A Farmhouse Held Hostage

On Monday May 8, 2017, a gigantic hail storm ripped through northwest Denver. 10–15 minutes worth of hail wrecked our neighborhood and many others nearby in the Denver area.

My husband and I returned home to a shocking disaster. Our home was ripped apart. Trees and plants on our 1/3 acre sprawl were bare — it may as well have been January. But that was the least of it. Our siding was scattered all over our yard, accompanied by shattered glass, roof pieces, and bits of what once were screens and trim on our home. Anything outside was ripped to shreds, even a new metal fire pit was dinged up. It looked like a tornado came through. Nope, just hail.

Window has been boarded up for 12 weeks.

I was on a conference call at the office when my husband got home first. A text from him popped up on my screen saying “so our house is in rough shape..”. I thought he was being dramatic (sorry honey). Then pictures popped up in his texts. Of our beautiful home littered across the yard. Well, that… sucks. I sent one of the photos to my client — he gasped and told me to go home and reconvene later. I took him up on it. Nice client :-).

I stepped inside and counted 1….2…3…phew. Our 3 animals inside the house unhurt. Shattered glass scattered around the house and curtains blew in and out through gaping holes where windows that had survived 120 years of beatings had met their match with the hail. Mini ponds of melting hail were forming on our floors — on carpet, on wood, around corners. Hail really knows how to get around in a house. Glass in the dog water bowl. On the couch. Glass, water, debris, branches, holy crap, have we entered Oz? Hope the dogs hadn’t been thirsty! Curtains were sliced, wood floors scratched, the list goes on. Worse things could’ve happened. We still have a house. Nonetheless, it was pretty overwhelming. If you read this post, you saw the damage: https://medium.com/perfors-mansion/the-storm-that-tried-to-eat-our-farmhouse-5e4bde09f74b.

Hope our dogs weren’t thirsty.

Steve and I got to work — boarding up windows, sweeping up glass, drying out soaking carpet and furniture inside, ripping up floors that had water leaking in to dry it out. We stayed surprisingly calm, thinking “We have good insurance. We got this. It’ll be fine”. Never occurred to us that insurance would be the least of our worries.

We stayed surprisingly calm, thinking “We have good insurance. We got this. It’ll be fine”. Never occurred to us that insurance would be the least of our worries.

Boy, was USAA awesome. Put at the top of their priority list, USAA adjustors arrived in less than 48 hours because our damage topped the charts. USAA sent a 32-page comprehensive claim estimate in less than a week. “Oh, wow, this is… long. But it’s ok, we got this. It’ll be fine” we thought.

And then we realized that USAA was the least of our worries. We got our first claim check in June, made out us + the mortgage company (standard). Phew, progress. Lucky us. The mortgage company certainly has a right to ensure that their investment is protected. Just have to get them to endorse the 1st payment, and we can get work started. Sweet, let’s do this!

Our Mortgage Company is Holding Our Insurance Money

.. and they won’t tell us why.

Franklin American Mortgage’s Insuranceclaimcheck.com deposited our USAA insurance check. They received every document on their lengthy requirements to-do list. Our contractor knocked out every piece of paperwork requested in less than a day. It’s been 13 weeks since the hail storm that did over $100,000 in damage to our home, and we have not seen a dime from Franklin American Mortgage.

It’s been 13 weeks since the hail storm that did over $100,000 in damage to our home, and we have not seen a dime from Franklin American Mortgage.

Terrified that a damaged roof and falling apart light fixtures would cause leaks, electrical failures, or who knows what else, we have fronted over thousands and thousands of dollars in materials together with our contractor to start (approved) work. The roof is done. Light fixtures replaced. Our contractor hasn’t been paid. We haven’t been reimbursed. Not. One. Dime. We have no idea when the mortgage company may decide to give us the money that we need to continue repairs on our own home, their investment… and they’re not giving us any answers.

We have no idea when Franklin American Mortgage may decide to give us the money that we need to continue repairs on our own home, their investment… and they’re not giving us any answers.

Over the last 9 weeks, we have called Franklin American Mortgage’s third party claim service 7 times. We have given them over 16 documents (not pages, documents) for our FIRST check.. this isn’t for final repairs. This is the first check we are supposed to get for ACV (actual cash value). The purpose of that money is so that we can put money down to start repairs. After every phone call, we comply with each new request. 3 times the instructions completely contradicted the prior call. Each representative (different every time) tells us a fun new tid-bit:

• You’ll get your check after sending 5 required documents.
• 1 of us is not on the loan. We sent in a doc to make sure we could both call to help manage the claim. Rejected. Revised. Rejected again. Told to do a different kind of verification. 3 weeks after originally being told, Steve doesn’t have to call the 1–800 number from work on the oil rigs… #progress.
• 1 doc on incorrect letterhead. Re-send, wait 3–5 days, call back, see if they liked the letterhead better.
• Check comes after asking for it via phone (we did, again, again, again).
• All paperwork is in and correct. Check is coming soon.
• You’ll get your check after 1 more thing is re-submitted (ha, see prior bullet).
• Change the cost estimate on 1 form (we changed it, re-submitted).
• The doc amount you changed to is wrong (the amount they told us to down to the cent on prior call).
• 1 doc needs to be re-sent.

Before each call, we wait in a queue with a 1–800 number on hold. We re-explain the process. We wait. We get a conflicting answer. Rinse. Repeat.

The online account has said to expect the check in 4 days for over 60 days. There’s no hint that anything is missing. Maybe I’m getting senile early. Perhaps our contractor, my husband and I have all three suddenly and simultaneously lost the ability to properly fill out paperwork.

This is all you get… rejected 5 waivers to let them speak with our contractor, guess they really don’t want to talk to them! We sent in some of those 4 times. “Not accepted” means it didn’t go through, but “Received” does NOT mean “approved.” There is no approved status. You never know if it’s approved. Until you call. And they give you directions, then reject the modified form that followed their own directions. On one call I had the lady phonetically spell and list each letter of each items he wanted me to change to eliminate error. Sent it in. Called again. They rejected it. Still no money for us.

We worked so hard to get this house. 1–800 numbers don’t get that. USAA showed us they cared. But not Franklin American.

Is it weird that it bothers me that they just…don’t… care? It’s like talking to a bunch of robots. We’re humans, trying to repair our home, bending over backwards to do everything they say. Then they hold our money for months, force us to be out of pocket thousands on repairs, halt our progress with a home that now looks condemned (boarded up windows, siding peeled off all over the yard…), and take up endless hours of our lives. Did you know, mortgage company, that we had plans this year? We wanted to make progress on our house, not spend months fighting to restore it with the insurance protection that we pay for on time, every year. Not fight the company holding the mortgage that we pay on time, every month. We have no power, no recourse. I guess that’s what you sign up for with a mortgage. Gazing at the thousands of gigantic holes in our home’s siding and boards nailed to our windows, I’m starting to wonder if our mortgage company is ever going to pay. I know I have no control over it.

Meanwhile I’m learning more about Franklin American, apparently the subject of a $70 million lawsuit for false claims filings in 2015. Yikes, while the lawsuit is unrelated, that’s not reassuring to how they do business. I shouldn’t let that get to me — every big bank seems to have press about lawsuits in the last few years. There are ripoff and horror story reports about Assurant’s insuranceclaimcheck.com are all over the place. It’s like getting sick and trying to self-diagnose on webMD. Oh my gosh, will we end up like these poor people, frozen in time with their damaged homes fighting this company? What a horrible feeling.

So far, the process has cost us…

• Thousands of dollars in funds that are now not available in our personal bank account. What if something happens to one of us and we need that money? What if one of us gets a fluke job offer and we decide to move? So many what-ifs, so many things we can’t be prepared for. We can’t do anything.
• The contractors are out the money on the roof. Are they accustomed to claim check delays? Sure they are. But this… is… beyond the norm. They delivered a quality service on-schedule and sent in the paperwork on time. How are we going to convince them to start on the next repair task, requiring more upfront costs, when they haven’t seen a dime
• Thousand of dollars in lost hours of productivity. Instead of working to improve our home’s value, we are spending hours every week filling out paperwork (which never works) with insuranceclaimcheck.com. Instead of spending time growing my company and hitting deadlines, I’m spending hours with Franklin American Mortgage’s third party claim service, you get the picture. I’m going to lose all my hair before we see a dime.

The worst part is seeing how little Franklin American and Insuranceclaimcheck.com care.

The worst part is seeing how little Franklin American and Insuranceclaimcheck.com care. I know, I know, that’s real life. Companies don’t care. But that’s really not true. USAA cares. Our contractor cares. And they both show it. Not the mortgage company. A human on the other end of the line who couldn’t care less about actually helping you with your claim is a terrible feeling. The robotic monotone responses that make it crystal clear that Franklin American and insuranceclaimcheckk.com couldn’t care less about getting your claim check to you. Couldn’t care less about the compromised position that you’re in.

We are so lucky that our damage didn’t force us out of our home. What do people do who have lost their entire homes from a natural disaster? Imagine being on the phone with a 1–800 number insuranceclaimcheck.com automaton (yep that’s their new name) with your home burned to the representative hearing “Actually, ma’am, you will need to re-submit that form for the 4th time, give us 5 business days to process it, then if it’s approved, call us back, then you’ll get your first check within 10 business days.”

Meanwhile, we continue to write mortgage payment checks every month, thanking ourselves that we had some money to front to get repairs started and a contractor willing to contribute. Not everyone is so lucky. Ironic, isn’t it, that our own mortgage company is preventing value-improving repairs on a property they have a vested interest in?

Time to go send in a doc for the 7th time, Steve just got off the phone with the automatons.