[HN Gopher] How to help a friend who lost their home in a fire (... ___________________________________________________________________ How to help a friend who lost their home in a fire (2020) Author : dredmorbius Score : 68 points Date : 2021-12-31 15:47 UTC (7 hours ago) (HTM) web link (www.sonomamag.com) (TXT) w3m dump (www.sonomamag.com) | squidbot wrote: | I lost my childhood home in the 1991 Oakland hills fire when I | was in my early 20's. I was the only one home at the time and it | started on our block, so I had no time to get anything out of the | house but the clothes on my back. So, I'll emphasize number 12 as | one of the most important points on the list. | | As long as you are insured, the only things you really miss are | the things that can't be replaced. In our case it was slides and | photos of when we were kids and of grandparents, great | grandparents, etc. And mementos like concert t-shirts and such. | | If you are a relative and have old photos, consider having them | digitized and printed, and give an album to the ones who lost | their home. My sister (in her own place by then) collected photos | from relatives and made my mom and I each an album like this (not | digital then so it was a bit more work!) and it's literally the | only photos I have of myself growing up that I can share with my | kids. It's weird in a way, my wife has boxes of childhood | treasures she can show the kids, and I have just one small album, | but I think it means that much more because it's all I have. | | If you are a friend, and shared experiences with the person who | lost the home, and you have some keepsakes from those times | together, that would be an amazing gift. I mentioned concert | t-shirts, and I had a friend at work who had a connection with a | well known musician who was able to score me a few old shirts. I | still have them to this day and treasure them as one of the few | reminders of those good times. | | Also, about #5, bringing food. Please ask first! Food tends to be | a popular way to help, but it can actually get overwhelming. We | had so much in our freezer at one point we had to ask people to | stop bringing it. Plus, you don't necessarily know peoples tastes | or what they are really craving for comfort. I think restaurant | gift cards would be a better choice. Hardly any storage needed | and it lets the family choose what they really want. Or, as | mentioned in number 7, invite the affected people over for a | meal! In the beginning they are probably in a hotel room until | insurance helps with a more permanent place and it is nice to get | out for a night. | | Otherwise, this is a good, timely article with the fire in | Colorado. My heart goes out to those families as I've been | through it and it sucks. | aeturnum wrote: | I had my house burn down as a child and I think most of these are | very good! I think #11 is a little circumstantial, but #13 | (paperwork) should be twice in bold. The work of documenting your | possessions is difficult and long. There is also tons of other | paperwork to do. If you are up for forms it can be an enormous | help. | | Also - take 5 mins over the next few days to make a quick walk- | though video of your house and back it up to the cloud. Nothing | too fancy or detailed, but if you need to make an inventory for | insurance (or any other reason) it will help enormously. | lbriner wrote: | There is a lot of goodwill out there and it works best with | community and people we can either relate to or live close enough | to in order to feel empathy. | | What is remarkable is that doing something by yourself can feel | impossible but with just a ffew people to help with | time/money/expertise can turn the impossible into very doable! | | If we all gave a little more to a few people who are struggling, | the world would be very different but sadly some people would | rather spend their money on a new iPhone or holiday than | investing in someone who just needs a little boost. | chiph wrote: | I can't find it at the moment, but there was a Reddit post from a | claims adjuster that said when filing a claim, be as specific as | possible. So don't just put down "55-inch flatscreen television", | it's a "Samsung ABC-55-OLED with stand" (be honest! insurance | fraud is a crime). This is because the policy you have with your | carrier says they have to replace your stuff with as close to | original as possible. If you aren't specific enough, you get | reimbursed for the cheapest 55" TV they can find. | | So go through your house and make an inventory, writing down the | actual model numbers and when you bought the item. A video record | where you verbally give that same information can help too. Don't | forget small items like the pots & pans, knives & forks, bath | towels & linens. | | Pay close attention to your policy's exclusions. High value items | like jewelry, tools, firearms, art, and computers often have | fairly low limits on them. Or maybe your teen-aged daughter has a | closet full of designer clothes. Get additional specialty | insurance on these - it's cheaper than you might think. | | So far as saving your data - if it's not offsite it's toast [0]. | Copy it onto an encrypted external USB drive and leave it at the | office or at a friend or relative's house. | | Have a storage tote with all your important "must-save" papers | and some cash, so you can just grab it and go in case you have to | evacuate. Print out your insurance policy and important phone | numbers so that you don't need electronics and power to view | them. | | [0] I don't know why insurance companies don't offer 10gb of | storage with someone like Backblaze for their customers. Seems | like a natural thing to want, now that everyone has electronic | files for everyday life. | whatshisface wrote: | That sounds like an enormous amount of labor unless you're | starting from an empty house. | lostlogin wrote: | > I don't know why insurance companies don't offer 10gb of | storage with someone like Backblaze for their customers. | | I agree. Refraining from the 'I told you so' with those you | chided repeatedly to sort their shit out is really hard. | | I've started just doing it for them, as dealing with the | fallout is more painful than remaining tactfully silent and | trying to restore broken, corrupted or deleted files. | rabboRubble wrote: | dammmmm thank you. your comment just triggered a reminder to me | to update my personal articles policy for changed computer | hardware. | [deleted] | libria wrote: | I'd probably be the worst person to have around after someone's | house burned down. I have almost zero sentiment to material | except photo albums but those are in the cloud (Yes, I would weep | if all of iCloud + off-site storage were unrecoverably | vaporized). | | My concerns are strictly financial: What is the actual loss minus | insurance? This is a $300-500k question; why is the article | wasting words on sweaters, ziplock bags, spatulas, gift-cards, | wooden crates(wtf)? | | Honestly, my biggest irritation would be lost time. I famously | loathe paperwork. So I'll get to my real question: | | What can all of us do *today*, pre-burned house to deal with this | situation? | | * Buy a ton of fire extinguishers? | | * Walkthrough video showing everything of high value and poking | it to prove it works? | | * Pre-file some paperwork or make a spreadsheet of high value | items: cost + origin + date of purchase + current value? | | * Locate nearest fire dept and drop off maps with nearest route | to your house? | | Anyone been through this can pitch in on best prep/prevention | tips? The goal being, if my house burns down right this second, I | want a big red button to push that kicks off all the Residence- | Disaster-Recovery script and if it exits zero, I'm sitting in | this same kind of chair at the same kind of desk saying "Thanks | HN". | | Despite my callous tone I do want to mention my heart goes out to | those affected by the Colorado fire right now. Reach out to folks | there if you know them: | | https://www.cnn.com/us/live-news/colorado-fires-update-12-31... | Spooky23 wrote: | This stuff comes up because losing a house is like dealing with | the affairs of someone who does without a plan. | | Think about everything you need ID for, including renting an | apartment or hotel. If that's lost, you're screwed for a month, | minimum assuming you have the proofs required to get a new | drivers license or passport. | | Little things that you take for granted are very difficult too. | Sweaters sound frivolous, except the world doesn't stop on your | account, so the kids need to go to school and you still need to | go to work. | | The other thing is you need the presence of mind to know what a | public adjuster is and hire one asap, so you don't get | lowballed by the insurance company. That may also mean that you | need the cash or credit to survive in hostile conditions for | 90-120 days, depending on your state. | ejb999 wrote: | Pretty much agree - it would be traumatizing if my house burned | down no doubt, but other than family and pets, I have no | emotional connection to anything else in the house - its just | stuff. If the house was on fire, I'd grab my laptop and backup | disk - that would be about it. | Schweigi wrote: | From a material perspective access to cash will be the most | important thing if you don't have friends or family who can | help out. If your wallet with credit cards and id burned down, | it will be hard to book a hotel for the night or buy essential | things like food or clothing. I think that's something your can | prepare already now. For example by storing a credit card in a | second location with people you know or at your work place. | Also in todays age where nobody remembers phone numbers anymore | it might be good to try to remember the numbers of your most | important contacts so you can at least contact your friends or | family in case your phone is damaged. | | Besides that, a digital copy of all your paperwork will help a | lot down the road. Also you need to pre-declare all expensive | items already before with the insurance. You can't just claim | that your $50k watch collection got "lost" after the fact. It's | also good to understand how the insurance will pay. Do they pay | based on a % of the damages house? What happens if all of your | belongings are full of smoke and not usable anymore because of | it but the house is not really burned down? | squidbot wrote: | See my top level post, but I've been through it. A couple of | quick answers. | | It's hard to understand how overwhelming it is to suddenly | loose every single material possession. And you're spot on. | Dealing with all the paperwork and agencies like FIMA and | insurance companies. If you have the ability to help someone | out in these areas it could be really helpful. Unfortunately | it's hard, and most of the "dealing" has to be done by the | victims. | | So, the point of the article is what can you do so help in the | immediate where you have people you know suddenly have to | replace literally everything. The spatulas and boxes may seem | silly, but when you're dealing with so many things at one time, | even small stuff taken off your plate is helpful. For example, | the first night I finally went to go to bed and hadn't even | thought to pick up a toothbrush and I was too overwhelmed to | deal with it and actually broke down in tears! | | Prevention tips? Well for the Oakland firestorm or the Colorado | fires there's not much to prevent. All I can say is do an | inventory of your home and determine what you'd really miss if | it were gone. Put those things close together so you can grab | them in a minute. Or make sure you have copies. Cloud photo | storage definitely makes a big difference. If you have old | photos, make digital copies. | lotsofpulp wrote: | > What can all of us do _today_ , pre-burned house to deal with | this situation? | | 2 is one, and 1 is none. Have a second abode nearby that is | ready to go at a moment's notice. Could be an empty home or | apartment you own, or could be family and friends you can stay | with. | | With electronic backups of everything, I do not see anything | else that would need to be protected. Although, I do have a | small go box with important documents, especially government | issued IDs and copies and cash that would come in handy, | assuming I have the ability to extract it from the burning | house. | oblib wrote: | Great post. And the timing as well for me because we almost lost | our home to a fire just a few days ago. Someone bought the 5 acre | lot next to our place recently and about a month ago they hired a | guy with bulldozer who's been knocking down almost every tree and | all the brush and piling it up and burning it, and then leaving | the fire unattended all night and on the weekends. | | It burned for three weeks before it spread to our place and it | was pure luck that one of our daughters and a granddaughter took | a bag of garbage out just a bit after midnight and saw it burning | on our property. | | It was pretty much inevitable it would do that and pure stupidity | on their part, but legal where we live to do that. But there are | laws that make it clear you're responsible to keep it under | control and liagle for any damage that occurs if the fire crosses | your property line. | | There were seven of us here so we called 911 and then ran outside | and started raking leaves and dead fall away from our old wooden | barn and chicken coop to create a firebreak. The fire was less | than 30 feet from the barn and it would've been no more than 10 | minutes at most before it would've caught fire. From there it | would have spread fast to our house. | | When the firefighters showed up they asked us to get out of their | way, which of course we did. Then they spent about 4 hours | getting it under control. | | Since then we've had many neighbors and locals reach out and | offer help and that's been incredibly heartwarming. The guy who | bought that property hasn't contacted us though. He owns a | construction company but I'm pretty sure he bought that lot to | build a home for himself so it's in his best interest to reach | out and apologize, but so far nothing at all. | MikeTheGreat wrote: | First, F that guy and his contractor too. They're both a-holes | for being so irresponsible with the fires. | | That said - I do wonder if the future neighbor is even aware | that something happened. If it's an empty lot (i.e., the future | neighbor isn't living there now) and the neighbor doesn't visit | regularly it might be possible that the person just doesn't | know. | | This is definitely an inauspicious start to your relationship | with the future neighbor but hopefully the person will turn out | better once they actually live there. | lotsofpulp wrote: | Considering you (or your insurance company) might have a legal | case against them, it would seem to be in the adjacent property | owner's best interest to only communicate via lawyers to limit | their potential losses. | oblib wrote: | Here's a link to a post the Fire Dept put on Facebook: | | https://www.facebook.com/CTCFirePD/posts/4787245711356321 | bittercynic wrote: | If you're going to be neighbors, I think it's more important | to deliver a sincere apology. Then again, from the behavior | leading up to this it doesn't sound like the new owner cares | too much about positive relationships with neighbors. | akiselev wrote: | Some Canadian provinces [1] and US states are beginning to | adopt laws that apologies don't constitute an admission of | liability. Hopefully, these catch on - it's ridiculous that | we have to be so guarded about basic human decency because | of the threat of litigation. | | [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apology_Act,_2009 | scottlamb wrote: | > Considering you (or your insurance company) might have a | legal case against them, it would seem to be in the adjacent | property owner's best interest to only communicate via | lawyers to limit their potential losses. | | This line of thought seems common, but I think it's incorrect | as well as immoral. Personally, I'd be far more likely to be | lenient on someone who sincerely apologized. When someone | doesn't admit fault, I'd be more likely to use the legal | system to declare them at fault and seek the maximum damages. | I don't think I'm alone. There have been studies on this, | mostly in the context of medical mistakes. | https://www.calbarjournal.com/July2010/TopHeadlines/TH1.aspx | mindslight wrote: | One of the hard and fast rules of open fires, regardless of | anything the law says, is that you make sure it is | completely out before leaving. It would seem that this guy, | or at the very least his contractor, is a straight up | asshole. | | I would have called the fire department the very first day | they left it unattended. And speaking to the legal | situation, I would be shocked if actual firefighters | brushed off that level of irresponsibility. | lotsofpulp wrote: | It depends what the expected value of the loss is. Based on | the story above, I assume they are looking at a minimum of | 6 figures, possibly even 7 figures. At that point, it could | be about livelihoods, and the risk tolerances get much | smaller. | | If I am the person whose house was burned down, even with | an apology, I am not going to be lenient on replacing what | I lost, which is at least 6 figures worth. If the insurance | company is involved, they are definitely not going to care | about apologies, just getting all of their costs covered. | | Edit: ignore everything I wrote. I thought the OP had lost | their home due to the neighbor burning stuff on their land. | I lazily missed the word "almost", in which case, since | there are no large damages for the negligent neighbor to | worry about, I agree that an apology is at least warranted. | scottlamb wrote: | The studies of medical mistakes included cases where | someone actually died or was crippled for life. So it | doesn't make sense to me to think this applies only to | minor incidents. | | My opinion: when someone sues for damages, they're | looking not only to offset the harm they've suffered but | also to ensure the same thing doesn't happen again. The | first part depends on their circumstances--they may | desperately need that money now. The second part may be | satisfied entirely by a sincere apology, or the lack of | an apology may underscore the importance of punitive | damages. | MikeTheGreat wrote: | I think I'm missing something - the story above is about | how the neighbor's contractor didn't control their fires | so the author's family had to rake leaves in the middle | of the night to avoid their house burning down, yes? | | At this point it seems like there's no "real" damage done | so the person who's responsible for the fire couldn't be | sued for anything. | | My understanding is that the neighbors et al expressed | support because they all understand how close to disaster | this was, not because there was a disaster. | | (Having said all that - the neighbor & the contractor are | both a-holes for not being responsible and then not | apologizing afterwards.) | oblib wrote: | That's spot on. We have some old fence post made from | cedar that burned up and probably between a 1/3 - 1/2 and | acre of the forest floor that's burned, but that will | recover. | | More than anything this has been stressful, and not just | for us. All of our neighbors have been stressed by this | as well. They all know it's just a matter of which way | the wind is blowing and how hard. | lotsofpulp wrote: | Big oops by me! Sorry, I misread the original comment as | "lost our home" and missed "almost lost our home". | Spooky23 wrote: | If the party suffering harm is insured, it doesn't really | matter because the insurance company will do whatever it | can to recover it's loss. | chabes wrote: | My brother's house burned to the ground in Colorado last night. | His wife is about 7 months pregnant with their first child. I've | been looking for more ways to help remotely, and this article had | a few nice tidbits. It just seems so daunting, having to deal | with what comes next. As the article mentions... the road to | recovery is a marathon, and not a sprint. | drivers99 wrote: | > Our attorney had just explained that despite the 300 pages of | paperwork we have submitted to our insurance company, I have | another 100-300 more to go in order to obtain the balance of the | insurance policy monies we seek. | | That seems excessively difficult. I'd probably give up before the | first 100 pages. | [deleted] | anthomtb wrote: | Well this article hit home. A large chunk of my hometown burned | to the ground last night. | | My parents still live there and are okay but there is no doubt | that friends and colleagues (I still work in the area) have lost | their homes. | idoubtit wrote: | A close relative's house burned this fall, so I can relate to | this subject. It was in western Europe, so it probably differs | from the US experience: insurance was a great help, and other | structures (e.g. municipality) are now involved in building back | the house. Unlike the article, it was not a from a large scale | fire, so neighbor solidarity was very important and very useful. | | In the case I know, the most important point was that the family | could take care of the young children for the first week, which | is the most chaotic. It also softened their trauma. | | Another important point is to deal with the jobs: explain what | happened, try to find temporary adjustments (co-workers and | hierarchy were great in this case), and if working gets too hard, | ask for a sick leave. I couldn't do any of this myself, but | talking about it with the victims is essential. | | Apart from this, all the points 1-9 of the article are valid and | important. Especially in 1, "sift through ashes for remnants of | cherished belongings", which is so heartbreaking for the house | owners that it shouldn't be done alone. ___________________________________________________________________ (page generated 2021-12-31 23:00 UTC)