home in TV. We find every job on the house expensive compared to the UK.
We needed our roof replaced and went to Batterbee Roofing, following a recommendation from a neighbour. The first thing the sales guy said was why pay ourselves when the insurance company would probably pay. Now we are quite dumb when it comes to how things work in the US. So we were sceptical. But we went to our insurers and within a week their person had visited and we had a check for $10k. We were stunned - that would not have happened in the UK.
Batterbee then went through the various options and we went for a higher grade roof with transferable guarantee. Our roof is around 1800 sq ft.
The total cost was $15k.
The insurance company sent us a further check for just over $2k when the job was completed. Our deductible was $1k. Had we not upgraded the roof that would have been the limit of our cost.
Batterbee did a great job - as confirmed by the wind expert we had to produce our certificate for the insurers.
Hope that helps
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As a forensic engineer in the Chicago Area in my working life, I worked for many different insurance companies evaluating all types of property damage claims. My assignment always was to determine the cause and/or extent of damage so that the insurance company could determine if the cause of damage was an insured coverage. In the Chicago Area, most of the roof damage claims we investigated were ones where the Insured was claiming damage caused by ice and water, hail or wind. When it came to asphalt or fiberglass shingles it was easy to determine if there was ice or hail damage by examining the marks on the shingles or water infiltration caused by ice damming, which occurs when water in the downspouts and gutter freeze and the ice in the gutter works its way under the shingles and subsequently into the house. Damage caused by those problems were almost always covered. It is also easy to determine wind damage, since shingles were usually missing.
I am here to tell you that many people tried to claim damage to their roofing, but were denied coverage when the forensic engineer determined that the shingles had simply deteriorated due to natural causes and had reached the end of their useful life. More often than not, we observed curled shingles, missing granules, and other wear defects. Such conditions are NOT a covered peril under any insurance policy. There are many roofing contractors that the insurance industry refer to as storm chasers. They move to areas of storm damage and often go door-to-door telling homeowners they can get them new roofs. They will often go to the extent of damaging the roof so that they will try to get the roof replaced. A good forensic engineer can determine if that has been done; and if so, will indicate in his report the real cause of the damage. Ultimately, the homeowner or business owner does not get paid for the damage that the "storm chaser" has inflicted. Some insurance companies use their adjusters to make the inspection and most adjusters can't recognize what the cause of the damage was and will pay the claim. Shingles and built-up roofs have a limited life span, which can be prematurely shortened in Florida because of the prolonged and hot summers. You were very lucky to have an inexperienced adjuster who was likely unable to determine that your roof had simply come to the end of its useful life. Additionally, although I have been retired for about 4 years and I am not familiar with shingle costs in this area, the amount you paid sounds high to me. I also suspect that your roof surface area was greater than 1,800 sq. ft. More likely, your house is 1,800 square feet (under air) and the roof surface area is much greater due to the slopes and the overhangs, garage and lanai are not usually included in the floor areas used to describe a house. According to the Internet, asphalt fiberglass shingles will cost from approximately $150 to $400 per square (1 square = 100 square feet of
roof surface area), not including the cost of new roof vents if they were replaced.
We did investigate a townhouse development that had extensive premature shingle failures that the insurer's all turned down claims. The Association tried to sue the Insurance Company, Developer, several roofing contractors used by the Developer, the carpenter contractors for failing to install adequate soffit and roof vents, the architects, and numerous other people involved in the construction of the buildings. There were 5 forensic engineers representing various parties to the litigation. In the end, it was proven that the shingles were defective and, based upon documents obtained from the shingle manufacturer, the manufacturer new the shingles were defective but sold them anyway. In over 50 years of my practice, that was the only time in my career defective shingles were found to be the cause of the premature shingle failures.
I hope that your comments don't give people the idea that their insurance company will automatically pay to re-roof their house when the need arises. Most shingles in production today should last from 20 to 30 or more years depending primarily on the weight of the shingle per square, with the heavier the better.