Water damage to a house - what should I do?

[Tom7227]

My brother in law's house up in rural Turtle Lake WI had a pipe break and the house got flooded. I don't know how bad it is. The pipe was in an upstairs bathroom and the water ran all the way down through ducts and there supposedly was 4 inches of water in the basement. He has insurance but the agent said he can't do anything until Monday.

I am going up tomorrow to see what I can do. Someone went up today and cleaned up as best as possible and turned the furance up to 75 degrees. Should I put some fans out, open a window to let mositure out?? Obviously I'll be taking a lot of pictures.

It would be nice to get ServiceMaster out but that doesn't look like it will happen until Monday or Tuesday. Any thoughts on what I can do to try and minimize the damage?

Thanks for any advice.

Tom

[sparcebag]

Hopefully the Ins will OK a tearout redo.The molds even then may be hard to stop.Heres a site you can ask the question

http://www.awc.org/index.html

[516]

go rent one or two of those big squirrel-cage fans they really move air, if there is carpet pull up a corner and put one so it blows under the carpet it dries from bottom out and put a dehumidifier down there. Iv had to do it a couple of times myself and saved the carpet.

[SSCHOPSHOP]

516 is RIGHT and maybe 2 dehumidifiers, His insurance agent is wrong. A water claim has top priority they have to have an adjuster THERE with in 24 hours. "Call the company NOW" not the agent. My wife is an adjuster and this is not the way it goes down. He can get reimbursed for the equipment he rents. You have to get the water out first, turning up the heat WILL PROMOTE MOLD GROWTH, don't turn the heat up...Take tons of pics, close ups and far aways. His agent just sells, Call the company!!! Make sure when they come in to fix they do COMPLETE DUCT CLEANING, or he will moisture problems later.

[rmhanton]

as a long time servicemaster employee.. THEY ARE REQUIRED TO BE ON SCENE WITHIN 24 Hours dont let anyone tell you differently... heck if you want ill come out and do the work in my truck with fans and everything.. we had a huge job on deer lake last year. get em out there wuick though mold grows within 72 hours

[Tom7227]

Thanks for the help/advice. Two guys spent about 12 hours on Saturday mopping things out. I went up on Sunday and set out a bunch of fans and dehumidifiers. Monday the adjustor showed up. The floors were all dry and the humidity was down to about 33% when we left. The adjustor called in a service master type outfit and hired a contractor to go in today and test what was wrecked and start the tear out. Three rooms of walls and hardwood floors. Water had run out the house and there was 3+ inches of ice out 50 feet from the house in a big fan shaped area plus 4-5 feet tall ice stalagtites by a front window.

I think the insurance should have to pay us who when up the first 2 or 3 days and cleaned things up. I put on over 300 miles going there. Should they pay us? Any idea what would be fair per hour for that work? Pay for drive time?

Thanks again.

Tom

[sparcebag]

Turn in a bill Tom,Have the insured submit it to the Ins.Co.Make it fairly Itemized.

Also suggest to the contracter after tear out a week or so of dryout time before installation begins.

Reset the fans & dehumidifier.