Contact your insurance agent and see if you qualify for a discount on the California Fair Plan said the letter I received in the mail.
Hey, save money on fire insurance, I thought, why not?
It gave a list of things that were needed to make sure the house was fire safe, almost all of which it appeared we had done over the past few years.
We have the necessary clearance, have removed many trees that were close to the house, redone the driveway so fire trucks of any size can get all the way around the house and much more.
So I contacted my insurance agent who said the Fair Plan people would be in contact with me. I must stress the insurance agent is just the middle person and has no say in what Fair Plan inspectors decide. That is a crucial point.
A few days later, I received a call from an inspector with Fair Plan who said he would be coming to my property to take a look. Were there any vicious dogs? A locked gate? Anything else?
No, you can come take a look.
He stressed I would not need to be there, scheduling it in the daytime when I couldn’t be there. A clue, I later reasoned.
About a week later, he texted me and said he was going to take a look.
Wow, I thought, maybe a chance to save a few hundred dollars. Even though it was just that amount, I figured any savings on a bill that is in the thousands would be a positive.
About two weeks later, the letter came in the mail.
Sorry, they said, just not enough has been done.
They cited various issues. One was the fact my pump house is too close to my house. Let’s see, that pump house was installed, well, I don’t know when. Decades ago because it contains what is the original hand-dug well on the property.
Then there was another “big” issue: the patio table. A few years ago my son and I constructed a really nice table made almost strictly out of 2X4 material. Sturdy and used all of the time.
Sorry, can’t have a wooden table on a patio. Oh, and that rigid plastic storage container that houses my charcoal, cooking tools, bird seed and more just isn’t good enough.
I knew the still-open eaves would be an issue, but the house was built in a manner that just isn’t conducive to covering those up. There are screens and everything else installed that CAL FIRE recommended, but that just isn’t good enough.
Oh, an don’t forget that wooden front porch. Even though it is part of the permanent house, apparently they didn’t like the fact it’s made out of wood to match the home. Another strike.
By the time I had gotten this far in reading the letter, I knew my fate was sealed. No discount for you!
If that wasn’t enough of a dagger, just a couple of weeks later I received a letter saying my fire insurance was going up yet again. And I’m hearing there’s another increase on the way.
Now I don’t think the increase was related to the inspection … at least I hope that’s not the case.
Even though I was turned down, it wasn’t the end of the world because I have become so accustomed to high fire insurance rates you find a way to adjust.
But here’s what galls me to no end.
About 10 feet from my property line is a huge pine tree that came down in the windstorm a few years ago. And that’s just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the many acres of property that are adjacent to my land. It’s a total disaster and nobody seems to care.
But I would imagine their Fair Plan rate is the same as mine. Heck, probably cheaper because there is no house on the land. There once was some semblance of a vineyard and also an illegal growing operation.
But then it changed hands and now there seems to be a weekend shooting range that not only disturbs the peace but also makes me nervous when what appear to be drunken people are firing guns during the dry summer months.
But that’s apparently okay with the Fair Plan folks. Oh wait, they wouldn’t know about all of that because they haven’t been on that property.
This is where the insurance market is so frustrating for so many people.
A lot of people work hard to make their property as fire safe as possible. Certainly, in a big blaze, very little is completely fire safe. But if you have good driveway clearance and have removed trees, CAL FIRE will protect your home if at all possible.
I have witnessed this first hand during the many fires over the past decade. Fire trucks literally surround homes with good clearance when at all possible.
I would imagine the people running Fair Plan haven’t a clue about structure protection and the directives under which CAL FIRE operates.
Many point to Palisades and the devastation that was unleashed in Southern California. My heart breaks for those people and what they had, and still have, to endure.
But in that case, homes were built on top of homes with one road leading in and out surrounded by canyons. They didn’t have a chance.
Here, we have a chance thanks to the expertise of CAL FIRE and the scattered nature of the homes in the county. That makes us different.
But apparently in the eyes of insurance officials, we’re all just one and the same, a number on a letter that leads to denial.
People here (and in Southern California) are struggling just to pay their fire insurance. That’s been augmented by the rising cost of everything over the past year and a half. Gas, food, clothing … everything.
The root of this problem lies within both the insurance industry as a whole and the lawmakers who regulate how it operates. This is not immune to California, either. Florida is struggling enormously with insurance because of hurricanes.
Until there is a reckoning with the laws and a reality check with the insurance companies, we will continue to suffer. No matter what we do, short of building an underground bunker made of cement, it seems our rates are going to continue to climb. Maybe even then.
And there is little we can do to change that direction.
I wish I could wave a magic wand and make lawmakers understand, or somehow make insurance executives realize what they are doing to the people who support their companies.
But my magic wand is a dud. As are the wands of so many others.
I guess I’ll just go home and sit on my patio table, grumble about the property next door and admire my pump house.
Greg Little is editor of the Mariposa Gazette and can be reached at greg@mariposagazette.com
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