Storm damage & insurance claims
Hail and wind damage documented the way your carrier needs to see it, before you file. And a straight answer on whether you've got a claim worth filing.
The short version. If hail or wind damaged your roof, your homeowners policy is supposed to pay to put it back the way it was, minus your deductible. You report the claim, your carrier sends an adjuster, and if it's approved they pay for the repair or the replacement. Most claims settle in 30 to 60 days. It isn't a loophole and it isn't a scam. It's the thing you've been paying premiums for.
The part most people get wrong
That's the whole problem. Granules wash down into the gutters, the shingle mat bruises where you can't see it from the driveway, and the roof keeps shedding water for another year or two like nothing happened.
By the time there's a stain on a bedroom ceiling, the claim window on that storm has usually closed. At that point it isn't storm damage any more, it's a maintenance problem, and you're paying for it yourself.
That's why the inspection is free and why it's worth doing after a storm even when the roof looks fine. Ten minutes now is the difference between the carrier covering a roof and you covering it.
Start to finish
Someone gets on the roof, photographs and measures everything, and tells you honestly whether there's enough damage to be worth filing. Sometimes there isn't, and we'll say so.
You call your carrier, not us. It's your policy and your claim. We hand you the documentation to file it with.
Your carrier assigns an adjuster to decide whether the damage is storm related and covered. Someone from Condition One is on the roof with them, so nothing gets missed or argued about later.
The carrier reviews the findings and, if it's approved, issues the first payment. That's usually the actual cash value, with the rest held back as depreciation.
Tear-off, decking, new system. Most residential roofs go on in a day.
The final invoice goes to the carrier, the recoverable depreciation gets released, and the claim closes. You pay your deductible and nothing else.
Big storms move slower. When a whole region files at once, or the claim needs supplements, or a mortgage company is holding the check, 60 to 90 days is normal. When the damage is obvious and nothing snags, four to six weeks is more typical.
What we handle
Most of the friction in a claim happens after the adjuster leaves. That's the part we're useful for.
Straight answers
Usually not from one legitimate storm claim on its own.
Hail and wind are treated as acts of God, meaning they're outside your control, so carriers generally don't raise your premium as a penalty for a single weather claim. What can move your rate is a catastrophic loss adjustment. If a lot of homes in your area file after the same storm, the carrier may adjust rates across the whole region at renewal, and that happens to people who never filed.
They can decline to renew you, but they generally can't cancel mid-term over one legitimate claim.
Wind and hail are standard covered perils in most homeowners policies, and filing a valid claim shouldn't trigger a cancellation. Carriers do reassess risk at renewal though, and claim history is part of that. It's a fair question to ask your agent before you file, and a good agent will tell you straight.
Your deductible is your share of the job, and you pay it. That's not a policy quirk, it's the law in Pennsylvania.
In Pennsylvania it's illegal for a contractor to pay, waive, rebate or absorb your insurance deductible. If a roofer offers to cover it, or to bury it in the invoice, they're proposing insurance fraud and putting your claim at risk, not doing you a favour.
It's one of the fastest ways to tell the difference between a company that works here and a crew that followed the storm in.
A public adjuster is a licensed professional who works for you rather than the insurance company. For most straightforward roof claims, you don't need one.
They review your policy, document the damage, and negotiate with your carrier on your behalf, typically for 10 to 15 percent of the settlement. That can be worth it on a large or complicated loss, or when a claim has been denied, badly undervalued or stalled. On a normal hail claim where the damage is clear, that fee usually comes out of your pocket for work that was going to happen anyway.
Most policies expect prompt notice, and many set a window of one year from the date of loss.
The practical answer is sooner than that. The longer you wait, the harder it gets to prove the damage came from a specific storm rather than age, and that's the argument carriers win. If a storm went through your area, get it looked at that season.
Yes.
Military, veterans, police and firefighters all get a discount. Austin served as a Marine in Iraq, so this one isn't a marketing line.
They went to bat with my insurance company for 16 months and never gave up.
We'll photograph the roof, tell you what we find, and tell you honestly whether it's worth filing. If it isn't, you've lost twenty minutes.