How to complete inventory list after a house fire?
March 7, 2016 5:01 AM Subscribe
My family recently lost nearly all the contents of our house to a fire. How do we handle completing this home inventory list?
Our family all got out and are fine and have been VERY well cared-for. But I am stymied at the moment by the inventory list that was created & provided to us by a contractor hired by our insurance company. We have the list, and we are supposed to provide replacement value plus age for each item.
There are thousands of items. Our house is three stories, plus a basement (which had a separate apartment where a cousin of mine lived). Two of our children's rooms were completely destroyed; almost everything else is being written off due to fire or smoke.
Since I'm posting anonymously, I'll try to provide as much detail here as possible; forgive the length.
Our insurance company is State Farm. They commissioned the inventory list but have been unhelpful with any guidance on how we are supposed to assign values (I've asked). I've taken pictures of every room of the house but now have to confront this damn inventory. I have it in google docs and we can edit it.
We had hundreds of books. Including many, many children's books that were burned to ash. How to value books, when the inventory list says (of a surviving piece) "Bookshelf. Hardcovers 58, Softcovers 35, Children's books 35"? How to assign "age" to all those?
How do we begin to recreate an inventory of our children's rooms, which are nothing but rubble? (We are supposed to do that from scratch.)
How do we value our clothes, which were a total loss, and appear on the list in items like "child's shirt"? For that matter, how do we check that the inventory list is complete? (We're under a deadline on this because a cleanup crew is going to start hauling everything out of the house this week so that rebuilding can start.)
Obviously I know we have to guess on a lot of stuff (age of each one of our possessions??), I just don't know where to start. Are there resources, or professional services, that could help value all this stuff? We would happily pay for such help. :) We live in NYC.
I have googled, of course, but mostly come up with services that inventory your stuff in case of fire--not after it's been destroyed.
I would value any tips on how to go forward with this--and any advice on other pitfalls we should look out for as well, related to recovery from a house fire. Anyone who has been through this (first, I'm sorry!), or if you work in a field related to home recovery, I'd welcome your thoughts. I guess one other thing I'd like to know, from anyone who works in insurance, is how much detail/accuracy an insurance company typically expects on a form like this (excluding fraud of course).
Thank you!
Our family all got out and are fine and have been VERY well cared-for. But I am stymied at the moment by the inventory list that was created & provided to us by a contractor hired by our insurance company. We have the list, and we are supposed to provide replacement value plus age for each item.
There are thousands of items. Our house is three stories, plus a basement (which had a separate apartment where a cousin of mine lived). Two of our children's rooms were completely destroyed; almost everything else is being written off due to fire or smoke.
Since I'm posting anonymously, I'll try to provide as much detail here as possible; forgive the length.
Our insurance company is State Farm. They commissioned the inventory list but have been unhelpful with any guidance on how we are supposed to assign values (I've asked). I've taken pictures of every room of the house but now have to confront this damn inventory. I have it in google docs and we can edit it.
We had hundreds of books. Including many, many children's books that were burned to ash. How to value books, when the inventory list says (of a surviving piece) "Bookshelf. Hardcovers 58, Softcovers 35, Children's books 35"? How to assign "age" to all those?
How do we begin to recreate an inventory of our children's rooms, which are nothing but rubble? (We are supposed to do that from scratch.)
How do we value our clothes, which were a total loss, and appear on the list in items like "child's shirt"? For that matter, how do we check that the inventory list is complete? (We're under a deadline on this because a cleanup crew is going to start hauling everything out of the house this week so that rebuilding can start.)
Obviously I know we have to guess on a lot of stuff (age of each one of our possessions??), I just don't know where to start. Are there resources, or professional services, that could help value all this stuff? We would happily pay for such help. :) We live in NYC.
I have googled, of course, but mostly come up with services that inventory your stuff in case of fire--not after it's been destroyed.
I would value any tips on how to go forward with this--and any advice on other pitfalls we should look out for as well, related to recovery from a house fire. Anyone who has been through this (first, I'm sorry!), or if you work in a field related to home recovery, I'd welcome your thoughts. I guess one other thing I'd like to know, from anyone who works in insurance, is how much detail/accuracy an insurance company typically expects on a form like this (excluding fraud of course).
Thank you!
I'm so sorry, this must be very stressful. Take a deep breath, it doesn't have to be perfect, it just has to be good enough.
For lots of items, you can assign an average price and age. It's fine.
For books:
300 hardcover books--$10 x 300 = $3,000-Average 5 years
600 paperback books--$5 x 600 = $3,000--Average 2 years
For clothing, do the same.
50 Children's shirts--$10 X 50 = $500--Average 6 months.
Children's toys $2000--Average age 2 years
They know that it's an estimate, and frankly, you'll hit your cap for your payout WAY before you get through that list.
Don't sell it short, or underestimate. As long as you're in the ball-park, it's fine.
Do your homework on big ticket items. TVs, computers, furniture.
What they're doing is a formula whereby they depreciate the amount of your recovery by how old the item was at the time of the loss. So if you had two TVs, and they're both $500 to replace, and you bought one a year ago, and one 3 years ago, you might get $450 for one TV and $250 for the other. That is unless you have replacement value, in which case, I don't know why they would be asking about age.
It's daunting, but taking your time and not getting overwhelmed will help you get what you're entitled to. Take it in chunks. And you don't have to be exact.
You don't have to identify the rubble, just think about what things you had, what you need to replace, and it will come to you.
Also, if you plan on replacing your Noritake stoneware with Ikea 'break-um-up' plates, that's not really relevant. The Noritake set cost $700 when you bought it new in 1995, so put that on there.
posted by Ruthless Bunny at 5:34 AM on March 7, 2016 [5 favorites]
For lots of items, you can assign an average price and age. It's fine.
For books:
300 hardcover books--$10 x 300 = $3,000-Average 5 years
600 paperback books--$5 x 600 = $3,000--Average 2 years
For clothing, do the same.
50 Children's shirts--$10 X 50 = $500--Average 6 months.
Children's toys $2000--Average age 2 years
They know that it's an estimate, and frankly, you'll hit your cap for your payout WAY before you get through that list.
Don't sell it short, or underestimate. As long as you're in the ball-park, it's fine.
Do your homework on big ticket items. TVs, computers, furniture.
What they're doing is a formula whereby they depreciate the amount of your recovery by how old the item was at the time of the loss. So if you had two TVs, and they're both $500 to replace, and you bought one a year ago, and one 3 years ago, you might get $450 for one TV and $250 for the other. That is unless you have replacement value, in which case, I don't know why they would be asking about age.
It's daunting, but taking your time and not getting overwhelmed will help you get what you're entitled to. Take it in chunks. And you don't have to be exact.
You don't have to identify the rubble, just think about what things you had, what you need to replace, and it will come to you.
Also, if you plan on replacing your Noritake stoneware with Ikea 'break-um-up' plates, that's not really relevant. The Noritake set cost $700 when you bought it new in 1995, so put that on there.
posted by Ruthless Bunny at 5:34 AM on March 7, 2016 [5 favorites]
I recently saved this comment about insurance claims, specifically about fires. It's from a former insurance company employee and I found it really insightful and helpful. I'm sorry this happened to you and I hope this helps.
posted by rachaelfaith at 5:45 AM on March 7, 2016 [9 favorites]
posted by rachaelfaith at 5:45 AM on March 7, 2016 [9 favorites]
I don't know how State Farm, specifically works, but when a relative lost many high-value items in a robbery, they found that it was better to let the insurance company replace them then take the cash. That is, for things like TV, have them send you a TV, rather than reimburse you for the cost of the TV. The reason was that when paying cash they would send you the literal price of the replacement TV. However, replacing the TV actually costs more than the price -- on a multi-thousand dollar heavy item, tax and delivery can really add up. When the insurance company sent a TV, there was no tax or delivery to pay.
I imagine that how this works varies from one regulatory jurisdiction to another, and one policy to another, but it's worth thinking about. Obviously they can't replace your clothes and books directly, but for anything they can, it might be worth having them do that.
posted by If only I had a penguin... at 7:36 AM on March 7, 2016 [1 favorite]
I imagine that how this works varies from one regulatory jurisdiction to another, and one policy to another, but it's worth thinking about. Obviously they can't replace your clothes and books directly, but for anything they can, it might be worth having them do that.
posted by If only I had a penguin... at 7:36 AM on March 7, 2016 [1 favorite]
First off, I am very sorry for your loss. I've known people who have experienced total-loss house fires and it is very emotionally difficult, particularly this process of valuing your stuff and replacing it.
There does appear to be companies that can help you with this if so desired.
A place to start might be to use a readymade home inventory checklist to help you think of things. Do it in Excel to make the list easy to add on to. Draw a layout of your house as best as you can remember. Go room by room and list every little tiny thing you can remember, even the cheap plastic bins and shoe racks in your closet. Include a short description for special items. Where relevant, include the material - hardwood bedroom set, silk shirts, etc.
Get all the photos you can of the house before the fire - if you lost them, does your extended family have any to help? Get the post-fire photos which may help with the inventorying.
Don't forget the consumables - pantry food, freezer/fridge food, cleaning products, makeup/toiletries.
If you can't remember what you paid for something, find out what it would cost to replace it brand-new with something comparable today. Go to your bank/credit card company and get copies of your statements to check for what you paid for items.
Please note that unfortunately insurance does not allow you to assign any sentimental value to objects/possessions, and quantifying the value of antiques and collectibles can be a real challenge.
posted by lizbunny at 7:43 AM on March 7, 2016
There does appear to be companies that can help you with this if so desired.
A place to start might be to use a readymade home inventory checklist to help you think of things. Do it in Excel to make the list easy to add on to. Draw a layout of your house as best as you can remember. Go room by room and list every little tiny thing you can remember, even the cheap plastic bins and shoe racks in your closet. Include a short description for special items. Where relevant, include the material - hardwood bedroom set, silk shirts, etc.
Get all the photos you can of the house before the fire - if you lost them, does your extended family have any to help? Get the post-fire photos which may help with the inventorying.
Don't forget the consumables - pantry food, freezer/fridge food, cleaning products, makeup/toiletries.
If you can't remember what you paid for something, find out what it would cost to replace it brand-new with something comparable today. Go to your bank/credit card company and get copies of your statements to check for what you paid for items.
Please note that unfortunately insurance does not allow you to assign any sentimental value to objects/possessions, and quantifying the value of antiques and collectibles can be a real challenge.
posted by lizbunny at 7:43 AM on March 7, 2016
Oh my gosh, we went through this! So sorry that you have to deal with it. It's such a shock and a jolt and an enormous pain. So glad everyone in your family is safe. (That's what I had to keep reminding myself as I slogged through this process, and it really is what's important.)
Getting through this is tough, and involves a whole lot of thankless unpaid work. But it's what you have to do to get your life back together, and a fair payout from the insurance company.
Making the claim is a daunting and time consuming process. Our experience sounds similar to yours, in that a couple of our rooms were destroyed completely, but most everything else was still there, although charred, scorched and waterlogged.
Contrary to the advice above, my advice is to make as detailed a claim as you can. If there's any way that you can find the enormous time or energy to do that, it will pay off in the end. Getting the claim together unfortunately is like having a part time job, but the better job you do, the less "adjustment" the insurance company will make to your claim. The more detail, the less they can quibble with.
If you don't have the time to deal with it yourself, there are people who will get the list together for you in exchange for a percentage of the claim. Two of these people approached us unsolicited, offering to do the inventory for us. We decided to handle it ourselves. To find those people, call disaster services and fire restoration companies and see if they have any names.
If you have a decent insurance adjuster, you'll be just fine. If you're having to age each item, then you probably don't have replacement value insurance. The fact that they will be deducting value because of age means it's even more important to get as much value for your items as you possibly can. Ruthless Bunny refers to hitting your cap for payout. That depends entirely on your policy and wasn't an issue for us even though our loss added up to a big number. Hopefully it won't be an issue for you either.
In our experience, the more detailed the claim, the less push-back from the insurance company. I sat with trash bags full of clothes, and my friend typed the list as I pulled out each item and dictated "Blue wool sweater from Ann Taylor," etc. Then we assigned prices, either by just ballparking it or by internet search. We listed every single item in the house, down to paper clips. So much random stuff, but it all adds up! For the areas of the house that were completely destroyed, I made detailed diagrams from memory of each wall, closet, shelf, dresser drawer, etc., and tried to visualize walking in there and seeing what was on each shelf, in each corner, in each drawer, etc. Then I made lists from that.
If you have friends or family who have offered their help, consider letting them help with making lists before the stuff is removed from the house.
Our books were ruined but not destroyed, so I listed each one. Since yours are destroyed you'll have to come up with a random sample or just wing it. It's maddening. But just hang in there and do it.
Where are they taking your stuff when they remove it from the house? Our insurance company (not State Farm) put us in touch with a disaster services company. They came and took the entire contents of our home to a warehouse. Even though everything was scorched, charred, water damage, etc., they took it all and stored it temporarily. This was so the the insurance adjuster could come go through it (which I don't think he ever did). For most of a summer, I spent every spare hour going through those boxes, listing every single item.
My heart goes out to you. Best of luck with this. As they say, me-mail me with any questions. And I'll try to figure out how to me-mail so I can answer. Hugs!
posted by MelissaSimon at 7:46 AM on March 7, 2016 [2 favorites]
Getting through this is tough, and involves a whole lot of thankless unpaid work. But it's what you have to do to get your life back together, and a fair payout from the insurance company.
Making the claim is a daunting and time consuming process. Our experience sounds similar to yours, in that a couple of our rooms were destroyed completely, but most everything else was still there, although charred, scorched and waterlogged.
Contrary to the advice above, my advice is to make as detailed a claim as you can. If there's any way that you can find the enormous time or energy to do that, it will pay off in the end. Getting the claim together unfortunately is like having a part time job, but the better job you do, the less "adjustment" the insurance company will make to your claim. The more detail, the less they can quibble with.
If you don't have the time to deal with it yourself, there are people who will get the list together for you in exchange for a percentage of the claim. Two of these people approached us unsolicited, offering to do the inventory for us. We decided to handle it ourselves. To find those people, call disaster services and fire restoration companies and see if they have any names.
If you have a decent insurance adjuster, you'll be just fine. If you're having to age each item, then you probably don't have replacement value insurance. The fact that they will be deducting value because of age means it's even more important to get as much value for your items as you possibly can. Ruthless Bunny refers to hitting your cap for payout. That depends entirely on your policy and wasn't an issue for us even though our loss added up to a big number. Hopefully it won't be an issue for you either.
In our experience, the more detailed the claim, the less push-back from the insurance company. I sat with trash bags full of clothes, and my friend typed the list as I pulled out each item and dictated "Blue wool sweater from Ann Taylor," etc. Then we assigned prices, either by just ballparking it or by internet search. We listed every single item in the house, down to paper clips. So much random stuff, but it all adds up! For the areas of the house that were completely destroyed, I made detailed diagrams from memory of each wall, closet, shelf, dresser drawer, etc., and tried to visualize walking in there and seeing what was on each shelf, in each corner, in each drawer, etc. Then I made lists from that.
If you have friends or family who have offered their help, consider letting them help with making lists before the stuff is removed from the house.
Our books were ruined but not destroyed, so I listed each one. Since yours are destroyed you'll have to come up with a random sample or just wing it. It's maddening. But just hang in there and do it.
Where are they taking your stuff when they remove it from the house? Our insurance company (not State Farm) put us in touch with a disaster services company. They came and took the entire contents of our home to a warehouse. Even though everything was scorched, charred, water damage, etc., they took it all and stored it temporarily. This was so the the insurance adjuster could come go through it (which I don't think he ever did). For most of a summer, I spent every spare hour going through those boxes, listing every single item.
My heart goes out to you. Best of luck with this. As they say, me-mail me with any questions. And I'll try to figure out how to me-mail so I can answer. Hugs!
posted by MelissaSimon at 7:46 AM on March 7, 2016 [2 favorites]
One more point after re-reading your post. The list you were provided by the contractor hired by your insurance company provides only general categories like "10 children's shirts." They could be ratty hand-me-down T-shirts with no value, or they could be shirts from the Gap or a Mickey Mouse shirt from Disney World, etc., that have value. It's only by adding details that you make sure you're getting what you're owed.
posted by MelissaSimon at 8:06 AM on March 7, 2016
posted by MelissaSimon at 8:06 AM on March 7, 2016
I worked as a personal lines insurance analyst for a year and people who hire lawyers got 20-50% more on their insurance claims. People tend to significantly under-claim for both inventory and expenses because of some form of guilt (I don't want to take advantage or seem greedy ..etc..). Insurance companies are legally obligated in most states to tell you everything you are entitled to but often 'forget'. Insurance lawyers representing clients never forget anything.
posted by srboisvert at 8:31 AM on March 7, 2016 [3 favorites]
posted by srboisvert at 8:31 AM on March 7, 2016 [3 favorites]
Do you use credit cards? If so, log on to each card site and get your statements for the past however many years. This will give you a realistic basis for how much your stuff actually cost to buy, in aggregate plus some hint of place of purchase. Some cards will even give you a breakdown by their guess of store/purchase type, such as groceries vs. clothing.
Buy things online? Many sites will have a detailed list of what you bought and how much each thing cost. Search your email for "order confirmation." Amazon still lists all my purchases going back to 2006.
Claim it all.
posted by zennie at 3:56 PM on March 7, 2016
Buy things online? Many sites will have a detailed list of what you bought and how much each thing cost. Search your email for "order confirmation." Amazon still lists all my purchases going back to 2006.
Claim it all.
posted by zennie at 3:56 PM on March 7, 2016
My family went through this when I was young and definitely under-claimed. Please give yourself generous estimates. We had almost no pushback. Think about "replacement cost" including not just cash value but also time to source, select and order everything. It's a lot. Give yourself a reasonable cushion to start over.
posted by Miko at 6:59 PM on March 7, 2016
posted by Miko at 6:59 PM on March 7, 2016
Mod note: Update from the OP:
Thanks, all, for your help. MelissaSimon in particular--I'm sorry you've been through this.posted by LobsterMitten (staff) at 10:40 AM on March 8, 2016 [1 favorite]
We were not offered the option of warehousing our stuff. My husband and I talked about this at length yesterday and decided not to ask for it, but rather to rely on photos and the inventory list, to save the pain of going through each item ourselves.
Our house was not burned to the ground. It is over 120 years old, exterior made of block, and we have been able to go through all the burnt-out/washed-out inside, and retrieve what we could, as often as we liked over the past weeks. We are going to rebuild the interior and move back in, several months or a year down the road.
Our insurance does provide for replacement value for personal possessions. They do it in a stepped way, though--they pay out a depreciated amount for the things on the inventory, and then pay out the full value difference once we provide receipts, as we replace things. We have two years to do this. State Farm's policy technically is that replacements need to be correlated line-by-line with the inventory list (ridiculous), but our rep says she still uses a more general (older) method that puts things in categories for replacement. Not sure exactly how that will work out; we'll see. If anyone has any comments on this kind of system in particular, would love to hear them!
Ruthless Bunny--our limit for personal possessions seems pretty high; it feels hard to imagine we'd run up against it. We'll see! We are not hugely worried about claiming every penny; my main concern was how to complete the thousands of lines on this inventory form fairly and appropriately.
It says something about AskMe that when I was panicking about all this two days ago, I turned here for advice, and I just want to say thank you, all, once again.
our limit for personal possessions seems pretty high; it feels hard to imagine we'd run up against it.
...but do.
posted by Miko at 2:14 PM on March 8, 2016 [1 favorite]
...but do.
posted by Miko at 2:14 PM on March 8, 2016 [1 favorite]
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