I need advice!!!

[Guest guest]

Hello,

I discovered problems with my home 5 years ago with an unknown water source leaking into the home. I called my insurance company and they came out and told me it was my deck. I then paid someone $8,000 to come out and replace the wood and re-side the house with channels that would direct water away from the house and deck. Here it is 5 years later and I am midway tearing out and gutting my home to find the mold and water damaged wood and replace it. My 6 kids have gone through years of getting sick with two developing asthma and at times hospitalized with pneumonia. I have been ill with chronic health problems ranging from lyme to fibromyalgia and chronic fatigue problems. I even developed acne and skin rashes. Anyway, we didn't have the money to hire anyone so we are doing it all ourselves with air cleaners, respirators and I am sure we are doing it wrong but we had no choice. The allergy doctor insisted I either gut my house and get rid of it or move. The latter wasn't a choice as we would have to take a loss and we just couldn't do that. Soooo armed with a home depot $30,000 loan and a desire to fix our health situation, I started the demolition with my brother's help and my children helping wherever possible. We have only gotten to the point of gutting the kitchen and replacing with green board and the subfloor and new studs where ones were molded and rotten. We then knew we had to tackle the outside wall before anything else. Still believing that the deck was my problem as that insurance guy said 5 years earlier, I tore down the deck and removed the ban board and the fiber board that covers all of this house under the siding. The fiber board is permeated with mold so it definitely has to go. As I tore off the fiber board around the kitchen area I realized there was a sewer pipe that was in the wall that had a two inch crack in it. We didn't notice that crack from the inside. All that area was rotted and molded but we still thought it must be from the leaking deck. Anyway, it was apparant when you looked at the pipe that the mold and rot on the exterior were due to that leaking pipe. The water had been turned off to the kitchen 5 months ago when we started the project. Now this cracked sewer pipe was dry but everything around it including the walls downstairs and the ban board around the back of the house was rotted and molded because of the unknown broken pipe. I immediately called the insurance company thinking they should cover this and all the resulting problems that came with the leaking (i.e. high humidity in the home lending to an extremely high dustmite problem, mold and related health problems to that mold.) The insurance adjuster came out to look at the pipe and he didn't really say all that much except he knew about toxic molds and getting sick from it and he seemed to understand stuff like that, but at the same time, he said that he thought the pipe was probably busted by some flunky in the construction of the home 25 years ago so he would have to consult his supervisor to see if they could help. I felt as if he didn't really think there was anything they were liable for except that if they were charitable they might help a little. I am now really discouraged. I thought I had finally come to the source of my mold problems and I could finally have help to fix them. Everyone I have spoken to said that the insurance company should be paying for this and even the backlogged medical bills.

So far we have had to replace the walls and subfloor and we haven't even gotten to the downstairs bath which sits below the kitchen. We know the walls are molded behind there, because the shower walls were always moldy even after repeated cleanings. After using the dremel tool to chisel out the moldy grout, we realized we couldn't get it all because the mold was coming from inside the wall not the shower itself. We stopped and didn't pursue tearing that out yet. We did find Stachy in the walls of the bedroom downstairs and plan on replacing all the wood that was affected, but it's terribly difficult to work in there without getting physically ill (i.e. headaches, severe nausea and chest closing up.) I have used an industrial strength ozonator in that room when we are not at home for a few days to see if that would help. It only helped temporarily as the source of the mold was still there. I plan on using it after we remove everything but then again I know it's still taking chance that it will get rid of the spores.

Well, I am sure I am rambling now as my brain often goes into that mode, but I need help to know what my next course of action is. How can I make an insurance company pay for what I think it should cover especially since I called them out 5 years ago and they told me it wasn't a pipe but the deck and it wasn't their problem. I feel like they will weasel out of this one if I don't have some help forcing the issue. Does anyone know of what my next step should be?

Thanks,

Rose Briggs

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