So, a car hit my house...

Greg Voth wrote: In reply to maj75: Partially correct but.... In a third party liability claim they are only liable to the property damage limits of her policy. He would be paid on the depreciate value of the damage and they likely wouldn't be considering any code upgrades required. The only limitation I could forsake in this case would possibly running into the code upgrade sublimit if it is low and it for some reason required extensive work to bring it up to code.

Wow, you're generous in calling it partly correct. There are shreds of things that are very vaguely correct, by random luck. The rest of that is just an angry, uneducated rant...and actually completely wrong. Having someone go to their own carrier to benefit the at fault party? As you know, that's 180 degrees opposite the truth.

Having zero knowledge of how something like this works, I'm assuming the at-fault (drivers insurance company) will be paying.

I'm not sure if our insurance company pays us initially then "goes after" her company to recoup or if her company just pays without delay (I'm fairly sure my house didn't cause her to fall asleep).

I do know that our insurer gave us an initial check and asked us to pick a contractor to come over and send his repair estimate so they can cut a bigger check (which I assume won't be 100% of what's due until they see the house getting repaired correctly and we're not just pocketing the money).

Any corrections to my assumptions are not only welcome but officially solicited!

Make sure the contractor you pick uses an independent structural engineer. Or better yet hire an independent structural engineer and shop contractors based on the plans the engineer draws up.

Nick (picaso) Comstock wrote: Make sure the contractor you pick uses an independent structural engineer. Or better yet hire an independent structural engineer and shop contractors based on the plans the engineer draws up.

This !!!!!

ebonyandivory wrote: Having zero knowledge of how something like this works, I'm assuming the at-fault (drivers insurance company) will be paying. I'm not sure if our insurance company pays us initially then "goes after" her company to recoup or if her company just pays without delay (I'm fairly sure my house didn't cause her to fall asleep). I do know that our insurer gave us an initial check and asked us to pick a contractor to come over and send his repair estimate so they can cut a bigger check (which I assume won't be 100% of what's due until they see the house getting repaired correctly and we're not just pocketing the money). Any corrections to my assumptions are not only welcome but officially solicited!

Your insurance company will go after her and her insurance company to get their money back through a process called 'subrogation'. Her policy will presumably pay up to the property damage limits on that policy, which if they're state minimums is quite likely to limit the payment that your company will recover without suing her directly. That won't impact you, except possibly resulting in you not getting your deductible back.

The one homeowner's insurance claim I've filed in the past, State Farm sent us a check for 90% of the estimated price immediately. Once we'd gotten the work done, we could submit that receipts to get additional money. They didn't actually seem to care whether or not we actually got the repairs done.

cordus has it exactly right.

Klayfish wrote: Wow, you're generous in calling it partly correct. There are shreds of things that are very vaguely correct, by random luck. The rest of that is just an angry, uneducated rant...and actually completely wrong. Having someone go to their own carrier to benefit the at fault party? As you know, that's 180 degrees opposite the truth.

Haha, I was trying to be kind. Really the only correct point was sublimits which shouldn't really apply in this situation.

The rest was well... mostly inaccurate.

codrus wrote: Just be glad you're not this guy, he's had his house hit by cars 4 times in the last couple decades: article

There's a house that's been hit multiple times during the Targa Newfoundland. Apparently the inhabitants are fine with that because they end up with a nicer house after the repairs are done. Until the next year...

My friend who's dad was Fire Chief at the time was at the scene when Old Man Bettencourt (of the Honda Motorcycle Bettencourts in eastern Ma.) hit this house in the picture. That street is a LONG steep hill and that house had been hit 4-5 times until that last one and they rebuilt the house about 75 feet back. You can still see how the driveway doesn't line up any longer.

[URL=http://s265.photobucket.com/user/derekrichardson/media/Mobile%20Uploads/image_1.png.html][/URL]

one of my co-workers had her house hit last week.. by her own truck! Seems a drunk in a 4X4 slammed her pickup so hard it was sent careening across her 75foot lawn to take out the front porch

It just occurred to me that I have video surveillance footage from my boss's neighbor's house where I installed the camera system. An underage drunk driver took a wrong turn down their dead end road and carreened into the house at about 2 in the morning. He took out a large portion of her dining room, but was unharmed enough to casually exit the vehicle, pace around a bit and take a leak in her front yard.

Klayfish wrote: cordus has it exactly right.

I worked for insurance companies as an in house attorney for 25 years. What's your background?

Fact: The claim against the third party has no contractual limits.

Fact: There is no limit of the amount of your claim.

Fact: The amount of recovery may be limited by the at fault policy limits (but so is your claim against you homeowner's insurance.

Fact: If the at fault insurance company doesn't tender the policy limit (where their limit is below your damages) in a reasonable time, they may be subject to a "bad faith" claim where the policy limit doesn't apply.

Fact: If your insurance company pays, they have a subrogation claim against the at fault driver, up to the amount they pay plus your deductible. Sometimes this works to your advantage if the at fault insurance has a low policy limit. If the at fault driver has good coverage (more than your total damages) then it isn't necessarily to your advantage.

Fact: Getting a check from your insurance company will be the fastest way to get your home fixed as long as what they offer will fix your house to your satisfaction.

I should have included the caveat about the policy limits of the at fault driver in my initial post.

How are things progressing on the repairs?

Nick (picaso) Comstock wrote: How are things progressing on the repairs?

Well, it's a process just getting the work to start. Contractor came and estimated as best he could. I tore the wall apart (it was a finished basement) for him to get the full effect. Of course the damage was much worse than even he expected.

It's funny how things like this snowball: the excavator has to expose the foundation so the front and side lawn repair afterward will need to be addressed (i.e. paid for) as will the three trees/shrubs need to be replaced. We need to get two dumpsters. One for concrete chunks and one for house demo debris. And the POD for the furniture storage and the lawn damage those will do.

The siding was damaged right? Yup. And "there's no was they'll match the color due to sun fading differences" so that means the entire house will be resided.

The damaged wall needs to be taken out and supported. The supports will go to the floor... The finished floor. The floor that'll have to come up to support the wall.

It goes on and on. My wife noticed the front screen door now scrapes the frame (wore the paint down to shiny metal) exactly as you'd expect if the impact shifted the house to the side.

[URL=http://s265.photobucket.com/user/derekrichardson/media/Mobile%20Uploads/image_7.jpeg.html][/URL]

[URL=http://s265.photobucket.com/user/derekrichardson/media/Mobile%20Uploads/image_43.jpg.html][/URL]

Holy berkeleying E36 M3! That some serious carnage.

At what point do they hit it with a bulldozer and start over?

It's dramatic, but not really that difficult to repair. I've done a dozen or so similar jobs. At least you didn't have to extract the car from the basement (yes, I've done it).

Contractors ALWAYS say, "Never know 'till we get into it", and "It's worse than we expected". Hogwash.

You are not going to get anywhere near the code upgrade limits, unless your house is a 1 room 200 SF house.

Definitely agree on getting proper engineering.

Your last picture is the only one that bothers me. Looks like you will have to rebuild the wall to the footing, and also looks like your original construction was lacking in steel reinforcement. Still pretty straight forward repair.

Color matching the vinyl is not necessary for the whole house- just corner to corner. You really won't see the variations. Use stuff like this if you can to keep a little money on your side of the table (ie: push the insurance company for the whole house, but tell your contractor to only do the 1 side corner to corner).

Lifting the house off the foundation is very likely WAAY beyond what will be necessary.

Klayfish wrote: If she fell asleep, which I see happen fairly often, that means she probably didn't have her foot on the brakes or the gas.

I agree that you are probably right in this case, but that's not the way it always happens.

My Stepdad was killed in a wreck when he fell asleep at the wheel, and his size 14 foot continued to push the gas pedal down. Police investigator estimated the car was doing well over 100 mph when he hit a truck head on.

Re falling asleep at the wheel. I seem to remember that depending on how you literly "fall" asleep will determine if the accelerator I pushed or if the car coasts. Also adds eating position pre falling asleep and several other things. Injuries to the driver usually tell the story if they were asleep at impact. I read an article about accident reconstruction recently that was very interesting.

In reply to SVreX:

The contractor is this case is a long-time, very close friend and is doing all this work with my wife and me in mind. When he said "it's worse than I thought" it isn't hogwash, he couldn't have seen the crack that goes through to the footing until after I pulled the sheetrock. He believes it'll be a pretty straight-forward repair but as I wrote earlier, there's more to it than I ever imagined.

In reply to ebonyandivory:

I mean no disrespect to your friend, and like I said, it's a pretty standard response.

But the truth is that experienced contractors do not need to see every detail before having an excellent understanding of the scope of the work. Your first exterior picture shows pretty clearly that the wall is damaged below the grade, and it is reasonable to anticipate it could go all the way to the footing, especially if the wall is un-reinforced. It's just the way concrete acts.

Even if it didn't, the scope doesn't really change. Still going to need excavation, formwork, demo, masonry labor, concrete, waterproofing, hauling, etc. The only thing that seeing the crack to the footing does is change the scale, and not by much. The engineer would probably request it be exposed for verification anyway.

I'm really not being critical. It's the way the industry works. But I've lost vast amounts of money over the years because I was reasonably good at assessing damages without seeing them, and no good at all at using the line, "Never know 'till we get into it". I simply never learned to work the realities of the insurance industry.

"Hogwash" doesn't mean he was lying. It means that he probably has a pretty good sense of the scale of the job long before he ever sees it, but shouldn't say so because the industry is not structured to accommodate that response. Whether or not he knows what he is getting into, it is better to say he does not. He's a better businessman than I.

maj75 wrote: The reason you don't want to use your homeowner's insurance is that they wrote the insurance policy for their benefit and it will limit the amount and the type of damage you can recover. Those limits/disclaimers/exclusions don't apply when you go after the "at fault" party. Their insurance company will have to pay for all reasonable damages you incur because they don't have a contract with you, limiting what you can recover. Having you go through your insurance company is a little game the insurance companies love to play. They do it all the time. Your policy limits and contractual restrictions minimize the amount the at fault insurance company has to pay. Sometimes it helps your company, sometimes it helps the other guys insurance, but it helps the at fault insurance company every time.

maj75,
I have very little interest...actually no interest...in a whip it on the table match. I'll just say I've spent my professional career in auto claims, and still do.

Your rant above indicates to me that even if you have been staff counsel, you haven't had a lot of involvement in physical damage claims. To say "Having you go through your insurance company is a little game the insurance companies love to play...but it helps the at fault insurance company every time" is dead wrong. In fact, without going into lengthy detail that won't add to the OP thread here, the opposite is true.

OP,
Seems like you're doing a good job with documenting everything. Continue to do so. Sad to say, but I'm not surprised at that damage. A 4000lb projectile can do some wicked damage.

In reply to SVreX:

His assessment was very thorough when he first saw it. That one crack that looks as if it's into the footing that was only visible after I opened up the wall is what caused him to say what he said.

And at that, he merely said the foundation repair will be a bit more involved.

By listening to he and his partner, I get the notion that there's a balance to be struck between "Yup, I know what needs to be done, that's all I need to see" and "You never know what you're gonna find when you start tearing it apart".

I was shocked to see what was damaged, he however seemed to be very unphased by the work involved.

In reply to Klayfish:

Agreed. I'd LOVE to have had camera footage and would love to know the speed (it's probably lower than I think) that she hit the house with. Considering this was after cutting down a pole and driving 300 feet across the lawn of my neighbor.

I looked for her Equinox at the tow lot but never saw it.

You'd probably wince at what the video camera would have shown. It's still rare when I actually get to see video of an accident, though these days it's becoming more and more common. 10 years ago, if I saw a video in 1 out of 500 accidents, it was a lot. Now, it's more like one in 100. Anyway, a 30 or 40 mph impact into what is essentially an immobile object is quite violent. I'm sure the Equinox was totaled. It's amazing these days how well cars protect their occupants. They can absorb impacts that would have been lethal 30 years ago and let the driver walk out with not much more than sprain/strain stuff.