Life Amidst Destruction: Our Kitchen Water Damage

Life Amidst Destruction: Our Kitchen Water Damage and Dealing With Home Insurance Claims

If you follow me on Instagram, you probably saw when I posted about the water damage in our kitchen.  The problem with sharing snips of things on social media, is that the entire picture can’t be seen.  What also is missed, is the positive outlook on what is probably one of the biggest hassles that plagues homeowners…dealing with home insurance.  I didn’t know when I shared our kitchen destruction, now over a month ago, that it would be 2 months later until we even received a glimpse of the end in sight.  Let’s start from the beginning and I hope that my story helps you should this ever happen to you.  In order to stay positive, I snapped a few pics of our place showcasing life amidst destruction.

Dealing with Home Insurance Claims

Monday mornings typically consist of a quick breakfast for the kids and a rush getting them to two different schools.  This particular morning, I noticed that the hardwood floor in the kitchen seem to be buckling.  I felt like I was in one of those fun houses where the floors give you the illusion that you’re going downhill but you aren’t really.  I asked the hubs if he noticed the same thing, but he simply replied that the house was old and that perhaps we needed to get the floors refinished.  Little did we know, the floors were hiding a big secret.

I came back to the house to make my own breakfast and stepped into the dining room only to find that the carpet was soaked.  Just the night prior, I had stepped into the dining room to find a small area of the carpet was wet.  The hubs and I thought that the kids perhaps spilled a bit of water so we didn’t think much of it, but when the rug was still soaked the next morning I knew that something was brewing…..and it was something really bad.

Was the refrigerator leaking?  Was there dripping coming from a pipe in the ceiling or floor?  Nothing around the kitchen seemed to be leaking….so I thought.  The plumber came to the house and couldn’t find anything leaking either.

At one point, he suggested opening the wall in the dining room to see if there were any pipes leaking…..to our surprise, there were no pipes in the wall at all.

So, he suggested the next possibility.  That the pipe was under the cabinets and that they would have to be removed.  Ugh!  The leak wasn’t discovered until our water damage restoration company came that same day.  It was true, a pipe under the kitchen sink cabinet was leaking and had been leaking under the hardwood flooring, under the dining room carpeting, and even into the basement!

I submitted a claim to our home insurance and after 10 days we finally had an adjuster out to evaluate the damage.  Not only was I upset that I had to wait 10 days, but the dehumidifier and fans needed to dry the floors were running constantly for 6 days contributing to my migraine headache.  The water supply pipes to the kitchen sink were capped off and the dishwasher was disconnected to make matters worse.  They continue to be that way too!  I’ve had over 2 months of washing dishes in the powder room sink!

The adjuster claimed he only needed a 5 days to type everything up and submit, but it took nearly 45 days!  45 days to get the paperwork together and submit it to be processed and that is excluding the initial 10 days I waited for him to come to the house.

Now that we have our insurance check in processing, we can finally get all the kitchen plans together.  I’ll be sharing more of that soon, but here are the lessons I’ve learned in this horrible waiting game.

1. Call your adjuster to set up a quick and speedy evaluation
2. Set a achievable and realistic goal for the submission of all materials
3. If there are delays, contact your insurance claim manager (I will say that I contacted mine several times and even had to speak directly to the claim supervisor as nothing seemed to be rolling quick enough)
4. Keep all receipts of expenses during your waiting and take photos of additional damages.  You will want to inform your insurance company of these grievances.
5. Even after you’ve settled on an amount and have received the insurance check, consider writing a letter/email of complaint to your insurance company to inform them of such delays.

Stay tuned for more of my kitchen renovation adventures……