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Houston Chronicle

Attorney Phillip Sanov worked on dozens of Ike cases, representing homeowners and business owners before their insurance companies.

With the 2011 hurricane season, which started this month, expected to be an active one, Sanov recently spoke to the Chronicle's Purva Patel about how policyholders can help smooth the claims process. Following are edited excerpts:

Houston Attorney Phillip Sanov in the Houston Chronicle

Q: What's the biggest mistake people make before a storm hits?

A: It is very, very important for a policyholder to document the current condition of their stuff. What I mean by that is: Go into a room and take pictures of the room. Take a picture, turn a half-step and take a picture. Go into the hallway. Take a picture. Go into the next room. Take a picture. That helps in a few ways. No. 1, there is documentation that the stuff actually exists, and, No. 2, it documents the condition that the items are in prior to a storm hitting. That can be for contents, items people own, and for the walls, the roof and flooring. The biggest mistakes I see policyholders make is failing to document the condition of their homes and belongings.

Q: What's the most common dispute you saw after Hurricane Ike?

A: For residential claims, there were a lot of disputes over the pre-existing condition of the home and how much of the damage was due to Ike versus how much was already there. If you have pictures to show the general condition of the house, then that helps negate the insurance-carrier argument that this was a 20-year-old house and you can't prove that you updated it or kept it maintained, so we're going to take a depreciation on repairs that would have otherwise been made.

....

Q: What are some things homeowners can be reimbursed for that they don't always think about?

A: Bottled water, batteries, fans, any kind of food, nails, any kind of building materials whatsoever. I had a client in Pasadena who didn't realize he could get paid for the food he bought for three days while his power was out. He went online to retrieve his bank statements, and that was $500 he got that he wouldn't have otherwise gotten if he hadn't gone online and gotten the receipts from his debit-card transactions.

http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/business/7605767.html

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