Flood Damage And More

I have to admit that it is still very difficult for me not to think about the damage done, or that could be done again to my house in the future, because of the big rainstorm that took place here. It just seems that storms are getting so much bigger these days and happening more often and in so many places. By that I mean not just at my house, but at anyone's home in my area and in other areas of the region.  Just so you know, dear reader, I was told recently that we have never had such a bad storm in the place I moved to that anyone can ever remember. Now we have!

What I am really talking about is some kind of event that happens because of Mother Nature causing a problem which is outside of anyone's control. As I am sure you understand, I just went through a relatively minor flooding incident in my home and suffered some damage. In my case, the amount of water that entered into my basement was relatively low. It was a maximum of about 4 inches. Yet even this relatively small amount of water can cause a huge amount of damage as happened in other nearby  residences.

Moreover, my cost to repair this damage was relatively small compared with the cost to replace the damage in many other homes in this area where their basements were completely furnished and their costs to fix it up were in the many tens of thousands of dollars.

My basement was not completed and furnished as so many of the basements in other premises were. Therefore, that is why residents will have to spend so much more money to repair their basement, recover damage costs and then re-furnish it. I hope for their sake that their insurance policy covered these losses because many policies these days have a very limited insurance coverage where the total amount payable in damages is very low. Costs can be very high, as an example, just thinking about the cost to replace a few pieces of furniture only nevermind the additional cost to repair a floor.

I am writing this article because of a story that I saw in the Windsor Star. Here is what was said about the damages suffered that is just so horrific to think about:

"Swamped homes, stalled vehicles and soaked industrial properties affected by September’s flooding in Windsor and Tecumseh resulted in almost $108 million worth of damage, according to the Insurance Bureau of Canada.

The IBC confirmed Wednesday more than 6,000 claims — for home, auto and business — were filed with insurers after record levels of rain ruined hundreds of basements in Windsor and Tecumseh." (Dan Taekema, Windsor Star, November 2, 2016)

If you do the math, you will see that the average claim is $18,000! Mine was substantially lower and others I know are substantially higher.

I have no idea how much of this is split between Windsor and Tecumseh. All that I know from walking around in my area in Tecumseh is how many homes here had huge piles of damaged materials waiting to be collected by the garbage trucks. Undoubtedly, this was the material removed because of the water damage to the house.

There is no doubt in my mind from talking to people that even the relatively small amount of flooding in a basement caused huge amounts of damage to the flooring and furniture there that necessitated immediate replacement. Everything that was all thrown out was done so quickly right after the flooding so that further damage could not go on and so that repairs could be started right away.  Just to give you a recent example that I knew about, one person that I talked to very recently before the storm had told me that the cost to make his basement quite livable and to furnish it as desired when it was done a number of years ago was close to $100,000!

To be honest, I think that the various local Governments need to meet with their residents to discuss what action needs to be taken if something like this ever happens again. Notwithstanding this kind of flooding has not happened before, no one can claim that it will never happen again for many years. The suspicion is being circulated that our weather conditions are changing rather dramatically.

I believe that Government meetings should take place sooner rather than later so the local Governments can also talk to its residents about what really happened and why there was so much flooding and damage. If there were faults, what were they and what is being done to make sure that they never happen again.  Future actions for dealing with these claims need to be discussed and also what needs to be done now to deal with future claims similar to these. More importantly, what needs to be done to  prevent them happening  again.  Everyone needs to agree with what needs to be done.

The actions that need to be taken at those meetings I think depend as well on what the Insurance Companies may decide to do with respect to any future similar claims. Will the Insurers, because of the huge claims, delete this kind of coverage from residential insurance policies and if so, for how many years? Alternatively, will they just put a limit on how much can be claimed under the policies and if so, how much will that amount be? Will the premiums stay the same or will they increase and if so by how much and for how many years?  I would think that the Governments will not act until they find out what the Insurers will do first.

There are many things that need to be resolved as quickly as possible. I don't intend talking about it in this article because frankly, I don't know what they all are. If there are Council/citizen meetings set up in Tecumseh to discuss what happened, I expect that my wife and I will attend to find out what is going on here and what may happen and then what needs to be done. As far as I am concerned, I believe that it must happen as soon as possible and not ignore it and not talk about it at all as seems to be happening now. 

I just have a feeling that our weather will be changing rather dramatically for whatever reason and that such a change will impact people the way it has never impacted us before. In my opinion, we need to decide quickly what we need to do to minimize or even to prevent damage such as the damage that just impacted so many people so badly from happening here again.