house insurance woes

I received an email last week from the house insurance folks, listing external items that needed to be remedied at once.

Mind, that insurance policy renews every year on November 14, so I took this to be fairly short notice.

What were the three items that threatened my sanity?

"The dwelling siding has vine growth, builtup moss and mildew growth; fascia is missing or has peeling paint; roof shingles are curling and lifted and roof underlayment is warped."

 

Hey, those are the words of Travelers Insurance, not mine.

The first two items, about the vegetation and fascia, seem fairly minor, certainly not worthy of threat of policy cancellation, but, there they were.

As for the roof shingles, there were TWO - I had them send me the photos - that are lifted, and that rise they're calling warped underlayment has been there for years, even before the new roof was installed.

Nevertheless, I've called Armor Exteriors on the issues and am waiting to hear back.

I've also called Smitty about the fascia, reminding him that he and Tony had worked on all of that back in 2018. 

There had been a corner outside my bedroom that needed new wood, but the azaleas were in the way at the time.

Still, Tony had said he would take care of it when I'd trimmed the bushes.

Well, during the early part of the pandemic, I'd done that, cutting those bushes nearly down.

And when I approached him about that bit of woodwork, he'd blown me off.

So, now I'll have to try again to get him over here, but I'll have to cut down that particular azalea yet again.

Three years is a good amount of time for a bush to grow back to its height.

I'll tackle that on Thursday, after this latest bit has been hauled off by the city.

 

See, I've been working - yes, W-O-R-K-I-N-G - for almost four hours on the yard today.

I wanted to make some headway, take some photos, show the insurance people that I was diligently striving to make amends.

As the day was quite cool, I started in the back, where the sun was.

It took me two and a half hours to clear the rest of the vines off the back walls (I had done most of that during the summer), clear out the dead vines peeking out between the siding and base, cut other vegetation nearby, and haul it all over the fence into the side yard.

I have to admit, it does look a lot better, but my back will ache tomorrow.

And I still had the front yard to get done.

Again, I had done all that just a few months ago, but some had grown back outside and around the ocean room window.

So, I spent an hour eradicating it, as well as anything that wasn't blooming.

I spent another half hour hauling stuff that had been in the back yard to the curb for tomorrow, plus added another pile of branches and such from the front.

I may have to get started early on the lantana, but not until it has finished blooming.

No butterflies should have to suffer lack of food.

So, I took all those photos and sent them to Molly at GEICO, for Travelers, to show progress.

Then the mail came.

Travelers had chosen to NOT renew my homeowner's insurance???

What the fresh hell was this???

I pulled up the email from last week.

I had misread it.

Dated 10 October, like the letter that came today, it clearly stated that my homeowner's insurance was canceled and would not be renewed...

giving those three reasons for the decision to terminate it...

and giving me only an option to appeal, within 90 days.

To them I say: buckle up.

I certainly plan to fight this.

I have a call in to Molly right now, though I doubt I'll hear back today.

What a horrible way to treat a loyal customer.