Filing A Homeowner’s Insurance Claim For Roof Damage In Virginia
Discovering roof damage can ruin your whole day. Filing a homeowners insurance claim for roof damage can be tricky, but it’s important to do this immediately to prevent more damage in the future.
Nothing is worse than finding out your roof has suffered damage. The effects of the damage will affect your whole home, so you need to get it handled as soon as possible. That’s going to cost money, so filing a homeowner’s insurance claim for damage is essential to get the money you need.
Here’s how to make the claim and get the repairs done as soon as possible.
How Your Roof Can Be Damaged
There are several ways in which your roof can suffer damage, leading to you needing to repair it.
These include:
1. Weather damage
If you suffer bad weather, then you’ll find that your roof can be damaged by it. This includes strong winds, which pull at shingles and loosen them. It also includes heavy rains, which get under the shingles and cause water damage.
2. Debris damage
Related to weather damage, storms will bring debris with them. If the storm is particularly bad, then you’ll see that debris is blown onto your roof. This includes leaves, which gather up in your gutters causing problems, and even tree branches, which can punch holes if they fall with enough force.
3. Ice damage
This happens when the weather turns colder, and you weren’t prepared for the weather. Ice dams happen when snow melts off your roof, cannot escape your gutters, and so refreezes. It allows snow and water to sit on your roof, causing more water damage.
How To File A Homeowner’s Insurance Claim
If you’ve found that you have roof damage, you’ll need to get the homeowner’s insurance claim process underway as soon as possible. The longer you leave it, the more damage your roof will undertake. This leads to damage in your house, such as ceiling water stains and even rotting wood, so get the claim filed as soon as you can.
First, you’ll need to ensure you know what your policy covers. This is important, as what you’ll get from your company will depend on this.
For example, if your roof is under 10 years old, then they may cover the full cost of the repairs. Others may only give you the depreciated value of the roof, no matter how old it is.
Be aware that if the damage is considered normal wear and tear on your roof, then your insurance company may not cover the cost.
At this point when you get in touch with your insurance company, they’ll send out an inspector in order to inspect the damage. You can hire your own roofing expert to do a check too, so you will have an idea of how much the repairs will cost.
After the inspection has taken place, your insurance company will let you know how much you can expect to be given for the repairs on your roof.
Before You Need To Claim
If you’re a responsible homeowner, you’ll be doing regular checks on your roof to ensure that there’s no damage to it over the years.
When you do this, it’s a very good idea to take photos of your roof. These will show any normal wear and tear that happens, so you have something to compare to if damage does happen.
Ensure you take photos after you do any of your own repairs and maintenance, to ensure you have up to date pictures.
It’s also a good idea to have a roofing company in mind, should you ever need them to inspect your roofing damage. You can even hire them to do annual checks, to keep your roof in good condition.
A good company will be able to walk you through the claims process, should you ever need to.
How To Avoid Most Roofing Damage
If you want to avoid having to make claims if you don’t have to, then regular maintenance on your roof is a must.
Here’s how you can keep your roof in top condition:
1. Inspect your roof
The most important thing you need to do is inspect your roof regularly. If you’re not keeping a close eye on your roof, then you won’t know when anything goes wrong. Take a look at the outside, looking for any damage to the shingles, flashing, and so on.
Don’t forget to go into the attic and take a look at the roof there, too. Any gaps in the roof will let light shine through, alerting you that there’s a problem.
2. Insulate your attic
Insulation is so important for your roof. Without good insulation, you may find that you’ll get moisture in your roof that damages the wood.
As well as this, bad insulation will make your energy bills higher, as you’re losing valuable heat through your roof. Get good insulation installed for your peace of mind.
3. Clear out the gutters
It’s amazing the difference clean gutters will make to your home. When leaves and other debris are allowed to build up in there, they will stop the gutters from working as they should. Water will overflow back onto the roof, causing problems.
Get up on a ladder and pull away any debris you find in your gutters, and consider installing a gutter guard.
4. Replace loose or missing shingles
When you inspect your roof, you may see that there are shingles that are coming loose, or are missing entirely. If this is the case, there’s no need to worry. You can replace them yourself quite easily.
Many roofers recommend buying an extra box of shingles when you replace your roof, so you’ll have spares to hand whenever you need them.
Conclusion
If you’ve had damage occur to your roof, you’ll be worried about making the claim with your homeowner’s insurance company. If you’ve been taking good care of your roof and taking pictures though, it shouldn’t be a problem.
Hire a roofing company to walk you through the process, and get the right information to make a homeowner’s insurance claim.
Using this information, filing a homeowner’s insurance claim for damage will be simple, and you will get your roof repaired quickly.
