A hurricane claim is a 30-to-90-day process that turns on what is documented in the first week. Owners who treat the first ten days carefully tend to receive fair settlements; owners who delay or who let the contractor lead the conversation tend not to.
Week 1 (days 0-7): Document and stabilize
Goal: protect the property and create the photographic record before anyone alters anything.
Day 0-1:
- Safety first. Do not climb the roof. Do not enter any room where water meets electrical fixtures.
- Photograph the damage from outside (multiple angles, wide and close).
- Photograph any interior water damage with a date marker visible.
- Call your insurance carrier and open a claim. Get a claim number. Save the call confirmation.
Day 2-4:
- Schedule any necessary tarping. Document with photos before, during, and after.
- Photograph any pre-existing conditions on the property that are not storm damage (the carrier will look for these).
- Call your usual roofer — if you have one — for a walk and a written assessment. This is separate from any storm-chaser pitches.
Day 5-7:
- Receive your carrier's preliminary scope of loss.
- Compare it against the independent assessment from your roofer. Disagreements at this stage are normal.
- Decline any contracts pushed by door-to-door storm contractors. The Florida AOB (assignment of benefits) reforms have not eliminated bad-faith operators.
Week 2-3 (days 7-21): Negotiate the scope
Your carrier's adjuster wants to settle quickly. So does the carrier's reinsurance arrangement; speed pays for itself in their books. Your goal is correctness, not speed.
- If there is disagreement about the scope, request a re-inspection.
- Get bids from two reputable contractors for the work as you understand it. Bids are not estimates; bids are written documents with itemized scopes.
- If a public adjuster is part of the conversation, they typically take 10-20% of the settlement. Whether that fee is worth it depends on the complexity of the claim. Simple claims usually do not require one. Complex or denied claims usually do.
Week 4-6 (days 21-42): Settle and contract
Once the scope is agreed upon, the carrier issues a payment (typically the ACV — actual cash value — initially, with replacement cost coverage released as the work progresses).
- Read the settlement documents carefully. Confirm the line items match the agreed scope.
- Sign a contract with your chosen contractor.
- Submit the permit application.
- Schedule the start of work.
Week 7-onward: Execute
The actual project starts. Subsequent insurance payments are typically tied to documented progress — first underlayment, dry-in inspection, final inspection.
What goes wrong
Five common pitfalls:
- Signing a contract before the scope is agreed. Now the contractor is incentivized to deliver against the bid, not against the actual damage.
- Letting the contractor talk to the carrier without the owner present. This sometimes works; more often, the contractor's interests are not aligned with the owner's.
- Accepting the first scope from the carrier without independent review. First scopes are often conservative by design.
- Delaying the claim opening past the policy's notice deadline. Most policies require notice within 30-60 days. Confirm yours specifically.
- Using an assignment of benefits. The AOB transfers the claim to the contractor. The 2022 reforms limit AOB abuse but the cleanest outcome is to keep the claim in the owner's name.
What we will do
If you are our client and a storm has damaged your roof, we will conduct an independent assessment, document the damage, share photographs with your carrier, and write the bid against the scope you have agreed. We will not sign an AOB. We will not bypass your conversation with the carrier. We will not pressure on a contract before the settlement is right.
The right process produces the right settlement. The right settlement funds the right roof. Everything else is a shortcut.
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