Home Ownership (Hail Damage)

So my view on Home Ownership goes from one extreme to another, sometimes I love it, sometimes I rather rent my entire life. There will be MANY more post about the joys of home ownership. Today I'm going to discuss Hail Damage. Hopefully, this will be useful one day to you other first time home owners because it has been an experience to say the least.
One March 2nd 2012, Jordan and I were on our way to the airport for our ski vacation. We were thrilled to get out of Nashville for a few days. On the way to the airport, there are reports of a MASSIVE storm heading straight for Nashville (hail, wind, rain, tornadoes). We are in the car and can literally see this dark cloud of doom heading towards us. We decide in a split second that Jordan will drop me off at the front and he would park in the short term parking garage until the storm passed. It was probably the best split second decision we have every made. The bottom dropped out of the ski with golf ballsiz ed hail. Jordan is in the parking garage and I (with the rest of the airport) are told to go in the bathrooms because of the tornado warnings. The storm passed and all we can think is that we are about to be gone for 6 days and our house could be gone. My amazing neighbor checked out of the house for us and all seemed to be just fine. Once we got back, we realized the entire neighborhood was getting new roofs. We finally decided to call our insurance company and of course we need a new roof.

Now to the down and dirty of these kind of situations. Have you every heard of the term "storm chasers". I'm not talking about the ones that try and learn more about storms and how to prepare for them. I'm talking about the sketchy contractors that come knock on your door for WEEKS after a storm to screw you and your insurance company out of money. For 2 weeks after the storm, I came home almost every day with a new business card in my door. They want you to sign a piece of paper as your contractor, they get your insurance check, at their own time they will replace your roof and then they are nowhere to be found again. And of course, they are all going to tell you that you need a new roof.

Here is my suggestions on how to go about the process of getting your insurance involved when you have damage:

1) NEVER EVER EVER sign anything from a contractor allowing them to deal directly with your insurance company. You think duhhh, but you wouldn't believe the ways these guys will try and get you to sign
2) My suggestion is to contact your insurance company first and have them send out an adjuster.
3) After the adjuster comes out, they will write up a report and send to your insurance company.
4) If your company approves, they will send you what is called a "scope of work". This will detail what they will pay for and how much
5) They will then send you a check either to you or you and your mortgage company
6) Get 3 quotes based off what insurance said they will pay for

Seems easy enough, right??? Well, what these roofers will do is tell you to send them your insurance claim and scope of work and they will quote off of that. NO, NO, NO. Do NOT send them your claim# or scope of work. They will try EVERYTHING to get you to send that because they don't want to give you an actual quote. They want to know what your insurance will pay and how they can make the most money off of that.
You can give them the specs off the scope but never the price. If they don't quote, take them off our list!

These guys think they are dealing with a stupid, gullible woman. They have no idea how big of a B$@#h I can be when I think I'm being taken advantage of................. Bring it on!!!