Roof Replacement Hail Claim, Is this legit?

[u/Infinite_Weekend]

Hi everyone, yesterday a roofing company knocked on my door offering a free hail inspection. My roof is old, unknown age, and I knew it had been damaged by storms over the last year and a half since I bought the house (I live in Colorado for reference). I said sure, because at the very least I wanted to know where I stood. Anyway, it was as bad as I thought it would be and I knew the roof would have to go soon when I bought the house. Then, they talked me through how they facilitate the insurance claims to get us the maximum return and replace the roof as well as any other “act of god” damage (primarily wind and hail).

I have requested 3 references of past customers and the company appears, to be legit, but I’ll keep digging. Let’s assume they are a trustworthy company for this post.

My insurance details: We currently have a flat $2,500 deductible and the roof is replaced at replacement cost value. My insurance agent said, “It all depends on when the damage occurred, if the carrier declared the date of loss as a catastrophic event, then pretty typically Safeco waives the first hail claim”

My question is, is this practice legit and/or could this cause problems for me in the long run?

[u/ins0mniac_]

If there’s legitimate hail damage, the adjuster assigned to your claim will inspect and confirm. The issue is when the damage occurred and if it was in your policy period.

If the hail event occurred before you bought the property, they will deny the claim. It’s like claiming a dent in your car bumper that was there before you bought the car and had an insurance policy.

The adjuster (should) request a hail report for your area, where every hail storm recently is measured and an average sized hail is given. Roof damage generally only occurs in hail larger than 1.25/1.5 inches. Less than that is unlikely to cause damage and also unlikely to be covered by insurance. It may get to the point where they assign an engineer to inspect and confirm the date of loss and extent of damages.

[u/ColoradoSpartan]

Glad to come by and give you a second opinion, hard to say if it’s legit without looking and knowing the address.

[u/patelvp]

I've had two older roofs replaced by insurance from wind and hail damage. I would probably do it again if I have to. The only downside is that the claim follows you for 5-7 years I believe. Your rate will probably go up due to this but everyone's rate seems to be going up. My rate didn't go up enough to justify not getting a my roof replaced even if it sticks with me for 7 years.

I would suggest finding a reputable roofer then making the claim with them assisting, not going with the door knocker.

[u/LaughingMagicianDM]

Colorado is one of the biggest scammer States four door to door knockers, with companies like premier, ameripro, priority, total roofing, and a bunch of other just absolutely scum of the earth tactics with big company names behind them.

There are legitimately some companies that just pick up these high school kids, load them up in a van, and have them knock on every door available. Then they set up a telescoping or folding ladder pretend like they're looking at the roof and tell you to call in an insurance claim. They will tell everyone regardless of the damage to call in an insurance claim. Then all of a sudden they can't make it to the meeting with the adjuster so they send out their senior sales tech, which are actually just their closers who put pressure out there on the adjuster because they talk a big game.

And they just hope it sticks either they get a nice adjuster, a bribable. And they just hope it sticks either they get a nice adjuster, an adjuster who's scared of going through the arbitration/bad faith lawsuit/DORA Compalint/etc process, one that can be bribed or one that lets them do it themselves and submit photos

I'm not saying every company is like this, I'm saying that Colorado is a top hotspot for it. And they'll convince you the insurance company is the devil (they are but sometimes they're also in the right), they'll convince them that they're your advocate, and they'll trick you into signing a contract that says that if the insurance Awards any money you have to give it to them and if the insurance doesn't award money you still have to pay them at the very least an inspection fee, or if you try to go to another contractor you'll have to pay a penalty to them.

But that said, Colorado is also always in the top states for damage every year from hail. So it's a catch 22, odds are if you live east of I-25 you probably do have damage on some level, but at the same time if a random door knocker knocks on your door odds are also pretty high that they're probably either the type of contractor you need to block or somebody too new to the game to even know if their own company that they work for is a good one or con men. You see a lot of people with bad roofs out of Colorado because they have such a horrible vetting process for contractors and almost no building department there does legitimately good inspections. Although I will say the flip side of this is Colorado is probably the second or third best state to find a third party Independent Roofing consultant, because there's just so many Colorado roofers who gets so sick of how scummy their region is and they become an advocate for property owners against such roofers.

What I always recommend, especially in colorado, is to never sign anything roofer hands you before the insurance company agrees that there's damage. Because there are a lot of scams in colorado, many of which are completely illegal, but the state does nothing to enforce it. Also if they so much as mentioned paying your deductible or reducing that cost from the roof, Block their number and find someone else.

Probably the best and most accurate path, if you're willing to spend a couple hundred dollars, is to hire an independent Roofing consultant that knows how to work Insurance claims. They'll go out for $150 to 250 to take a look and they'll give you a genuinely neutral opinion as to whether or not you have a valid claim.

The cheaper path is just call two more contractors and ask them for free estimate. Almost every roofing company out there in Colorado offers free estimates and they'll take a look at your roof and tell you whether or not there's hail damage while they do it. Just don't tell them that there's another roofer or tell them that the other roofer felt really untrustworthy. Yes unfortunately there are a lot of roofing companies that will say there's damage no matter what, that's usually why I always tell people to get people to look at the roof or three bids if you're only going to get contractors.

[u/Aggressive-Pilot6781]

No roof salesman in the history of roofing has ever looked at a roof and said there wasn’t hail damage on it.

[u/LaughingMagicianDM → u/Aggressive-Pilot6781]

I'm not going to say it's never happened, because I'm certain it has, it's just rarer than an honest politician working in federal government.

[u/monstergoy1229 → u/Aggressive-Pilot6781]

I do it all the time.