Will insurance companies ever pay to replace vinyl siding on the whole house?
April 6, 2010 by
Filed under vinyl siding
We had a tree that was hit by lightening and damaged the vinyl siding on 2 sides of the house when it fell. Our siding has been discontinued and I don’t believe anyone makes 8″ vinyl siding any longer. The insurance company only wants to pay for the sides that were damaged. I can’t have two different sizes of siding on my house so I think the insurance company should pay to have the siding replaced on the whole house. Is this unreasonable?
the insurance company is paying for the damage caused no more no less. if you accidentally broke a neighbors end table and it was discontinued and they had three of them would you pay for three tables or one?
While it would be very nice if the insurance company would pay to have the siding redone on the whole house, as far as they’re concerned, the only part of the siding that’s damaged is on the sides they’re willing to pay for. I’m sure in their eyes, it’s no more their fault that the design of the siding on your home is discontinued than it is yours. I’m afraid that if they’re willing to do the two damaged sides, it’s going to be your responsibility to get the other two sides done in whatever design you want.
You need to get a Contractor involved. Surely there was more damage than just the siding. Call a Good Contractor and have him/her start checking on availability of the siding.
We run into this problem from time to time when homeowners want to add an addition onto their home.
We have salvaged siding (as much as possible) and used it on one or more sides of the new addition. Then on the less visible sides we use new siding as close to original as we can find.
Insurance companies (most of them) are reasonable. They have often authorized payment for our painters to paint an entire room when just a small area on one wall was damaged. This is just painting though.
A good thinking Contractor can get as much of a settlement for you from the insurance company as anyone. We just have to be able to find a category for every little thing on the adjusters estimate sheet.
You may come out ahead enough to pull all old siding off and install all new. You could leave all J-trim in place (that is a lot of the work when installing siding.)
Follow these suggestions and I bet you come out ahead.