BAY ST. LOUIS, Miss. -- First came Katrina to wipe out their homes, then came the insurance adjusters to deliver the really bad news.
Because most of the damage in Bay St. Louis and Waveland was caused by storm surge and flooding, the vast majority of homeowners and many business owners are being told they were uninsured or underinsured for their losses.
While homeowners insurance pays for wind damage caused by hurricanes, including damage from rain that comes in through broken windows and roofs, major carriers are unanimously refusing to pay for destruction caused by the massive wall of water that inundated the Mississippi coast and wrecked thousands of homes.
Only flood insurance offered by the federal government is covering the water damage, and few homeowners had it -- because few thought they needed it.
Since Katrina swept through the Gulf Coast Aug. 29, the multibillion-dollar issue of wind vs. water damage has been a topic of intense discussion from the Bay-Waveland area to Capitol Hill, where lawmakers are trying several strategies to save homes from foreclosure and speed the rebuilding process.
They hope to act in time to help people like Waveland resident Honey Spoon, 28, a single mother who closed in May on her first home only to have it destroyed three months later by Katrina. The manager of a popular Mexican restaurant in Bay St. Louis, she worked for years to improve her credit enough to buy a charming 1920s bungalow on 1.2 acres for $122,000.
Her mortgage company has suspended late fees for at least six months on her $850 monthly payments, but she is not sure what she will do when the grace period ends and already is talking about bankruptcy.
"I just want my house," said Spoon, who now lives behind the restaurant in a FEMA-issued trailer with her adorable 8-year old daughter. "I don't want handouts. I work to make an honest living. But I don't know what's going to happen."
Retired Marine Master Sgt. Pete Benvenutti, 80, had paid off the mortgage on his wrecked 107-year-old home in Bay St. Louis and is trying to figure out how to afford the $200,000 it will take to rebuild when he got only $50,000 from his insurance company.
"At 80 years old I'm not looking forward to a 30-year mortgage," Pete said.
Pat Murphy, a Waveland window salesman who leads a seven-piece jazz and blues band, can repair his storm-gutted home but likely will need $100,000 and a new mortgage when he was only a few years away from paying off the old one.
“I’ll be 57 in February,” he said. “This is not where I anticipated I would be at 57 years old. This is something everybody is going through.”
They and thousands of others are discovering that if they thought they had “hurricane insurance,” they were sadly mistaken.
“There is no ambiguity whatsoever -- I don’t know if I can make the statement any clearer than that,” said Bob Hartwig, chief economist for the Insurance Information Institute, an industry trade group. “It was common knowledge on the Gulf Coast … that flood is not covered, has not been covered and never will be covered under a homeowners’ policy.”
Many local residents and political leaders argue that Katrina’s enormous storm surge does not fit the usual layman’s definition of a flood.
“They are using the fine print in people’s policies to take financial advantage of them,” U.S. Rep. Gene Taylor, a Democrat from Bay St. Louis, said in an interview.
“A 30-foot wall of water that is pushed in by a hurricane is, I think, the flimsiest of excuses that those people could ever find for not paying on those claims,” said Taylor. “It was not a flood. It was a hurricane caused by wind, and they ought to pay.”
Hartwig argues that the language is clear and unambiguous. The standard homeowners policy approved by regulators in every state excludes any “loss caused by, resulting from, contributed to or aggravated by flood, surface water, waves, tidal water or overflow of any body of water, or spray from any of these, whether or not driven by wind," according to sample language provided by the trade group.
Nevertheless state Attorney General Jim Hood has filed suit against State Farm, Allstate, Mississippi Farm Bureau and other carriers, trying to force them to pay up for damage from Katrina. He argues that homeowners bought their insurance “for the primary purpose of insuring against any damage that could possibly result from hurricanes originating in the Gulf of Mexico.”
In a civil complaint filed in September in state chancery court, he argues that the flood exclusions are ambiguous, unenforceable and “procedurally unconscionable.”
An industry trade group responded that the attempt to “retroactively rewrite policies” would, if successful, “destroy the viability of every insurance policy in the state and undermine the integrity of every legal contract in the nation.” The industry is trying to move the case into federal court.
Private attorneys led by Richard Scruggs, who lost his own Pascagoula home to the storm, also have filed suit, trying to force insurance companies to pay. Other attorneys are taking a different tack, trying to negotiate by bringing in engineers to show that homes were damaged or destroyed by Katrina’s winds before the storm surged finished them off.
Taylor has introduced a bill that would essentially allow people in the affected area to buy flood insurance retroactively, giving them coverage nearly up to the amount of their homeowners insurance if they agree to keep the property insured for flood in the future.
Officials of the National Flood Insurance Program are strongly opposed, saying it would discourage homeowners nationwide from buying flood insurance.
But Taylor said he is optimistic that Congress will act on his bill or similar proposals intended to bring direct relief to homeowners who carried insurance, lived outside the so-called “flood plain” and are being denied coverage by their carriers.
“I see this as the real make-it-or-break-it issue -- whether or not I can help these people hang on to the homes and have something there to rebuild their lives,” he said.
Flood insurance is surprisingly cheap (as low as $233 for $100,000 in coverage), but even many insurance agents acknowledge there is widespread confusion about it. In the New Orleans area, some 60 percent of homeowners had flood insurance because they lived in a known flood hazard zone.
But in Bay St. Louis and Waveland the situation was different. Only about 15 percent of southern Mississippi homeowners had flood insurance because lenders only required it in the “special flood hazard area,” generally for those homes closest to the Gulf or in low-lying areas.
The flood hazard area is determined by FEMA, which oversees the flood insurance program and issues maps describing the so-called 100-year floodplain and other hazards that determine whether lenders will require flood insurance.
People on higher ground were not required to have flood insurance and generally did not, reasoning that they did not need it because their house stayed dry during Hurricane Camille in 1969, which made a direct hit on Bay St. Louis and until now was the benchmark for the area.
Business and homeowners commonly describe their status outside the federal special hazard area by saying they lived in a “no flood” zone. Many say they were told by their insurance agent that they did not need flood insurance.
“A number of insured are very confused about all this,” said Dave Treutel Jr., a prominent Bay St. Louis insurance agent. “My philosophy has always been, if you are in the three coastal counties, you are in a flood zone.”
Yet he did not carry flood insurance on his Old Town office building, which took on six feet of water.
Why not? “Because in the 300 years since d’Iberville and de Bienville landed, there has never been water on that bluff,” he said, echoing a sentiment heard frequently in an area still reeling from what one resident called “a 1,500-year storm.”
Murphy, the Waveland band leader, is a fifth-generation Hancock County resident who calls himself “about as local as you can get.”
He has known his insurance agent since they attended St. Stanislaus High School together some 40 years ago. He has been doing business with the agent, whom he declined to identify, for 25 years and still considers him a friend, although “there are things that need to be said. There was miscommunication.”
Just last year he met with the agent and bumped up the coverage on his 2,750-square-foot structure to $225,000 plus $70,000 for the contents. His insurance company has offered him $16,000 for roof damage and additional living expenses.
Some people are not quite certain whom to blame or what to do. Taylor and others say the federal flood maps were partly culpable because they vastly underestimated the potential flood zone. New advisory flood maps published by FEMA after Katrina would put thousands more homes in the special hazard area, meaning that lenders will require flood insurance in the future.
“The insurance agents are not the bad guy in this thing,” said Pete Benvenutti’s son Chuck, an accountant and local civic leader. “I’m not sure there is a bad guy.”
He and others say they are just hoping for the type of aid that was extended to victims of the 9/11 terrorist attacks, or previous disasters like flooding in the Midwest and California earthquakes.
“Maybe we don’t need to blame anybody,” Chuck Benvenutti said. “Maybe we need to say, 'Guys, we in south Mississippi need a hand. We need some help from our family in the rest of the nation.' Otherwise we will allow thousands and thousands of homes to go into foreclosure. We are not talking recession, we are talking depression.”
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I just get completely worn out in everyday life trying to understand why we even need small print. Insurance companies,big businesses, you name it they all have fine print for a reason. They all want you to pay for things you are not going to get. I don't vote for promises either. If they ever eliminate small print then we will all have to learn the legal lingo to understand the insurance word scams. What ever happened to working for a living instead of cheating for a living?
JW Adams Santa Rosa Beach, Fl. (Sent Nov 27, 2005 9:59:42 AM)
I have written several articles about the insurance issues relating to Katrina and my blog links to additional resources. Please go to Insurance Scrawl, www.insurancescrawl.com, which contains commentary on the law of insurance, the insurance of business, and the business of insurance, written by policyholder attorney Marc Mayerson
Marc Mayerson, Washington, DC (Sent Nov 27, 2005 11:40:18 AM)
As one who has been displaced by hurricane Katrina, I have seen the vast majority of residents in the New Orleans area struggle with the same issues. Here, we are told that the policy doesn't cover tree damage unless it has hit the house....when the policy says nothing to that effect. Insurerers are retrospectively rewriting policies, and hoping that if they make it difficult enough, they can keep the money that they should rightly pay the insured. Delays, hair-splitting, are all a way that they can get an interest free loan from all of us who have paid premiums. They keep our money as long as they can, and pay out as little as they can get away with. That is the name of the game. I hope that the federal government will not allow this abuse to occur. American's stealing money from other citizens, in the guise of business as usual. Hopefully the insurers will not be allowed to distort the legal loopholes to withhold help to those who have lost their homes, their neighborhoods, and everything that they loved.
Suzanne Parke, LA (Sent Nov 27, 2005 11:44:54 AM)
From an insurance adjusters point of view: your local agent should provide you with enough information so that you can decide on whether flood insurance is necessary. He or she should be familiar with the location of your property and advise you accordingly. I've seen too many uninformed policyholders who were never advised by their agent as to the coverage provided by the standard homeowners policy. However, ultimately it is the policyholder who needs to review the policy and be certain that there is adequate and proper coverage for their property.
Houston, TX. (Sent Nov 27, 2005 12:59:37 PM)
From an insurance adjusters' viewpoint: We must follow the language and intent of the insurance policy. If the policy specifically states that flooding is not covered, then it is not covered. I've been working these storms since early September and I am appalled by the number of people who live on or near the coast or bay and failed to purchase flood insurance. Contrary to what the media reports, most of these people are well informed and educated and knew that they should have had flood insurance but decided to roll the dice. Well, they lost and now they are complaining that the "rules are unfair". Don't blame us if you failed to do what you were knew you were supposed to do.
Wm. Roberts (Sent Nov 27, 2005 1:14:51 PM)
It only proves that insurence companys are all alike, take your money then find ways to not pay off when something like this happens. It is like buying a new car and have insurance on it, but now you need gap insurance because the prime will not cover all the damage or total cost if you total your car. I am all for the government taking charge and force these insurance companys, that take your money and leave you hanging, to cough up all the money to pay for these housed. Get real insurance, that is why we pay our premimems on time.
Chuck Royal, Martinsburg, W.V. (Sent Nov 27, 2005 1:19:06 PM)
insurance companies have never been accused of being fair, generous, understanding, or compassionate. the bastards ought to be outlawed; let the government take over the whole residential insurance business.
jim mccary (Sent Nov 27, 2005 1:48:14 PM)
I was told one time that when we point our finger at someone most of our fingers are pointing at the person responsible. We all take risks, and we decide what chances to take. Do I pt some money in an IRA or spend it all now, do I get 50k or 100k auto insurance, .. I could go on but you know where that was heading.
The last time I checked, our Fereral Government has been helping (which folks means all of us in this great land) the Katrina affected area. Overseas we are rebuilding a country ravaged by a militaristic murdering dictator. Those people had no choice before we came on the scene.
My heart goes out to these folks for the hardships they must endure. But, bottem line folks, you had a choice. Buck up. Lick your wounds. Learn from your mistakes. Move on.
Kim Wernly, Lansdale, Pa (Sent Nov 27, 2005 1:53:24 PM)
Are the storms a tragedy, of course, but suing to have your policy cover damage that was outside the scope of coverage purchased will have an affect on your region Forever. If an insurance company cannot rely on a contract (your policy) it will stop selling insurance at any price in your region, that will be a disaster for generations, everyone dislikes insurance companies, but you can not have any business operate without insurance, if its not available no major business will rebuild, because they cannot afford the risk sharing that insurance provides. Government aid? Yes, but changing a contract's terms after a loss, no matter how severe, will permanently cripple any State that allows that verdict to stand.
John P. (Sent Nov 27, 2005 2:35:43 PM)
What's the sense in having "Hurricane" insurance if it doesn't cover damage caused by hurricanes? Someone should define "flood" more clearly. Maybe they should define what "Hurricane damage" is. Insurance companies make billions of dollars off of premiums paid. The insurance companies take the risk of insuring people on the coasts and know that hurricanes will likely happen every now and then. To sell a policy that covers hurricane damage and then say the damage was due to flooding when in fact a hurricane was the cause, is dishonest. Insurance companies will be taking a hit but that is the cost of doing business. Rates will go up all over the country and that is expected. Insurance companies looking for an out on this is wrong. Hurricane insurance is useless if it doesn't cover damage from a hurricane. I may as well invest the money I would have used for so called hurricane insurance and provide myself with an emergency fund to cover any damage caused by hurricanes. This whole notion that the insurance companies shouldn't cover water damage caused by a hurricane because the water was driven into the coast and cuased a flood is ridiculous. Hurricane damage is: wind damage, water damage, heck, it's damage to your property when a hurricane hits. Maybe someone should define "Hurricane damage"
joe, Gulfport. (Sent Nov 27, 2005 5:00:31 PM)
What I still cant believe is all theses folks living near the coast with NO flood insurance! I dont pity these folks one bit..Then to top it off they want to rebuild in the same spot and expect the rest of America to pick the tab up.
Steve B. (Sent Nov 27, 2005 5:56:16 PM)
I grew up in New Orleans and used to go to the Biloxi beaches on the weekends during the summer. I can't beleive that people in coastal MS did not have flood insurance because some map said they didn't live in a flood zone. I live 60 mile from the Outer Banks in North Carolina and you can bet your sweet a## I have flood insurance. IT ONLY COST AN ADDITONAL $20 A MONTH ON MY MORTGAGE PAYMENT. I do not think we should allow these people to purchase flood insurance and make it retroactive. I feel for all the people affected by Katrina and have made donations to the relief effort, but these people made the decision not to purchase flood insurance. The extra $20 a month is alot cheaper than the payments on a low interest loan from FEMA for the next 20 to 30 years.
Gerald Theriot, Camden, NC (Sent Nov 27, 2005 5:57:54 PM)
I grew up in New Orleans and used to go to the Biloxi beaches on the weekends during the summer. I can't beleive that people in coastal MS did not have flood insurance because some map said they didn't live in a flood zone. I live 60 mile from the Outer Banks in North Carolina and you can bet your sweet a## I have flood insurance. IT ONLY COST AN ADDITONAL $20 A MONTH ON MY MORTGAGE PAYMENT. I do not think we should allow these people to purchase flood insurance and make it retroactive. I feel for all the people affected by Katrina and have made donations to the relief effort, but these people made the decision not to purchase flood insurance. The extra $20 a month is alot cheaper than the payments on a low interest loan from FEMA for the next 20 to 30 years.
Gerald Theriot, Camden, NC (Sent Nov 27, 2005 5:58:45 PM)
Like always, there is different opinions and different interpretations....having been down to help out, I have listened to many sides and kept in touch with lots of the wonderful, strong and inspiring people I met in Waveland/Bay St Louis.
Here in simple terms is a story the rest of you may understand, to demonstrate what seems to be happening to many....
Say you are driving along in your insured car, you get hit, the car is totalled, you are hurt, and you happen to be carrying your best friends top of the line golf clubs in the back. The truck you hit is from the circus, an elephant gets out and sits on your car, flattening the already totalled car. The insurance company then says to you, we will only pay for say your steering wheel, because we don't cover you for an elephant sitting on your car. You argue the car got wrecked by the accident, they say, no the flattening occurred from the elephant. And the elephant damaged the golf clubs. And there you have it.
I have several friends whose homes had gaping holes in the roof and ceilings, the ceilings collapsed onto the floor, then came the wave and the insurance company is saying 'only damage done above 5' high is covered'. These adjusters are not forensic scientists. How can you prove what was caused by what?. In the meantime they live in tents, trailers or in 2 cases, their rotting, mold infested home, while everyone discusses, debates and negotiates.
The lady who had 100% pay back is lucky and I am happy for her. In many cases, if your home got swept away and you were covered as you should be near the beach, your case IS cut and dry and payouts are being made. There are many, many though that are caught up in legal wrangling and in the meantime cannot move on. I hope you all get resolution soon. I think of you often, my hearts still down there!!
Sally, OR (Sent Nov 27, 2005 6:07:28 PM)
you no what gets me you say it cost 100000.00 to repair your home. what kind of home did you have if it costs 100000.00 to repair then it must have been 400000.00 new price. pretty hefty price being around here you can buy new houses and land from 65000.00 up 1700 sqf. call around and you can get you a whole house built for less than 100000.00 live within your means my god i got a modular home and 9 ac. for 300000. least i anit up side down in debt. but i do fill for you people down there as i own a tree company and worked the area of hattiesburg mssouth and as a poor area before the storm as well.
adam high point north carolina (Sent Nov 27, 2005 10:10:13 PM)
Everyone that has insurance policies receives a "written" copy of their policy, you must read it to know what you have as far as coverage. One person on this blog commented that he had flood insurance even though he is not in a flood zone, that is a really good idea, good for him. For the people wanting to sue the insurance companies for "what they don't have coverage for." I say BOO, you should be ashamed! You are going to drive up insurance costs for everyone, and that is really WRONG! As a matter of fact, I think anyone involved in this suit, should they win, God forbid, should have their names, addresses and all contact info given to the public so we can let them know how we feel about what they have done to screw it up for the rest of us.
Ginger Davis, Laplace, LA (Sent Nov 28, 2005 12:02:06 AM)
I can't believe the number of posts on this topic in reference to Mississippians asking for some sort of handout, or asking others to pay for our damage by a complete FREAK of nature, or the suggestion that we are just too stupid to have purchased proper insurance or make intelligent decisions. Unbelieveable! One of my very good friends lives 61 miles inland from the Mississippi coast, and never has she been told by her insurance company or mortage company or any of the neighbors within her community that she needed to purchase flood or hurricane insurance. Why? Well, because the area had never flooded! Although her damage was minimal compared others in her area, she has not once asked for any sort of aid in rebuilding structural damage that her insurance check did NOT reimburse! She lost a very good friend- who died from Katrina, a young woman only in her 30's with 2 children. Her stepdaughter was badly injured by falling debrie- these are the things that most of us here are concerned with!! Katrina was a devastating monster of a disaster, and as one of the previous commentors said, for those of you who think majority of us have asked for any handout- THINK AGAIN! We are rebuilding one day at a time by ourselves!!! and By the way, obviously we know, the cost of this devastion could very easily bankrupt an insurance company, but what I think most of you (not living here)don't get is some of the people have been cheated out of proper settlements due to the insurance companies trying to decide just exactly what caused who's damage. This has lead to inconsistencies in settlements- was it tornado vs hurricane?!? and much of the evidence is in the ocean or miles away due to the massive wind. It's just mind boggling how some people act like this was just some ordinary hurricane and we- Americans who just happen to live in Mississippi- got what we deserve- and for what????
Gypsie, MS (Sent Nov 28, 2005 12:47:45 AM)
READ WHAT YOU BOUGHT! Even living in Illinois and Michigan, I knew the difference between home insurance for damage from fire and wind versus flood insurance.
Frankly, the federal government should get out of the business of covering uninsured losses. If you don't have flood, tornado, hurricane or earthquake insurance and choose to live in areas that have those events, then you are on your own. Disaster assistance should be for unexpected events - you have a blizzard in Florida, fine or a huricane in Michigan, fine but not the other way around because those are expected. I do not want to subsidize someone's desire to live in a certain part of the country regardless of their reasons for being there.
At minimum, no one should be able to claim disaster assistance from FEMA more than once for the same property. If they choose to stay on the property and rebuild after it was destroyed once, then it should be solely their problem and not picked up by the taxpayers the next time they are wiped out by a flood, tornado, hurricane or earthquake.
ann carr (Sent Nov 28, 2005 3:52:52 AM)
I do not appreciate these people from other parts of our country crucifing our congressmen "Gene Taylor" He is trying to see that everyone has a roof over their heads and that everyone is protected from hurricanes. His office is helping indiviuals everyday get out of tents into fema trailers. If they wait on fema it would take another three months. Everyday Gene and his office are helping people in the community get things done. Also, on the insurance issue all of these people were told not to purchase flood insurance because it was not necessary. They were mislead and someone needs to be liable. I did have flood insurance on my business and my home but neither required. Note flood insurance only covers 250,000 for your structure and most homes were well over this amount. Even if one did have flood insurance this is a drop in bucket compared to what a beach front home might owe on their mortage. My business was 28ft above sea level and the area took 4ft of water. It was not in a flood zone. Note, this structure was directly on the beach road. The adjuster and a engineer decided that it was taken completely taken down by water. Now imagine this is a 35ft building and the surge was 32 ft. This would mean that 4ft of water could take a 35ft building down. PLEASE! Someone that road out the storm found my husband and I and told us that our building was completely gone before the water ever came. He was staying diagionally behind our building. Now this proves the point how can we beleive these engineers because until this person found us the insurance company was just paying for the roof. Remember, the insurance company is paying the adjuster. If a structure is completely gone only God knows what took it first. We had hundreds of tornadoes in Bay St.Louis and Waveland area. These insurance companies are just screaming flood for everything so they can skate out on their liabilities. Everything is gone so they have the advantage. And in the case of the structures that are still standing, how do we not know that the windows and doors did not blow out before the water came . In a hurricane the wind comes first then the water. Also in the same respect we all know that without wind their would not have been water in many areas. This was WIND DRIVEN WATER. If a car is blown into your home by wind it is covered. If a tree is blown into your home by wind it is covered, but if water is blown into your home it is not covered. This is a scam. I tell all of you affected by the storm do not give up. Do not let these insurance companies take advantage of you in this way. These insurance companies could pay thier claims the proper way and be fine. The are all reinsured. Also for the people out there that practically tell us to bad it was your misjudgement, they only worried about how this will affect insurance rates next year. One needs to realize you never know what might come your way therfore think of your fellow man in this situation it could be you. I do want to THANK all the wonderful people that have supported us and helping us to rebuild our area. May God forever bless you.
Jolynne, Waveland,Ms (Sent Nov 28, 2005 4:10:25 AM)
I really hope that all of these people that are telling us how stupid we are to live on the coast of Mississippi don't ever have to deal with earthquakes, tornados, floods, high winds, lightening storms, blizzards, wild fires, plague, the ground dropping out from under them, the sky falling on them - or a terrible tradegy in their family. I then will say "well, you ought to have known before you decided to continue to go on with life that you were living in some bad, unsafe place".
pat, long beach, ms (Sent Nov 28, 2005 12:46:38 PM)
My entire family lived in either New Orleans or Gulfport. All had flood insurance. The problem is they are all caught up in an insurance battle. If the insurance company rules it's a flood then no homeowner's only flood but wait the flood insurance folks claim it was hurricane damamge and won't pay. How can you tell someone that it was a flood when where their house stood there is not a speck of evidence that anything was ever there a 1/2 mile in from the beach. No one was wealthy. They lived there because it was home. Being in the military, i've lived lots of places where things happened-tornadoes in the Midwest, a giant flood that took out the next block from my house when the dam broke. People from the coast aren't asking for it because they choose to live in a bad weather place.
mary (Sent Nov 28, 2005 1:24:03 PM)
For those of you who sit in judgment on we who have lost everything, don't assume we didn't take steps to protect ourselves from this catastrophe. I had flood insurance though my home was not in a flood zone. My mortgage holder didn't require me to buy flood insurance. In fact, my agent tried to talk me out of buying it. But I insisted because I live on the Coast where hurricanes are a fact of life, and I understood the limitations of a hurricane/wind policy. I wanted to purchase it for the full replacement value of my home, but I was told there were limits on flood insurance the rationale being-- and I quote -- "a flood would in all likelihood damage but not totally destroy my investment" and, furthermore, that IF my dwelling and its contents were totally destroyed by a hurricane, which are combinations of wind and water, I would get some coverage from each policy -- flood and wind. So I purchased my flood insurance for the maximum allowable-- about 75 % of what I paid for my house The hurricane hit. My house, like those of my neighbors, was destroyed, a total loss. My insurance company agreed. I filed flood and homeowners claims. Again, I was told when I filed my claim I was in good shape. My flood policy paid off the maximum allowable; my homeowners was denied. I was barely able to pay off what I owed (and that only after dipping into my savings). Still, I'm in better shape than most of my neighbors. At least I still have my youth and a job and can afford to take on another mortgage. Still, I feel I've been hung out to dry. Something is terribly, terribly wrong with an industry that does not allow people to take the proper steps to protect themselves -- and, as in my case, discourages them from doing so.
Cathy, MS (Sent Nov 28, 2005 2:43:18 PM)
i think everyone is being unfair to all the insurance companies that are out there everyday adjusting claims and cutting checks if you READ your policy you would know exactly what you are covered for and more important whats not covered. i really feel for everyone that has suffered losses from this last storm season but at the same time i have to say, because i live in florida i have homeowners ins as well as windstorm cov and FLOOD everyone should realize that you have to protect yourself and insurance companies are willing to sell you any kind of policy you want you just have to pay the premiums
cindy coral springs fl (Sent Nov 28, 2005 3:16:47 PM)
Insurance agents, lawyers, politicians or whatever you call these types of people, the truth is that they are crooks. I hope those crooks we call politicians have some backbone and stand up to the insurance companies and force them to pay.
This isn't about a handout, it's about what is right.
What is right is that we help our fellow humans when they need it most, and just as we did during 9/11 or the tsunami halfway around the world, these people on the gulf coast need it now.
People are more important than profits. If you think otherwise, you are wrong.
Todd Fiedler, Kansas City, MO (Sent Nov 28, 2005 3:47:27 PM)
I live in Bay St Louis, Ms. I bought flood insurance even though I am not in a flood zone. Glad I did. Lots of my neighbors didn't have it. Our elevation is over 25'. We had a 30' plus storm surge come through. My house took serious damage, but can be repaired. That may sound like a good thing, but what if most of my neighbors can't afford to rebuild. What kind of community will I be left living in. I would have been a lot better off if my house had been totally destroyed. As it is, I must rebuild. Most of my resources are tied up in my house. Don't get me wrong, I'm not crying over things, but I wonder what kind of town I will be left living in. I hope some way can be found to help my community get back on its feet.
Mike, Bay St Louis, MS (Sent Nov 28, 2005 4:44:39 PM)
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