Is water damage ever covered after flood in basement?

[Mackenzie Click-Mickelson]

It all depends on what your policy covers. BUT now would def. be a good time for a consultation with your insurance agent

 

[tinkarooni]

Wow, lots of confusion here. You are discussing very different kinds of insurance. Without knowing what caused the water in the basement, no one on a random message board can assist you. Did the water back up from the drains? Did the sump pump fail? Did the water press through the walls or come in around a window? All of these things are, or are not covered by different coverages. Call your insurance agent ASAP. If you disturb the scene so they can’t tell what happened or fail to mitigate the damage, you are risking coverage if some does actually exist. Good luck!

 

[firefly_ris]

Yes you can but you need to talk to your insurance company.

We have a natural gravity feed and a sump pump. We live on a creek but it's far enough away from the house that we are not in a flood zone so no flood insurance. However we added $10k water damage to our policy. This worked out well because last Halloween we had severe rain and unbeknownst to us, a tree root had gotten into the gravity feed pipe and blocked it -- which caused our sump pump to need to run, but we didn't know the inside of our pump had corroded (because it never really needs to run) and so it was not doing its job and our finished basement flooded.

So, I recommend talking to your insurance agent to find out what you can do.

 

[_19disnA]

Agree that this starts by calling your insurance agent. They will ask you questions about what exactly happened and explain your coverage. If you were home at the time, you didn't realize water was accumulating in your basement until everything was flooded? Sump pumps are common in areas with high water tables in many parts of the country even if it has nothing to do with a flood zone and has more to do with the terrain and type of rock formations in the area. The neighborhood where we used to live was not a flood zone and not near any rivers/lakes but many homes had basement sump pumps to drain excess water from the home.

 

[mrsstats79]

Make a report to your insurance company. They will be best to help you.

 

[ZoeBell]

Thanks everyone. I spoke with State Farm. It will not be covered because the water either came from the sump pump or a sewer drain. Either of which are eligible.
I’m definitely going to look into water coverage going forward. And definitely buying a back up battery powered sump pump.

 

[mellvswdw1]

If you have State Farm you need to have an endorsement on your policy for “backup of sewer or drain”. It covers you in case the sump pump fails or water or sewage comes up from a floor drain in your basement. Flood insurance is through fema. You can purchase whether or not you’re in a flood zone. Water flowing through your home that is caused by a sudden rain is flood related. Water coming up through a sump pump or drain is a back up claim. Some insurance companies have a flat number and are included in the policy, some are endorsements. Sorry you didn’t have the endorsement, it’s a really important thing to have with a basement where your heaters, hot water heaters, washers and dryers, and super nice finished basements. I recommend that everyone call their insurance agent and ask for a review annually. Lots of things change.

 

[Knriehl85]

It is a coverage that you can purchase on your home insurance. Usually called backup of sewer and drains. It can usually be purchased in 5000 incriments. Flood insurance is something completly differant. Flood insurance is usually a seperate policy and pretty pricey.

 

[mellvswdw1]

It is a coverage that you can purchase on your home insurance. Usually called backup of sewer and drains. It can usually be purchased in 5000 incriments. Flood insurance is something completly differant. Flood insurance is usually a seperate policy and pretty pricey.

True, but if you have State Farm they are moving away from 10000 dollars for dry out and repair and 25000 for personal property. Now they are moving to 5% or 10%of your coverage of the cost to rebuild your home. Example...your home is covered to rebuild at 200000 your coverage for “back up of sewer and drain” at 5% would be 10000 and 20000 for 10%. It is an additional cost that varies from state to state. Also, you would be subject to your deductible. So you would have to pay your deductible before the policy endorsement would start paying.

 

[Alesia]

Wonder why they call them sump pumps.....sump with a "P" since if you look them up they are submersible pumps? Pumps usually put in a low area or pit and can go under water. When they sense water they turn on and pump it out.

A sump is a depression made to collect water. The sump is the pit that the pump goes into

 

[kaytieeldr]

Oh, I have never heard of one. Are these more common with people in flood zones? Or what makes them neccessary for some homes?

the house I grew up in wasn't technically in a flood zone, but it was (is) at the bottom of a hill and had a broom running underneath. My folks had two sump pump in opposite corners, but the basement still flooded once in a while. Most notable was the time my dad's boss was visiting on business and sleeping down there! House is over 60 now, and the brook's dried up by now.

Wonder why they call them sump pumps.....sump with a "P" since if you look them up they are submersible pumps? Pumps usually put in a low area or pit and can go under water. When they sense water they turn on and pump it out.

sump
[səmp]

NOUN

1. a pit or hollow in which liquid collects, especially one in the floor of a mine or basement.

 

[bearzabout]

We were able to get $100,000 in additional coverage for “back up of sewers and drains” through Cincinnati Insurance. They are one of the only companies to offer a high amount.

The insurance is nice to have just in case, but even more valuable is our basement watchdog battery back up system (we have two in case one dies). The batteries pump out the sump crock if the primary pump dies or we lose power. They are like car batteries that automatically charge when the power is on and can be swapped out are recharged on a battery charger hooked to our generator during periods of a lengthy power loss. The system is worth it weight in gold and has kept us from having any flooding issues for over 30 years, which is remarkable since the water table around our house is so high and our basement is like a boat hull.

 

[MillauFr]

since the water table around our house is so high and our basement is like a boat hull.

Why would anyone insure you then? I thought insurance companies would only want to insure people that live on the top of the hill in an area that gets almost no rain.

 

[bearzabout]

Our insurance company, like most, is happy with us since we have never had a claim. My guess is that if we do need to file a claim for backups of sewer and drains, they would probably raise our rates or cancel our policy the next year. This is why we try so hard to prevent having a problem in the first place. Given the choice, I’d rather deal with too much water than too little.

We live in Michigan, and many houses have problems with water in basements during certain events. Most companies do not offer coverage for sump pump failures since they are so common. Most do offer coverage from water coming through walls which happens less frequently. I am amazed that insurance companies can get away with not covering so many issues that are most likely to happen, but I guess if they did cover them, the cost of premiums would be too high for most people.

 

[auralia]

A sump pump doesn't mean you have flood insurance. Flood insurance is not something you can just buy- you have to live in a designated flood plain.

Anyone can buy flood insurance just your mortgage company will require you to if in a flood plain. I always buy flood insurance every year. For I think it’s 75k building 50k contents (my numbers could be wrong but I’m close) I pay 420$ For the year. You pick your level. We get ours through usaa. Have never had to use it but it gives me piece of mind.

 

[Mackenzie Click-Mickelson]

Anyone can buy flood insurance just your mortgage company will require you to if in a flood plain. I always buy flood insurance every year. For I think it’s 75k building 50k contents (my numbers could be wrong but I’m close) I pay 420$ For the year. You pick your level. We get ours through usaa. Have never had to use it but it gives me piece of mind.

This is true though I would add this additional caveat directly from FEMA's website: "Anyone can buy flood insurance if you live in a participating community, which must enforce floodplain ordinances and building requirements that meet or exceed FEMA guidelines. If your community does not participate in the NFIP, you can make a request for it to do so through your mayor, city council or county commissioner’s office."

It was rare but every so often we ran into this when I worked at the insurance company that someone was looking to do flood insurance (which on my end I never interacted with but was expected to have at least a basic understanding of it and how to direct the agent where to go to do a quote for it) and it turns out they were ineligible for it only because their area wasn't eligible not that the characteristics of their property were not being in a flood-prone zone.

 

[crisi]

the house I grew up in wasn't technically in a flood zone, but it was (is) at the bottom of a hill and had a broom running underneath. My folks had two sump pump in opposite corners, but the basement still flooded once in a while. Most notable was the time my dad's boss was visiting on business and sleeping down there! House is over 60 now, and the brook's dried up by now.

We are at the top of a hill steep hill - the top of the Mississippi River Valley - and have a sump pump. Ours has NEVER run - we are on clay soil - so the clay can hold a lot of water. The next door neighbor's at the same elevation ran continuously until water abatement was done on their foundation. They may be a regional thing, but are very common here (Minnesota).

 

[sweetpeama]

My parents were able to get flooding on their home covered when they had a pipe burst at the point that it came in from the well to the house in the summer of 2003. Insurance company tried denying it saying it was flood water but changed the tune when my parents stongly pointed out that they wanted to know where the water came from because our arear had been under a Drought level 3 which is extreme drought resulting in major crop and pasture losses and wide spread water shortages or restrictions for 150 days. Insurance company really quick was ok let us know how much you need for cleaning up.

OK now that there is the summary here is what happened in more detail.

We live in MT but my dad was working on a road construction job in the central part but more towards the southern part of Wy (dad was the head mechanic for an asphalt crew that went all over MT and did some jobs in WY as well) and my mom had gone to spend the weekend with him. Normally my sister who lived at home would have just taken care of things but she was working sports camps on the west coast. so I was staying out at the house to take care of the cats (bonus for me since my rental only had a small window air conditioner (cool if you were sitting right beside it but even moved to the next chair over and you were sweating buckets and it was not a big room only 12 ft x 12 ft wall to wall so maybe move 4 ft from the wall the ac was on).
I had a wedding shower for a friend that I was helping host and I was in charge of making the mints. On Friday night after mom left I made the cream cheese mints and molded them placing them in shallow pans with lids in layers to take to the shower the next day and then went and put them in the spare fridge in the basement when I finished up about 10 PM and went upstairs and headed to bed.
Saturday morning I took the portable DVD player my mom had asked me to take downstairs and put on thes shelve it was kept on when not in use. I headed down the stairs from the main living level of the house to the ground level where the entry way, the garage, and what was at the time the hot tub room (hot tub went out and my parents decided it was too much work for the amount they used it and the room got turned into my dad's greenhouse room. Opened the door to go down the few steps to the basment (daylight basement) and head I step on the last step before stepping onto the basement level and am is that water I feel at my feet (I had my walking shoes on so it was hard to tell as it was just at the rubber spot, look down and there is water coming up on that step. I turn back around and start back up leaving the portable dvd player on the chair in the entryway (the one we would sit on to remove boots in the winter months or if my brother or dad were out irrigating their irrigation boots. I run up the stairs and go into the room just off the top of the stairs where the breaker is kept to turn off the pump-look and see the numbers that read pump and switch it to off. Then I go to the phone and phone and call my brother who lives next door telling him there is water coming up the stairs in mom and dad's basement come help. My brother is I am on my way out the door now (he had to come about 250 feet from his door to our parents door) did you shut off the pump, already done I told him. In the 10 minutes that it took for me to go upstairs, shut off the pump, call my brother and him to get over to the house the water was now on the 1st step and was starting to come up to the 2nd step from the bottom. My brother goes down in the basement and climbs up on the freezer so he can reach down and unplug the freezer and the basement fridge.
He comes up to the ground level and yells up to me that I need to start making room in the upstairs fridge for anything in the basement fridge that would spoil if it was not kept refridgerated. I tell him that the only things in there are some of dad's beer and the mints I had taken down the night before. He goes and brings my mints up to me and asks if I have shoes I can get wet with me, I tell him I do have my thongs with me as I was using those as slippers for at night.
Meanwhile my sister in law gets my infant niece ready and comes on over to see exactly what is going on because all she knows is my parents basement if flooding I am heading next door.
Brother heads over to the barn area to get the pump that was use to pump out the corrals when we get too much rain as it will at least start the job. Meanwhile sister in law and I take turns going down and getting smaller items that are close to the flood line and even under water and spreading them out in the garage (my parents have a 3 car garage set up as 2 wide and technically 2 wide but the backside only has one car bay the other is my dad's woodwork area. We are trying not to put stuff in the bay my mom parks her mini van in. The other one is upstairs above the garage with my niece who is enjoying the baby swing and the toys in the family room while trying to call my mom's cell phone, my dad's cell phone, and my sister's cell phone plus the camp administrative number. (Sister would not have been able to do anything but we figured she could keep calling our parents phones and tell them to call home) The water was freezing cold because it was cold coming in from the well on the other side of the house. The basement if only 4 feet below ground and the water came in right at 4.5 feet above the basement floor on the opposite side of the house from the garage (house is 120 feet from one side to the other across that length all built by hand by my dad with a few things he needed a 2nd pair of hands friends and relatives helping him).
My brother gets the pump set up running the hose across the yard to drain well away from the house out one of the windows. He is then able to start going down in the basement as well to get items that we are hoping can be saved. After a while of seeing how slow the water is going down my brother decides that we are going to need more equipment and heads into a place that not only rents pumps but huge fans as well to dry out the floor amoung other items. While he is gone sister law goes back over to their house to grab more things for niece since she had only brought the small diaper bag and was out. Niece had decided it was a good time to take a nap so I just sat upstairs above the garage watching some tv and dialing all the numbers on rotation. I finally get a hold of my sister and tell her what is going on, she says that she will continue to try and call our parents so that those of us at the house can take that off our plates and can concentrate on getting a good start on the clean-up. Meanwhile while over at their house sister in law has gotten in touch with her aunt who lives in another part of our town. Her aunt is going to watch niece so that all of us can work on the basement. Brother gets back and starts getting the pump set up along with fans in areas that the water is basically out except for some small puddles. He tells me to go ahead and go to the shower for my friend as I was just going to run the mints and my gift over and then leave. I get ready and head out telling him that I will be back as soon as I can, about that time niece wakes up from her nap and sister law gets her all ready to go to sister in law's aunt. I will eat at the shower and sister in law plans on picking up a pizza for her and my brother.
At some point my sister gets a hold of our mom. I get a phone call from mom asking just how bad things are so I tell her along with how much the water has gone down by the time I l left the house. Mom says she is leaving now and will be home in 5 hours, I tell her to drive safe and I will see her when she gets home (mom had planned on staying until Sunday at my dad's camper near the job the company he works for was in the middle of completing) so I know that I need to park somewhere other than in the front of the garage as my brother has moved the 2 ton hoyer lift farm truck over in front of the far front bay so we could toss items that there was no way they were being saved like boxes containing canning jars that had fallen apart in the water, we would find other boxes for the jars to be stored in at a later time.
Even with set up before and clean up after the bridal shower for a friend I still get home before my mom does so I continue to work on the basement. My brother and sister in law had worked for a while then went and picked up niece and were at their house settling in for the night especially since they would be up a few times in the night with having an infant. Keep in mind that by now it was after 7 PM and we had been dealing with water in the basement since just before 10 AM and getting items out as we could. Mom got home around 9 PM and had just brought her stuff from the van into the house (do to space in the camper she would take clothing and stuff she needed as well as dish cloths and towels to swap out clean ones for dirty for my dad especially if he was not in an area with easy access to coin op laundry places and he had not been home for a few weeks) when the phone rang. I happened to be closer since mom was just coming in the entry from the garage and still had to come up the stairs to the main level of the house so I answered it. My dad was calling from his cell phone to tell us that his job superintendent told him to take a day or two off if and head home to get things taken care of on his house (helped that all their equipment was in well running order and they hadn't gotten equipment sent over from other crews because the higher ups were tired of hearing that something was down constantly on the dirt crew, or the crushing crew, or the smaller job paving crew and would send it over to the heavy asphalt crew so my dad could just take a look at it and figure out what was wong-aka they knew he could fix it) that the other mechanics could cover things. Dad was calling to let us know that he would be in between 11:30 and midnight so we wouldn't call the sheriff dept when someone came in the house that late.
The next morning dad starts in figuring out exactly where the water was coming in, keep in mind that I had shut off the pump a few minutes before 10 the morning before so when Dad got up and started working on it about 6 am Sunday morning we had been without water for 20 hours. I ended up going to my house to get a quick shower before church and my mom called on of her cousins and went and took a shower there. I mentioned that she could take one at my place but did tell her that she would have to wait for hot water as the hot water heater in the place I was renting would allow 1 10-15 minute shower and then it took some time to heat the water up for anything else. Mom and I headed to church. For those wondering why she did not shower next door at my brothers because his house was on the lot that my parents originally had a trailer house (pre 1978 model-actually a late 1960s so I am using the older term of trailer house instead of the newer term of a mobile home which is what is used since standardizing of construction laws were passed in 1978) that they (and later me until I was 15 months old) lived in until we moved into the house that my dad built and my parents still live in today. The house and the trailer were kept on the same well so if the water was shut off not only did we not have water there was no water at where evenutally my brother had his early 80s double wide. (my parents had sold their trailer to one of my cousins, M and his wife R who later sold it to a cousin. F from the other side of the family of another cousin, D. When it got sold again my parents said that they would no longer be renting the lot out (my brother had found one and wanted to use the lot) so the trailer would have to be moved. (didn't help that the people who bought the trailer had lived with the people, C and N who bought had lived with F as roommate and everytime F would go out of town would throw wild parties to the point that not only was my dad or brother going over there to tell them to tone it down the neighbors on the other side were going over as well and both the sherrif dept and the state highway patrol when they would go past could hear them with windows up in their patrol vehicles (keep in mind this is a state highway at 55-60 MPH speed limits) at a distance long enough that it was 3-4 lanes over depending which direction the officer was going. At that loud we never had to call and get the you $^&* how dare you call the cops on us because the nice officer would make it clear that they could be heard driving past and if they were that loud even though there was not a noise ordinance in the county they were going to be in trouble for disturbing the peace if they got a call from any of the neighbors (we only heard if we were outside or had a window open and my dad built the house that you don't hear much outside when in the house) they were that loud so the parties would shut down fairly quickly. My parents were tired of dealing with all the cars parked so that we couldn't get past to their house or to the shops and barns and after over 30 years of both the trailer and later just the lot renting got out. (My dad now has a nice big spot for his garden for which a few rules have been set mainly do not plan to be out of town when anything is going to be coming up in huge abundance because we are going to just let it go-us kids don't have time to pick 100 plus feet of beans or tomatoes, or what ever else is ready).
My dad figured out where the pipe had burst right as it came into the house and that there was not a second break futher down between the pumphouse and the house or a break in the line going over towards my brother's mobile home. This involved a trip into town to get replacement pipe as it came into a house as well as a temporary cap to cap it off as it came into the house so that he could run the water from the pump and look for soft spots in the ground that would indicate a leak. Finding non it was time to replace the pipe coming into the house which involved quite a bit of digging with shovels from him and my brother due to the fact that there were also electric wires and the natural gas pipe coming into the house in the same general location. He wanted to dig with the backhoe used for the septic installation business my parents were trying to get off the ground back then (didn't really get going and when requirements in our area went to a different more expensive pressurized system opposed to a drain field system smaller operations that were already running a profitable business for a number of years were put out of business due to the expense of the equipment needed to install the systems) but my mom told him don't you dare because we don't need to deal with a gas leak or cutting the electric as well. (I am not sure but what she took the keys with her especially since my dad has a history of not listening to her on stuff like that-hmm actually no he wouldn't do something like that just like he did not drive a stick shift vehicle with his left leg in a hip to ankle cast after having knee surgery or decided to build a corner cabinent while on crutches because he was bored (had to have a neighbor come over and split the piece of plywood though).
Due to my parents water having high nitrates my parents had been purchasing 2.5 gallon containers of water that were kept on the counter for use for drinking and cooking, but they decided the fall previously to go ahead and have a small 2K gallon cistern put in and have a single cold water faucet punched into the kitchen sink (ok dad did the work involved) for cooking and cleaning water so we at least had water to drink during this time. My dad was going to fix the pipe coming into the house and turn the water back on but my mom told him to hold off until the insurance adjuster could come out first thing Monday. He was all well what about the laundry you need to get done and she was what can't wait can be taken to the laundrymat down the road. At least my brother and sister in law had water at their house though they had picked up some gallons of water and both had taken showers on Saturday night at her aunts house so they were ok with waiting until Monday sometime to get showers (plus her aunt said they could come out anytime and have a hot shower)
Monday morning bright and early Mom calls our insurance agent who is great about helping her and dad fight it as the underwriters attempt the if it's coming in the basement it is ground water, if it was a pipe burst in the house there would be damage on the main floor as well. (Most construction if there is a basement has the pipes running in the ceiling of the basement just under the floor of the main part of the house so a break results not only in water in the basement but damage to the main floor as well). That is when it got into sure would like to know where the ground water came from due to the level of drought conditions we had been under for the length we had questioning from my parents as well as the agent. Finally the insurance company agreed to send out an adjuster to look at things later that week. My mom is look my husband is having to take time off work which is in town, neighboring state and is only able to do so because his boss said he could take a couple of days as this is their busy season I want someone out here today or tomorrow morning at the latest so he can get the repairs done so I can have water for laundry and showers. All of a sudden the we might be out sometime Friday we will call you with an exact time Wednesday afternoon or Thursday morning managed to get changed to how is 11:30 am tomorrow morning we can send an adjuster from a town 3 hours away but he is all booked up today.
Tuesday a little before 11 am we get a knock at the door to find the adjuster there (ok obviously someone was able to leave the office a bit early and or was speeding a bit but just a little). He comes in takes a look at things tells my parents well I can see it's obvius that it was a pipe burst in the house not ground water so we will cover the damages, how much do you think you have here. At that point mom could produce the pipe my dad had gotten, sheet rock dad had gotten as that would need to be replaced in the basement, the receipt for the rental of the 2nd pump and commercial hoses. We got told to make a list of prices on other items such as the carpet we had that needed to be thrown out, all the books and stuff that was wet (we should have gotten pictures but back then there was not really a way to scan them and have them digitally redone using programs that have a higher chance of being available today), and the fees for dumping at the county dump. (At the time it was completely under the control of the city so we paid a small fee for each load dumped as a county resident but those from out of county paid a higher fee, since then it has been changed to only residents of our county can use the dump and it is the county dump.
The physical clean up we had done fairly quick especially with having nice big windows things like the carpet could just go out the windows which were removed from the frame. The time spent writing down all the information on books including title, author or editor, edition, print date, publisher and then looking all the information up to get prices including finding such things as if it is a leather bound or gold embossed edges on the paper it effects the value as well. I got that job as I had more time to do the research plus mom spent all day on computer screens at work and dad let's just say at the time he could manage to turn on the computer if we said go and push the round button at the top on the right hand side of the tower and push the button on the right hand side bottom on the screen but beyond that he was helpless and even dangerous (we got tired of having to figure out what the problem was when dad attempted to get near the computer) so was banned unless given specific instructions to tun on the computer. I honestly think if I was doing it today I would snap pictures of the front cover, the back cover, and the copy right page including the ISBN number (I had a number of the books that could only be found using that as they were out of print and considered rare editions) to have a clearer indication especially all the ones that the copywrite date was in roman numerals (you have to translate the copyright MCMLVIII to 1958 to do the search for a book printed in that year) which I learned more about than I ever need to know in my life.

 

[Judique]

@sweetpeama you guys sure had an adventure!

 

[Shelly F - Ohio]

Ok, what is a sump pump overwork?

Our neighbor was covered when his sump pump failed and had floor insurance. When it happened the 2nd during hurricane Sandy and we lost power his insurance would not cover him unless he had a battery back up sump pump installed.