When Storms Leave Damage....call Larson Home Services

In the wake of last night's epic storm, Andrew talks about what should do if you have immedate damage.  (Spoiler: call Larson Home Services.)

Episode Transcript

(00:01):
Eight oh seven thirteen ten Wi bA on a very busy morning here in
Dane County, southern Wisconsin. Whata night. It was a lot of
damage and probably assessing some things andif you see some issues, we've definitely
got a guy who's got some greatanswers for you. And Andrew Larson course
comes to from Larsenom Services website LarsenomServices dot com. That's l A R

(00:24):
S O N Home Services dot comdelphone number six O eight five three five
forty three forty three. That's fivethree five forty three forty three. Before
we start talking about some of theuh wind damage and some other things in
the weather. Something I've got tomatch. I heard some guy who talks
really loud and really fast talking aboutnot being able to do a lot in
fifteen seconds, but being able todo certain things. And I know there's

(00:46):
a younger generation that doesn't always liketo pick up phones or talk on phones.
When you go to Larsenomservices dot com, you can actually chat right on
the website and if you've got toyou know, whether you've got a concern
about your house you want to quoteor an estimate, you can do that
right on the website, can't you. Andrew, and by the way,
good morning, good morning, goodmorning. It was an eventful evening.

(01:08):
And you know, typically when stufflike this happens, it's it's somewhat centralized.
This wasn't this. There was aswath of extremely strong storm storms that
skirted across the entire state. Andyou know, we have a we do

(01:34):
have a localized storm team that wecan kind of send to areas when they
get Really, I wouldn't even knowwhere to send them, is my point.
Like it's it's pretty widespread. Notto mention we were already really really
busy, but you know, there'shail in certain areas southwestern Wisconsin, Cobb,
Livingston, Dodgeville, Platteville, allthe way down to Debuke, and

(01:57):
I heard Monroe, like Stoughton,reports of hail everywhere. But I think
the more damaging issue is the widespreadwind and possible tornadoes. Sixty to eighty
mile an hour winds, pushes overtrees, breaks off limbs, land on
roofs. It's and honestly, whenit comes to that sort of damage on

(02:20):
a house, it's almost it canbe devastating, but sometimes it's more almost
an annoyance when you have to startdealing with insurance companies to get something fixed
where a limb fell in a houseor something like that, because they want
to they don't want to pay forvery much my pont. But look,

(02:43):
this is stuff that we deal withall the time. We're not a storm
chasing company. But what we're hereto do is for want, first off,
help our customers. Our people thatare already customers, are already part
of the Larson family or the LarsonKini Home Services family. If you have
damage on your gutters, if youhave damage on your roof, please reach

(03:05):
out. If it is something wherea limb fell on your house and you've
got a hole in your roof,please reach out. We will get somebody
out there asap to patch and plugthat as good as we can so we
can mitigate any further damage. Andthen we're there to walk you through the
process of working with your insurance company. That's just it is something that we

(03:28):
do. We don't you know,we don't go to other states and chase
storms, but boy when it happenshere, we want to help our customers
and we want to help their neighbors. So the first thing I say when
a storm like this hits, unlessyou've got like unless, I mean,
there are going to be people thathave holes in their roofs just because of
that wind. Limbs are going tofall and they're going to do some crazy
damage. We can do our bestto get out there right away and do

(03:53):
a temporary patch of some sort sowe can mitigate or minimize the damage that
may come from having an exposed holein the roof. If we're talking about
hail or lifted shingles from the wind, don't panic, don't freak out,
you know, don't sign a contingencywith the storm company that comes knocking on

(04:14):
the door. Take your time,find somebody local that can help you.
Because if it's a hail damage,unless it put a hole in your roof,
it's not something that's going to startcausing any interior damage until further down
the road. And that's why whenwhen people's homes get hit with hail,
what actually happens is it breaks thefiberglass matting of the shingle, It cracks

(04:39):
it. So then over time,what it does is it speeds up the
wear process of those shingles. Soon all of our asphalt shingles there's rock
granules and that's what protects the actualasphalt or fiberglass matting. While if we
crack or break that matting, therocks all start to fall off. Now
you've got a little spot on yourroof with no granules, excuse me,

(05:03):
and you've got crack matting. Nowthat will start to cause a leak.
But it takes time. It's notsomething that you have to absolutely rush into.
You can take your time, havea good, local, reputable company
come out. If you're our pastcustomer, obviously give us a call,
because that way we can do theroof the exact same way we did before.

(05:23):
If you have our gutters and theygot wrecked from hail or smashed from
a tree falling, call us.We can walk you through the process.
There will be people knocking on doorstrying to create massive urgency to sign up.
Sign up, sign up, soyou can get it done. It's
usually not that severe that you needto rush into it and get it done

(05:44):
immediately, So take your time andplease reach out to it. Reach out
to us. Today. We've gotlike we've got the army assembled to answer
the falls this morning. That's awful. Number six so eight five three five
forty three forty three. That's fivethree five forty three forty three. Make
those phones ring at Larst Home Servicesthis morning. The website Larsenhome Services dot

(06:04):
com. That's Larsen L A R. S O N Home Services dot com.
And again the telephone number six soheight five three five forty three forty
three. And Andrew, you bringup as always a very interesting perspective and
something that maybe a lot of homeownersdon't think about, is having hail damage.
Is, as you point out,unless it actually pierced through the roof,

(06:26):
I'd be more concerned at that pointwith a metia or something else.
But if it was just hail damage, that is something that you have.
I've seen hail that has actually wentthrough shingles, like landed in people's living
rooms. That's like apocalyptic. That'swhere a helmet takes a whole nother meaning
it sure doesn't. And with that, so if you have that situation,

(06:48):
definitely you've got to get get onthe phone right now and get that taken
care of. If you've got othertype of damage, get on the phone
with ours home services schedule at appointment. Because I think the thing that people
need to real and you highlight this, Andrew is as there are people and
they're going to be going door todoor and doing other things. They are
going to part of their technique ofhow they how they do things is they

(07:10):
create like you've got to do this. Now you've got and they have you
sign things and you end up ina contract and all these other things where
it's really something that that we talkabout the cost of a new roof,
We're talking about something here that that'sgood, if done right, can last
lifetime. If done wrong, canend up costing you. You end up
paying more upfront and end up payingmore in the long run as well.

(07:30):
You really do want to take yourtime. And again, as you point
out, Andrew, unless it's unlessit's something that's that's you know, when
you point out tree limbs and otherthings, you do want to just kind
of have you know, your guyscan come out, take a look,
give them an assessment, and uhand work from there. It's not a
pressure thing. It's not a doit now, do it today thing,
sign on the dotted line stuff.Absolutely, And that's what you know.

(07:54):
Professional storm chasers and I'm not sayingthat all professional storm chasers are bad because
there's a lot of good ones andthere's been a lot of great companies that
have come out of just helping peoplewith storm damage. But they're going to
try to create a lot of urgencyto get you to sign on the dotted
line. And the bottom line ishave somebody come out. If you have
us come out, We're going toinspect your roof, okay, and we're

(08:16):
going to do a full inspection,and we're going to show you that inspection
seventeen point inspection as well as avideo so you can physically see what's up
there. We don't want you gettingup there, let us do that.
So once we show you that inspectionand we're going to you know, we're
going to see if we can findhail damage, if we can find the
wind damage where you're going to needsome repairs, and if it's worth filing

(08:39):
an insurance claim. Because here's thedeal. If people haven't noticed weather patterns
have changed. You know, Wisconsinand Minnesota like never really used to be
part of what I would call likethe hail belt, and it's becoming a
little bit. Stuff is moving furthernorth. And I've had many talks with

(09:00):
insurance adjusters, insurance companies, insuranceagents, and the industry itself is kind
of it's changing. Our area hasbeen what I would call undercharged for insurance
for many, many, many yearsbecause the lack of severe hailstorms. I
mean, there's a lot of peopleon here that are sitting back shaking their
head, probably going, yeah,you know, I'm paying like thousand,

(09:20):
fifteen hundred dollars a year for homeownersinsurance. I got a five hundred dollars
deductible, never file a claim.That's changing and those days of having a
twelve hundred dollars homeowner's insurance policy witha five hundred dollars deductible to get a
full roof those days are leaving.Those are gone, And if you still
have that might now might be areally great time to take advantage of it

(09:43):
if you really do have damage.Because I've been seeing some letters going out
to people where they're changing deductibles.They're actually turning into a percentage of the
home value. My father just gotone and it was going to a minimum
of fifteen hundred dollars deductible or onepercent of the value of your home.
Well, nobody's homes in the DaneCounty area are worth one hundred and fifty

(10:03):
thousand dollars. They're typically all worthcloser to two fifty three hundred is going
to be an average price. Sonow you're talking twenty five hundred to three
thousand dollars deductible, and certain thingsare changing when it comes to insurance.
There's there's actual cash value your whatyour loss is actually worth because they depreciate
it. Ninety percent of all policieshave then what's called recoverable depreciation. Meaning,

(10:28):
Okay, your roof is worth twentythousand dollars, but it's twenty years
old, so we're only going togive you half value. We're going to
give you ten thousand minus your newone percent deductible. You're going to get
seven grand to replace a twenty thousanddollars roof, but you have recoverable depreciation,
so when the work is done,we will give you another ten thousand.
Okay, you're still paying your threethousand dollars deductible. The problem is

(10:48):
is that most companies are getting ridof the recoverable depreciation if your roof is
over a certain age. Because insurancecompanies have, for lack of better terms,
they've just been losing their tail.They've been losing money and they're not
in the business to lose money.So I don't want to scare anybody,
but things are changing and I wanteveryone to be cognizant of that, everyone

(11:11):
to be aware of what their policyactually reads. And if you don't know,
because honestly, who even opens mailfrom that insurance company. Let's be
honest, like that's right into therecycling bin and that's the problem. Oh
it's insurance, a whatever, don'tcare as long as it's not a bill
whatever. Know what it says,and we can help you read through that

(11:31):
language, because sometimes it's very hardto understand. But we have had some
disappointing conversations with customers over the pastsix months where they had significant damage come
to realize they weren't even going toget half what it was going to cost
to cover that damage because of theirpolicy changing, and they didn't even know
because they probably threw a letter awayor didn't read an email. And unfortunately,

(11:56):
that's all the insurance companies have todo is send you a letter and
it's your job to read it.It's important that you get what you deserve,
what you're paying for. And oneof the great things too, and
working with Andrew and the team.And Andrew mentions his dad, Greg and
everybody at Larst Home Services the folksthat will take care of you, take
care of your home. If you'vegot questions, if there's something obvious,
you definitely want to call Larst HomeServices now. If it's something you just

(12:20):
wonder about, maybe hail rolled throughand you don't know for sure if there
was any damage, or if it'ssomething that you can I may want to
look and look and work with yourinsurance. Andrew and the team will work
with you to work with your insurancecompany, no matter what the situation is.
Give them a call today. Sixoh eight five three five forty three
forty three. That's six oh eightfive three five four three four three for
Larsen Home Services. The website LarsenhomeServices dot com. That's l A R

(12:45):
s o N Home Services dot com. Andrew, it's always great talking with
you. Drink a big pot ofcoffee because I know you got a busy
couple of days, right, youtake again that number six oh eight five
three five forty three forty three.That's five three five four three four three.
Speaking of storm damage, Kevin Hamwill be joining us from Ham's Arborcare
next year. On thirteen ten WIVeight