California Wildfires and Your Insurance Policy

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XYt4MkBuOWo

Keith Brentlinger

Alta Vista Insurance Agency
1020 South Santa Fe Avenue
Vista, CA 92084

Toll Free: 1-888-724-2124

With the recent wildfires on North San Diego County, it is a great idea to educate yourself about your current insurance policies to make sure you are properly covered in the event of losing your assets. Any questions, please feel free to give us a call 888-724-2124.

If you need to report a claim, please visit our claims page for additional information https://altavistainsurance.com/claims/

Keith Brentlinger from Alta Vista Insurance wants all the victims of the San Diego Wild Fires to know that you are in our thoughts and prayers. If there is anything at all that we can do to help navigate your claim at this time, don’t hesitate to contact us at our office. 1-888-724-2124

During this time we have received several calls from our policy holders that they have been contacted directly by their insurance carriers to see if they were okay and if they needed to file a claim.

Our insureds were quite impressed, and so were we that our industry is taking proactive steps in this time of need to help our community.

During our conversations with some of our clients a common question is, “What would happen if my house were to burn to the ground, and every thing is gone? How is that claim going to be settled? What will the claims adjustor need?”

A claims adjustor will need an inventory and some sort of documentation of what you had. One of the easiest ways to have a document of what that includes is to have a video tape inventory of your home.

So when video tape inventorying your home, we suggest that you capture all of your posessions so that when you go through. For example, when you go through your kitchen open up all your cabnets so you can see all your pots and pans. When you’re in your bedroom, open up your dresser drawers. Video tape your closets. If you have a storage shed, or garage, don’t forget to video tape in there. Pretty much, your whole house needs to be recorded.

Another advantage of doing this is it is going to show the materials and finishes within your home. So it is going to verify if you had granite counter tops, the type of cabinetry you had, flooring, bathroom fixtures, etc. All that is very important.

So that leads to another thing, you want to be sure your policy has enough coverage to actually rebuild your home and replace your contents if it was a total loss. What happens sometimes is that people have done major renovations to their homes, or done room additions, and they haven’t let us know, or the insurance carrier, and there is a very good chance there wouldn’t be enough coverage.

We invite you to please contact our office. We’d be glad to review your current home owners insurance, renter’s policy, condominimum policy, mobile home policy, and make sure you have proper coverages.

Or if you don’t have any of those policies, we’d be glad to give you a free no obligation quote on that.

Something else to remember is there is no end to our fire season with the current drought, so what we recommend is that you do this now than trying to do this when you get an evacuation notice from the sherrif’s office or fire department. Because then it is going to be too late.

Again, our thoughts and prayers are with the families in this current situation. And if you need more information please visit our website: AltaVistaInsurance.com/claims

Thank you,
Keith Brentlinger