First House, First Insurance Claim, and No Idea Where to Start

The Order the Process Actually Runs In

Get the roof looked at before you call the carrier. That sounds backwards, and it is the single most useful thing on this page. A written, photographed condition report tells you whether there is a claim worth filing at all. If the damage comes in near or below your deductible, there is nothing to file and you have kept your claim record clean.

Then read two lines in your policy: your deductible, and whether your roof is covered at replacement cost or actual cash value. Those two lines decide what you actually recover, and almost nobody knows them before they need them.

Only then file. When the adjuster comes, someone who knows roofs should be there, because that visit sets the scope everything else is measured against.

What the Words Mean

Replacement cost value pays to put back a roof of like kind and quality, subject to your deductible. Actual cash value pays the depreciated value, so the age and wear of the old roof are subtracted first and an older roof returns less. Many carriers write a policy at replacement cost while the roof is young and quietly move it to actual cash value once it passes a certain age.

On a replacement cost policy the first payment is usually based on actual cash value, and the carrier holds back the difference. That held back amount is called recoverable depreciation, and it is released once the work is actually completed. A first time homeowner seeing that first cheque often assumes it is the whole settlement and panics. It usually is not.

Why Having Someone in the Room Helps

None of the above is secret, but all of it is unfamiliar, and unfamiliar is expensive when there is a deadline attached. The practical value of having a contractor who does this weekly is not that they argue with the adjuster. It is that nothing in the process surprises you, and the scope gets documented properly the first time so there is no supplement fight later.

What This Means If You Are In It Now

Do not file blind. Get it inspected and documented first, read your deductible and your coverage basis, and expect the first payment to be partial. If someone offers to cover your deductible, that is the moment to end the conversation, because on a covered claim the deductible is normally the only out of pocket cost you should have.

In Their Own Words

Posted publicly on Google by Katelyn Beemer, quoted here as written and trimmed only for length.

PRC was great to work with, I had to file a claim with my insurance and with being a new homeowner I didn’t know where to start, Ian and Bradon helped me through the whole process and made it so seamless! The work they did as well was magnificent the materials and workmanship is top notch! I would highly recommend anyone looking for an honest contractor to give PRC a call!!

Where to Go From Here

If this is close to your situation, our roof replacement page covers how we handle the work itself. If it is not quite yours, the closest one we have written up is a stucco house where the whole roof edge had to change.