Read the first two lines of the Duties After Loss condition in the standard homeowners form and the whole claim reframes itself: "we have no duty to provide coverage under this Policy if the failure to comply with the following duties is prejudicial to us." Then the third duty on the list is to protect the property from further damage, make reasonable and necessary repairs to do it, and keep an accurate record of what those repairs cost (ISO HO 00 03 03 22, Section I - Conditions).
That is not advice. It is a condition of your coverage. If a hole in your roof goes untarped for a week and the ceiling below it collapses, the insurer has a documented argument that the ceiling is not a covered loss — it is a loss you allowed to happen. Meanwhile the same policy, a few pages earlier, promises to pay the reasonable cost of the exact measures it is requiring you to take. You are being asked to spend money the policy has already committed to giving back. Almost everyone finds out about half of that arrangement.
The rest of the claim runs on the same pattern: obligations that are enforceable against you, and entitlements that are only paid to people who ask for them correctly and on time. The insurer will send the actual-cash-value check on its own. It will not send the depreciation holdback on its own. It will price the estimate off its own software. It will not add the general contractor's overhead and profit unless somebody makes the case. It will reimburse your hotel. It will not reimburse the meals you can prove, because you did not keep the receipts, because nobody told you the policy lists "receipts for additional living expenses incurred" as part of your sworn proof of loss.
By the end of this guide you will be able to: run the first 72 hours in the right order, without destroying evidence or forfeiting coverage; photograph and narrate a loss so that an adjuster can price it without guessing; make the claim call from a script and know exactly what not to volunteer; prepare for and walk the adjuster inspection so that the numbers come back closer to right the first time; read a line-item estimate and name what is missing; collect the second check instead of forfeiting it; assemble an additional-living-expense claim that survives review; and, if you disagree, climb the escalation ladder one rung at a time — supplemental claim, reinspection, appraisal, department of insurance, public adjuster, attorney — knowing what each rung costs and what it can and cannot decide.
There are fifteen scripts in here. They are the working part of the guide. Everything else exists to tell you which one to send, and when.
A note before you start: this is general education about how the homeowners claim process works, not personalized insurance, legal, or financial advice, and nothing here is a prediction of how any particular carrier will handle any particular claim. Policy language quoted or described is from the standard ISO Homeowners 3 - Special Form (HO 00 03 03 22), the form most homeowners policies are built on; your own policy is the authority and it will differ, sometimes materially, because carriers amend the form and states mandate their own changes. Statutory deadlines are state law and vary enormously — the Texas figures used here are labeled as Texas examples to show the shape of the rules, not because they apply to you. Every dollar figure in a worked example is arithmetic shown on the page, using illustrative amounts you are meant to replace with your own. CalculatorByState takes no insurance commissions, refers you to no carrier, no public adjuster, and no law firm, which is exactly why it can tell you when hiring one is a bad trade. For coverage questions about your property, talk to a licensed agent in your state; for a disputed or denied claim, talk to an attorney licensed in your state.
The first 72 hours, in order
Order matters more than speed here. Doing the right things in the wrong sequence is how people destroy their own claim while working hard.
- People first, and the utilities. Downed lines, gas smell, structural sag, standing water near electrical. If any of those, leave and call the utility and the fire department. Nothing below this line is worth an injury, and no adjuster will ever penalize you for evacuating.
- Do not clean up yet. This is the single most common unforced error. The debris on the floor, the water line on the drywall, the hail bruising on the shingles you can reach safely from the ground — that is the evidence, and it is worth more intact than tidy.
- Document, then mitigate, in that order. Photograph and video the damage as found. Only then tarp, board, extract water, and shut off the supply line.
- Mitigate for real. Tarp the roof, board the openings, get water extraction started, move undamaged contents out of harm's way. The NAIC's Post-Disaster Claims Guide is direct about the sequencing: document everything first, then take reasonable steps to prevent further destruction.
- Keep every receipt for the mitigation. These are separately payable under the Reasonable Repairs additional coverage and they also prove you performed the duty.
- Make temporary repairs only. Not permanent ones. The Texas Department of Insurance puts it plainly: only make repairs necessary to protect the property, and do not make permanent repairs until the insurer tells you to. A permanent repair completed before inspection is a repair the adjuster cannot verify.
- Do not throw anything away. Not the ruined sofa, not the shingles the roofer pulled, not the burst supply line, not the fridge full of spoiled food. Photograph it, bag it, and put it somewhere out of the way. The failed component is often the entire causation argument.
- Report the claim. Same day if you safely can. There is a script for this in Section 3.
- Start the log. Date, time, name, role, phone number, what was said, what was promised, what you sent. Every single contact. Section 13 is the format.
- Find your policy and read three things: the declarations page (limits and deductibles), the Loss Settlement condition, and the Duties After Loss condition. If you cannot find the policy, request a complete certified copy in writing — you are entitled to it, and you will need it before you can argue about anything.
The mitigation checklist
Run this as soon as it is safe, after the documentation pass. Every line is either a duty under the policy or a receipt you will want later.
- Photograph and video every damaged area before touching anything
- Water shut off at the main, or the specific supply line isolated
- Power isolated to affected circuits if there is any water near electrical
- Roof tarped or the opening covered; keep the invoice
- Broken windows and doors boarded; keep the invoice
- Standing water extracted and drying equipment running; keep the invoice and the dry-log
- Wet carpet, pad, and soaked contents moved out but not discarded
- Undamaged contents relocated out of the damaged area
- Failed component (supply line, water heater, hose, appliance part) bagged, labeled, and kept
- Removed building materials (shingles, siding, a section of wet drywall) photographed and a sample retained
- Freezer and refrigerator contents photographed before disposal, with a written list
- Every mitigation invoice photographed and filed the day you receive it
- A written note of the date and time each mitigation measure was completed
What the policy actually requires of you
The Duties After Loss condition is short, and it is the most consequential page in your policy. In the standard form it requires you to give prompt notice; notify police in case of theft; protect the property from further damage and keep a record of the repair expenses; cooperate with the investigation; prepare an inventory of damaged personal property showing quantity, description, actual cash value and amount of loss, with bills and receipts attached; show the damaged property, hand over records, and submit to examination under oath as often as reasonably required; and send a signed, sworn proof of loss within 60 days after the insurer asks for it (HO 00 03 03 22).
Read that list as a work order rather than as legalese and four things jump out.
The inventory is your job, not the adjuster's. The form specifies the four columns: quantity, description, actual cash value, amount of loss. If you hand over a list without those columns, you have handed over something the adjuster has to re-do, and re-doing it is not going to be generous.
Receipts are named in the policy twice — once for the mitigation repairs, once for additional living expenses inside the proof of loss. Both are items the average claimant discovers three months late.
The proof of loss includes "specifications of damaged buildings and detailed repair estimates." That is the policy telling you, in its own words, that a contractor's line-item estimate belongs in your file. Getting one is not an escalation. It is compliance.
The 60-day clock only starts when they ask. Many claims never involve a formal sworn proof of loss. If yours does, that request is a meaningful event: calendar it the day it arrives, and do not let it lapse quietly.
The five sentences that cost people money
Everything you say in the first week gets typed into a claim file and read later by people who were not there. None of these five sentences is a lie. All five are guesses that get recorded as facts.
"I think it's been leaking for a while." You have just handed over the wear-and-tear defense. Sudden and accidental is covered; gradual is generally not. If you do not know when it started, the true answer is "I noticed it on Tuesday."
"It's not that bad." Said at the front door, before anybody has opened a wall. It gets written down, and it becomes the baseline against which every later discovery looks like an exaggeration.
"Probably around ten thousand dollars?" Never estimate. You are not the estimator, guessing low anchors the file, and guessing high makes everything else you say look inflated. "I don't know yet — I'm getting a contractor's estimate" is a complete answer.
"The roof was old anyway." True, irrelevant, and directly useful to the depreciation calculation.
"Yeah, that's everything." Said about the contents list on day three. Say "that's what I have so far" until you have actually finished the inventory, because a list you called complete is hard to reopen.