Approved for a full roof replacement? Congrats!

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Reading your insurance estimate can be confusing. How do you even know if you were approved for a full roof replacement or not? The approved amount will give you an idea, but your most reliable source is your Prestige Roofing field rep. Reach out to them as soon as you receive your insurance estimate, regardless of whether you were approved or not. They can help you best with how to proceed.

It's important to keep in mind that an estimate from the insurance company is exactly that- an estimate! They understand that they are not roofing professionals, and therefore may need to be educated here and there on what the project needs (and therefore what they owe for the claim). This process is called 'supplementing.'

Supplements are usually discussed both before and after the work is initiated- this is called 'pre-supplementing' and 'post-supplementing.' The reason for post-supplementing is that a) there are some items that insurance simply won't pay for until completed- such as ice and water shield, and b) due to the nature of the work, some project needs are not discovered until after the shingles have been removed. For example, occasionally we find multiple layers of tar paper were installed which initiates an additional charge for the cost of removing the extra layer(s). This is 100% normal, both from our perspective and your insurance adjuster's.

But back to the present- how do you read this darn estimate? First of all, you're not alone. The average homeowner isn't filing claims often often enough to be familiar with the format/logic behind how they write it. We at Prestige Roofing, however, work with these estimates from insurance adjusters on a daily basis. We're here to help! Give your Prestige field rep a call, and they'll sit down with you to review it together. At this meeting, they'll also finalize project details with you such as shingle type, colors, signing off on paperwork, and collecting a down payment.

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Brief overview of how to read your insurance estimate

Something to keep in mind as we dive into this topic is that an estimate is built on two fundamental assumptions: 1) scope- what needs done, and 2) price- the cost to get it done. When you read an insurance estimate, you are looking at their initial findings in both regards.

In this blog post, we'll limit our discussion to what we call the summary page- sometimes it is a few pages in and sometimes it is near the last page, but it will probably say 'summary for dwelling.'

1. Look for the 'replacement cost value' (RCV) number- that is the total cost (according to insurance) of your project (according to insurance). It will be in bold.

2. Below that, you'll see depreciation subtracted. This is a portion of the project funding that insurance will not release to you until the work is completed and we've invoiced them accordingly (note that in very rare cases, you will see the phrase 'non-recoverable depreciation'- this means that due to your policy type, you will be responsible to pay the depreciation, not insurance).

3. Below that, you'll typically see the phrase 'actual cash value' (ACV). This is the RCV less depreciation.

4. Below that, you'll see your deductible subtracted. This is insurance subtracting the deductible from their payment to you, because per your policy, you are responsible to pay your deductible.

5. Below that, you'll typically see 'net claim.' This is the first project payment you will receive from your insurance carrier.

6. Below that, typically separated by a bold heading, you'll see that the depreciation subtracted from above in number 2 will indeed by paid to you. (If the project cost was lower than the insurance estimate for any reason, insurance will be the one saving money -not you- by sending you less than the full depreciation amount in this step).