What About Your Insurance? Andrew Larson from Larson Home Services Joins Us.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:02):
At five thirteen ten Wiba and Ask the Experts brought
to you this morning by Larsen Home Services Online Larsen
Home Services dot com. That's l A R s o
N Home Services dot com, Grete website. To learn more
about the whole team at Larsen Home Services all the
different things that they can do for your home. Experts

(00:24):
from the Attic Up is that is? Is that the
best way?

Speaker 2 (00:26):
I know?

Speaker 1 (00:27):
I think that's the way you've described it and kind
of focused things Andrew Experts from the Attic Up. It's good, good,
good way to phrase that.

Speaker 2 (00:34):
I mean, that's our takeline. Yeah, you know it's pretty subjective. Yeah,
I did those two minutes up. Objective, I don't know,
it's yeah, it's from the Attic Up. That's what we do.
We get asked every single day to do siding, to
do windows, to do foundation work, to do basement waterproofing work.

(00:55):
We don't do it and we won't do it. We
stick to what we are experts at and that is
gutter soft of facial roofing and insulation, which insulation is
so vague if you've listened to this show, but that's
what resonates with people. So yes, I yeah, I got sorry.

Speaker 1 (01:13):
Having Well, that's it's it's perfectly encapsulates what you guys do.
I just sometimes wish you did some of those other
things Andrew. As a homeowner, I'm like, gosh, I wish
I could call Andrew for windows because the type of
work you guys do. Obviously, we've talked about it on
the show a few times. You guys redid our roof
a few years ago, and to this day, just one

(01:34):
of the greatest decisions we ever made was working with
you guys, and absolutely love what what you guys were
able to do. This week, we're going to talk about
insurance and working with insurance companies and navigating insurance is
a very complicated process. Insurance companies are in business to
do what you might expect to make money, which means

(01:56):
they're not always advocating for you as a homeowner. They're
not always advocating for your house. It's important to have
somebody that can really advocate and help you navigate that system.
Let's talk about insurance and when it comes to when
it comes to your home and roofing and other things.
What are some of those areas that people really need

(02:16):
to be aware of in that.

Speaker 2 (02:18):
Well, yeah, yeah, So the biggest thing with insurance right now,
and I've talked about this before, but we keep running
into it again and again, is the landscape in the
home insurance world is changing. You know, I'm not a
I don't get too much like into global warming or
climate change or you know, whatever you want to call it.

(02:41):
But I mean, it was like fifty degrees this weekend. Sure,
call it whatever you want call it. There's no snow
on the ground. It's February. Things are changed, things have changed.
It seems like with weather patterns. Let's just call it
that things have changed with weather patterns, and things have
changed with what we would call norm. I mean, look

(03:01):
what just happened in California. It sounds like that that
was arson set fire, but I mean seventy five eighty
mile an hour wins it seems odd anyway. More and
more natural disasters keep occurring. And I know everybody likes
to say that the insurance companies are the devil. They're evil.
They don't care about us. I get that, but they

(03:25):
do have to make a profit to stay in business.
And you know, they pay very very smart people, people
much smarter than myself. Most of them called actuaries or
statticians to do very complicated math problems to figure out
the statistical probability that something's going to happen somewhere that's
going to cost them money. And different regions change. And

(03:48):
what has happened is that the Midwest has become more
and more prone to hail damage. Wisconsin and Minnesota primarily
is what I'm talking about here. I mean back, you
go back even just ten years ago, and if we
had a hal claim listen, I don't claim to be
a hale expert either that or hail insurance expert. That

(04:10):
is not what I am an expert at. We are
expert at experts at doing great roofs for people that
last a lifetime. But with as many customers as we have,
we do have to deal with insurance companies. So what
we've seen change is this what was typical ten fifteen
years ago. If you had a two hundred thousand dollars
home that which probably was the typical price of a home,

(04:33):
not anymore, but you were going to pay probably twelve
hundred dollars a year, maybe nine hundred dollars a year,
and you might have a five hundred two thousand dollars deductible.
If you got hail, they'd replace it for that deductible.
That is changing because what they're realizing is that that
model is now losing them money. So some companies just

(04:54):
change what they do and how they charge, and other
companies just pull out of the area all to I
can only imagine the mass exodus of insurance companies in
California right now, like that was happening beforehand. Do you
think that's coincidence. Do you think it's coincidence that major
insurance companies started to pull out of that area. No,

(05:15):
because they employ very smart people that go, hey, things
are changing, something's gonna happen. We're gonna lose money here.
So what we're seeing is this customers calling us because
they have to get their roof replaced because their insurance
company said they had to. If you don't get your
roof replaced, we are dropping you. Because they know they

(05:39):
know that the age of the shingle on that home
is going to be much more susceptible to hail and
win damage than a new roof. They keep making the
new shingles better and better and better. More Class four
impact rated shingles keep coming out because again they're understanding
the shingle manufacturers are understanding where the consumer's going to

(06:03):
right now because there's a lot of attention on it.
The insurance companies are bringing the attention to it. So
homeowner's calling and saying, hey, we got to get you
out here, we need an estimate on a roof, got
to get a roof of place, or insurance company is
going to dump us. Not only on top of that,
our thousand dollars deductible that we had is gone, our
new deductibles two percent of our home YadA YadA, YadA YadA.

(06:23):
So I really wanted to talk about this because I've
heard three times in the past week of customers calling
us and saying these same things, open your junk mail. Okay,
all of that rigamarole. I really want to get down
to open your junk mail. I can't tell you how
many letters I get from my insurance company and I

(06:43):
literally rip them in half and I throw them away.
Why because it's junk mail. But it's not. That's the problem.
It's not junk mail. Right now, they are changing policies
because they can, and letters are going out to homeowners,
homeowners are not reading them, and then we saw this
last year when we had some storms. People are getting blindsided.
I mean, we dealt with a bunch of people that

(07:05):
because of the age of their roof, they were sent notifications,
they didn't read them, and honestly, it wouldn't have really
mattered that much anyway, because those letters basically said, hey,
your roof is more than fifteen years old, you need
to replace it. Well, they didn't got hail damage. Now
they found out that on a twenty twenty five thousand
dollars claim they were only going to get a total

(07:25):
of about half oh whereas before they would have if
on twenty five thousand dollars claim, they would have got
twenty four thousand dollars. Now they're getting twelve. So I
just I don't want people to be blindsided. It it's
a really pg sucky conversation. Thank you, It's a really

(07:46):
sucky conversation they have with the whole one and say,
I'm really sorry. There's nothing we can do. Your insurance
company is not going to pay more, and they don't
have to because here's what your policy says. So open
your junk mail, make sure that you're up, you're up
to date on what the standards are and what you're
deductible is, and what they're requiring. You know, my my

(08:10):
father got the same same letter about a year ago,
and his deductible went to one and a half percent
of the value of his home. So we like, we
did some math, yeah, and I told him, I said,
if you get a hail claim, you're gonna get about
seven grand total, and his roof would probably cost about
twenty twenty one thousand dollars unless he replaces his roof

(08:33):
with a newer one, and in that case he is
his deductible would be roughly oh three to four thousand dollars.
And you know, so he would benefit from it. And
you know, my point to him was, let's just get
it replaced and let's put a Class four impact on there,
because I think the point we're getting to is being

(08:55):
proactive on the material that's on your roof, so if
something does happen, we don't even have to worry about
the insurance company. And let's I'm not even mentioning the
F wave shingle because I'm not on here trying to
sell anything. I'm just trying to educate. But our F
wave shingle comes with a hail warranty. If it's damaged
from hale, you don't have to call your insurance company.
F Wave will replace it for free. Wow, which is

(09:17):
a pretty phenomenal. Is it more expensive Heck yeah, it's
more expensive, but it looks better, it's lighter, it's easy
to install, it has it has a fantastic warranty on
top of a hail warranty. So a lot of people
want to go a steal because steel is not gonna
be It'll get dented from hail, but it won't leak

(09:41):
from hail. Our f Wave product won't even dent. You
won't even know if got hit. So there's phenomenal options
out there. I just want people to be educated and
know what the insurance companies are doing, because I think
it's going to be It's been changing, and it's going
to be changing and possibly changing even faster than it
was before, just because of what other shifts and storm shifts,

(10:02):
and so.

Speaker 1 (10:03):
I still remember a couple of years ago, the first
time you you mentioned on the program f Wave shang
shingles and I talk about the impact rating. I think
you talked a little bit about the fire rating wind resistant.
I mean, uh, for for your if you're looking for
as we talk about kind of what what the environment
is like these days, it's the it's the right it's
the right piece for the job. Now, as you mentioned

(10:25):
there is there is the conversation about costs. But you
think about having to replace your insurance company saying the
roof you have now needs to be replaced for us
to cover it. You really want to make sure that
you're making the step in the right direction so you
don't have to deal with that type of question or
conversation again in the future. Be like Greg, do like
do you like Andrew's dad did pick up phone? Can

(10:45):
call it Larsenal Services six so eight five three five
forty three forty three. That's five three five four three
four three for Larsenal Services. The website larsen Home Services
dot com. That's l A R.

Speaker 2 (10:58):
S O N.

Speaker 1 (10:59):
Home Services Again. Talk with talk with them, have them
out for that inspection. It's a really no pressure. They'll
give you the information you need to know about your roof,
especially if you've got one of those letters. Have the
folks from our home services take a look and see
what they can do for you. Andrew. It's always informative.
It's always great chatting. You have a fantastic day.

Speaker 2 (11:17):
All right, Talk next week and again.

Speaker 1 (11:18):
That website Larsenholmes Services dot com. Kevin ham haamsarbacare he
joins us next he is. We'll let him tell you
where he is. We'll join us next here on thirteen
ten Wiba