Terry’s House & the Hurricane Damage Finale
Recently, I shared with everyone how my home was almost destroyed by Hurricane Ian, the damage inflicted to the house, how I fought with insurance adjusters for 11 months, and how I got my butt kicked by not being an expert in the field of insurance adjusting. I should have hired a professional who negotiates with insurance companies rather than trying to do it myself. Now that 15 months have passed since Hurricane Ian hit my home in Ft. Myers Beach, Florida, I thought I would share the rest of the story with everyone. Earlier, I shared that the hurricane, with its 14-foot surge of water, destroyed the back walls of my home, washed away the garage doors and everything in the garage — including the cars inside the garage — and removed all the landscaping. What the water didn’t take with it, the 155-mph wind took care of by blowing water underneath the sliding glass doors, thereby soaking the floors of the home with water and the sheetrock on the walls and ceiling, which all had to be removed. Because of all the damage the house had incurred, the flooring in the house had to be replaced. My general contractor told me that I needed to get all my furniture and personal belongings out of the house so they could replace the flooring and the sheetrock. I could either move everything to a mini storage facility, or the contractor said I could move everything to a storage area he had in another house down the street that was converted to a climate- controlled storage area. Since it was down the street, and I could go check on my stuff or get anything out of storage I may need while the contractor was repairing my home, I agreed to his proposal. That was the middle of October. Come Dec. 22, 2022, while driving a vehicle to Florida to replace my car that was washed away by the hurricane, I got a call from my general contractor to let me know he had some bad news for me. I was tired from driving all day, and I asked him what was the bad news. He said there had been a fire in the storage building
where all my furniture and personal belongings were being stored, and everything was burned up in the fire. Yes, not only was my house ripped apart from the hurricane, but now all my furniture and personal belongings just got burned up. This is part of the reason it took me so long to settle with the insurance companies because I now had to deal with the contents portion of the policy, too. So, now I have a house that is partially dismantled and no furniture or personal belongings either. Fast forward to August of 2023, and after cussing, complaining, begging, and whining with the subcontractors who would show up to work on my home, I was able to move back into my home. Mind you, I didn’t say that it was finished, but it was livable. Even as I write this story 15 months later, I still have people working on the house.
same sentence that comes out of his mouth. “Terry, I have some bad news for you.” (Mind you, I have a house full of new furniture now, and I am living in the house but was not home when I got this call.) The contractor said what happened was the plumber who had been hired to replace the hot water heater, which was located in the attic of the house, had turned the water off to the house, and one of the painters who was painting outside who needed to clean his brushes turned the water back on thereby sending water flowing freely into the house and into the attic and down through the ceiling, ruining the sheetrock in the ceiling of the living room. Which meant they needed to remove all the sheetrock in the living room and start over repairing and painting the ceiling in the living room. No, you can’t make this stuff up. So, the remodeling continued. Then, in November, while installing curtains, they drilled into a water line inside the wall and shot water all through the kitchen. Please keep in mind the reason I have shared this with you is because it is about stuff. Nobody was hurt. Nobody is sick. Only stuff. Thank God nobody is sick, which would be a problem. I was taught if it can be fixed by writing a check, then it is not a problem. Because we all know that if one of our loved ones was sick, we would give all the money we have to make them well again. The moral of the story is that life is a journey, and we have to be prepared to accept what happens to us. Stuff is going to happen we could never think of, like a pandemic, a hurricane, or a fire. It’s never-ending. Life can be humbling, and it continues to remind us things could always be worse, and it helps us to appreciate what we have. I have been humbled and am thankful for every day, which makes each day a great day, and I hope every day in the New Year of 2024 is a great day for you, too. Let the journey begin!
But wait, there’s more. Come October 2023, I get another call from my contractor with the
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