30 Years of Water Damage Restoration: How One Las Vegas Contractor Became an Industry Authority

Hey everybody, this is Dave from a greater town.

And as you all know, what we do here

is meet local business owners and hear their story

about their business, how they got started

and sort of where they're at now.

So today's episode, we've got Craig

and I'm just gonna let Craig start up

and tell us who you are, how'd you get started

and tell us about your business.

Thank you, appreciate you having me on board today.

Craig Herman, I've lived in Las Vegas since 1973.

Started in the janitorial industry back in the 80s

and did commercial janitorial.

And I discovered my clients had commercial carpets

that needed cleaning, so I started a carpet cleaning company.

I soon found out that while I had this equipment

to clean my client's carpets,

there was a natural progression

to step in doing water damage.

So I'm doing water damage and I like it so much better

than the janitorial business.

I sold my janitorial industry and dove into this back in 96,

full time doing water restoration,

got into the mold industry, started doing mold abatement

and then got my contractor's license

because I would do a water loss for a client.

I'd be removing building materials

for whatever water damage happened at the property

and or mold and they'd want to, they'd say,

hey Craig, what about putting my home back together?

In Nevada, you have to have a Nevada contractor's license

to perform those tasks.

So we naturally evolved to become

a full-fledged restoration contractor in Las Vegas.

Okay, all right.

So I'm gonna try to like walk through sequentially, right?

So this is 96 and you had been doing carpet cleaning,

transitions into water damage or restoration

as you're calling it.

And I'll ask some questions about all the terminology

around that in a minute.

But so now, you've done that and now,

how quickly did you get into, actually, you know what?

I'm sorry, should step back a second.

What's the name of the business?

We haven't.

Construction by Mirage and Mold Eliminators.

The reason there's two different names is Mold Eliminators

points straight at what I'm dealing with

as far as people's homes.

They wanna have it eliminated.

So we've called the restoration industry Mold Eliminators

and the construction company, Mold Eliminators

doesn't sound like a name you would use for construction.

So we started construction by Mirage.

Right, right, okay, very good.

They go hand in hand.

Yeah, sure, yeah, it makes total sense.

You're sort of feeding yourself business,

which is brilliant.

Okay, so how long after the mold,

you started working on mold,

did you do the construction part?

It pretty much happened simultaneously.

As I was doing it, it's like immediately,

I'm starting to do work for clients

and I needed a contractor's license

to legally step into that dynamic.

So as progress, I got my license for construction at 04, 2004.

Okay, yeah, so a few years later, yeah, okay.

Yeah, all right, that's incredible.

All right, so that's incredibly impressive.

I mean, we're talking 95 to 2006, it's 30 years.

You should be very proud of that.

I've seen a lot.

We've been to the Gulf Coast of Mississippi

when Hurricane Katrina hit the Gulf Coast.

So we've mitigated, which is another word for remediation

for mold impacted building materials.

We've seen the worst, homes underwater for eight hours.

That's something you really can't describe

unless you're standard looking at it.

And especially the months afterwards

as the building material sat wet all that time,

it just corroded and ate away stuff.

So we've seen the worst you can see of mold

to the simplest scenarios where

from a whole house being underwater

to a simple hot water heater that fails in someone's garage

and floods out their garage or maybe part of their house.

I've done every dynamic between those two.

Yeah, yeah, okay.

All right, so I'm glad you sort of went into that

because I personally have never,

well, actually that's not true.

We had a mold, I don't know what kind by any means

in our crawl space at one point in a prior house.

So I'm curious to start learning a little bit.

I mean, I'm sure there's hundreds of kinds of mold

or maybe not that many, but a lot.

So to a normal consumer that doesn't really understand,

they may just be thinking,

oh, there's black spots on my ceiling, I need help.

What is it that's actually happening?

Well, first off, mold is ubiquitous.

It's in the air continually around us.

We accept normal levels of mold that's outdoors.

We should have a cleaner level of mold inside of our home,

a lower consideration because filtration, air conditioning,

carpet and things like that

kind of captures some of those things.

So when a consumer has visualization

of something that's catching your eye,

if you see the building material

starting to pull away from the wall,

like your baseboards pull away from the wall

or you see discoloration,

that's the time to call a professional.

This first moment you notice it

because our insurance covers,

that's what is for sudden and incidental damages

to where if you see the damage and you think, well,

and you kick the can down three months and then you go,

you know what, I better address this before it gets worse.

And now it's gotten worse.

And it's three months later, you call your insurance company

and the first thing they're gonna ask you is

what's the date you noticed it?

And if you give the true data three months ago,

they may be cordial and polite on the phone,

but they're gonna deny the claim

because we're covered for only sudden and incidental damage.

So it's important that when a homeowner notices something,

they immediately call a professional like Mold Eliminators

to come out and investigate it.

We do free and home consultations.

So there's no cost or obligation to the homeowner.

You're gonna professional to come look,

give you evaluation and give you a proposal

how to correct your scenario.

Yeah, okay, wow.

See, like this is why we love doing these things,

these interviews,

because I really wouldn't have thought

of the insurance angle and the whole, you know,

reported date and all this sort of stuff.

So it's great to have exposed that

or, you know, brought that to the surface.

Okay, and is there like a varying degree of danger,

you know, not just in the amount of damage or mold,

but mold types, like, is that a thing?

That's a great question.

It's a very subjective question

because every one of us have a different immune system.

For example, you could line up 10 people in a room

and introduce a mold spore, let's say, stacky bultris,

and you introduce it at a high level.

Maybe two thirds of the room don't notice anything,

but one third of the room of people will start to have,

you know, lightheadedness, itchy eyes,

their sinuses may start to run.

So it depends upon our individual immune system

and how it's gonna react to the spore.

As you know, and again, there's before,

there's over a hundred thousand different species

and genres of mold that's out there.

So it all depends upon what you have an allergy to.

For example, I have an allergy to wheat and flour.

So if I eat anything with wheat and flour,

it affects my body.

The same thing with mold spores.

People have allergens to airborne particulates

they may not be knowledgeable of.

It could be pollen in the air.

It could be dust in the air.

That kind of the carrying point

for bringing in the mold spores,

but those mold spores are light, they're buoyant,

and they float through the air.

And if you have something decaying inside your home

that has water introduced,

I guess I should say this,

in order to have mold, you need three things.

Water is the first source.

It feeds onto an organic building material,

such as drywall,

kitchen cabinets are made from pressed board with glue.

So anything with glue or paper.

So that includes wallpaper, your kitchen cabinets,

your vanities, subflooring,

a linoleum flooring has glue on it,

wallpaper has glue on it.

And of course, wallpaper and drywall has paper on it.

So those properties can grow mold.

So all you need is the third element is time.

You get that building material wet,

let it set wet for three days to 10 days,

and you have the potential for mold to start growing.

Now, obviously there's different factors.

Is it a fresh water or is it a sewage water?

Is it hot, is it cold?

You introduce a sewage water and you have a warm environment,

it's gonna grow rapidly.

You could have a fresh water loss in a cold climate,

and it may take three months for it to grow

because it doesn't have the chance for it to really go.

So it's all a very subjective question

of the person's immune system

and how the mold was introduced

and how their system's reacting to that airborne particulate.

Okay, all right.

So let's say I notice something suspicious

and I call and you guys come in,

you give the quote,

you know, an inspection,

and let's just scope it to a fairly small thing.

It's not total flood or anything like that.

What does it take to get rid of it?

Is it a one-day process?

Is it 10, like how does it work?

There again, that's subjective.

If it's a small area like behind a commode

and you have a little leak from the toilet overflowing,

simple project.

Unless it goes in behind the vanity

that's to the left or right or behind the shower,

then it becomes a little bit more involved.

But if it's just sheer drywall

and there's no marble or cabinets or granite, easy.

You're in and out in a day and a half, two days

to mitigate it.

That's just the mitigation part, removal of it,

not the rebuild.

If you've got it behind your kitchen cabinets

and you've got a beautiful kitchen cabinet

with cherry wood cabinets and a very nice granite

that your wife chose that she'll never wanna get rid of

and now you're having the contrary,

just saying we're gonna have to take out your kitchen

and pull up your granite,

that doesn't make homeowners very comfortable.

So it's a very subjective and where it's found.

Kitchens, bathrooms, showers,

more tedious and much more expensive.

Simple drywall with no special finishes

like Venetian plaster or any faux finishes.

Very simple to do.

So it's a very subjective question

of what was introduced to the mold

and how much it's grown.

Sure, sure.

The key thing is drying it down.

The second you as a homeowner notice water impacting

your building materials,

you wanna call us out immediately

because we could dry it down

and even a big kitchen like I first just described,

I can dry that down without removing any of the cabinets,

any of the kitchen granite tops or anything.

I can make it dry and prove it's dry

and have air samples to validate that after the fact.

So time is of the essence for the homeowner to be wise

and to call out the professionals

of mold eliminators right away.

Yeah, yeah, okay.

All right.

My goodness, this is true for every industry

but there's so much that professionals know

that the average consumer has just thrown no idea.

There's no reason for them to know, right?

So again, this is one of the reasons why we do these talks.

Okay, so in addition to mold,

I know you're also doing fire and what else?

Yes.

Fire, water, mold, we do hoarders.

Sometimes folks just collect things

and can't seem to quite release their hands from it.

I have a woman on my team that is great

at speaking with people who have a hoarder issue

and help them hold their hands and make them feel comfortable

because it's typically a hard separation from your product

or your things you have in your home.

It's hard for someone to separate.

It is very emotional.

So I have a lady on my team who's very empathetic

and warm towards that person.

So that helps.

Another thing that we do is crime scene.

People pass away in their homes, things happen

and we go in there, we can correctly remove

any building material that's compromised

because of bodily fluids

and restore the home back to pre-loss.

Wow, okay.

Yeah, that's another one

that I just wouldn't have ever thought of.

It's the sort of thing you don't think about

until you need it, I guess.

Right.

Another piece of it too is asbestos.

So some homes, if they're built prior in our nation,

prior to 78, have the potential to have asbestos in them.

If that's asbestos, then that's a whole different animal.

To remove that, there's permits from the city or state,

there's proper removal, the guys have to be uniformed,

they gotta be testing the air all the time

to make sure we're not bringing those spores outside

of the contained environments.

And mold is similarly handled as you would with asbestos,

just not to the severity of the legality of asbestos,

but it's very, very similar.

Our guys do the suits, they set up for containment,

they remove it, they bag it, they dispose of it safely.

Mm-hmm, mm-hmm.

Okay.

Asbestos, and then what's the other one?

Is lead paint still a thing?

Yes.

Removal, yeah.

And we're certified for lead-based paint removal also.

That's not a common thing, but it's used,

like for example, we do work for the city of Las Vegas,

where they have water systems.

And then the pipes are coated with lead-based paint

because it deters into your corrosion.

So there's one of my clients, the city of Las Vegas,

that hires us to remove lead from building materials

they use for their plumbing.

Big, we're talking about big plumbing valves and pipes.

So there is that scenario.

It's not oftenly used, and mostly in homes

that are past 1960 and beyond,

would have lead in the paint and or some of the finishes.

Right, yeah, my dad was a painter.

So, you know, in the 70s up until he retired more recently.

So yeah, I mean, I know he used to use lead paint.

So, you know.

Okay.

So what else is he gonna ask?

So we did mold, we did, oh, I know.

I was on your website and I noticed something,

and I'm sorry, I'm gonna incorrectly describe the document,

but just like every industry, there is rules, right?

Especially in something like this,

where there's regulations about how this gets handled.

And I noticed the document,

which apparently you've been a co-author of.

Yes, there's an internet, it's called the IICRC.

It's a sanctioning body.

They write standards for water damage, for mold,

for odors, for crime scene cleanup,

for carpet and textiles.

They write standards that are across the board

for restoration contractor like myself.

There is one document called the mold standard,

which is a S520.

It's a living document that's been around for 18 years,

and it's required to be evaluated by professionals

in industry every eight years

and brought up some new current standards,

whether it's science that we use

or systems or chemicals that we use

for doing abatement projects for the removal of mold.

I was invited by my peers, gosh, seven years ago,

and we spent six years every week on a Zoom call

with professionals around the world

reviewing this living document and retooling it,

which was reissued out on 2024 as our print date.

So I have the privilege of being a co-author

of the International Mold Standard.

Oh, that is huge.

Huge.

You wrote the book.

I enjoyed it.

It was enjoyable to be consulting with other people

who are much smarter than me.

I'm pretty smart,

but these cats are much more scientifically involved.

So it was really rich for me to get investing six years

of my time into that,

because I walked away with a tremendous amount of knowledge

that I've shared with my staff,

which ends up to the consumer.

So you're getting the A-team, I guess, for a mold abatement

when you call mold eliminators.

Right, okay.

So we haven't exactly covered this.

I mean, we sort of touched on it,

but in order to be a mold eliminator

or any of these abatement or removal projects

that we've described, you need to be certified,

I'm assuming.

There is very few regulations.

There's New York, Florida, and Texas are three of the states

that demand contractors be specifically licensed.

I would wish that they would put that requirement

across all the 52 states of America,

because it would create a common platform

for us all to work on.

But in most municipalities, aside from those states,

you don't have to be licensed to do mold abatement,

which is to me a tragedy, I think,

because then you get guys that,

and I get called to come in behind them all the time.

They put lipstick on the pig.

They don't pull the proper building materials.

The house is flooded.

They just don't remove anything,

baseboards or drywall, put a fan against it

and charge for their equipment and walk out the door.

And they're saying thank you.

And you're thinking, okay, great, my house is back.

And then you decide to change out your flooring.

You pull off your baseboard

and it's black behind your baseboard.

And you're going, oh my gosh, that was two years ago.

You go and call your insurance company and they go,

well, sorry, that was two years ago.

That's not covered.

It was neglect.

You didn't do it right.

So it's important not to get an uncertified firm.

Again, if they can say they know the standard, the S520,

and they abide by the IICRC S520,

they should be a reputable company in your city.

I'm actually shocked that there's not state or nationwide,

I mean, I guess it wouldn't be done on the federal level,

but even that more states don't require

some sort of certification.

I'm actually really shocked.

It takes lawsuits.

There just has to be enough people being legally chased

after they finally make it legislature.

That's what it takes.

You really have to fight like it.

And that's how asbestos got to be the problem.

It took from the thirties when my dad worked

in asbestos plants back in Buffalo, New York,

he got mesothelioma and you don't know,

cause it took 30 years for the signs of asbestos

to affect that person's respiratory system.

It's gonna take time before mold really affects people.

It's not as bad as asbestos, but it's not healthy either.

Yeah, right, right.

Okay.

Okay, so then from a consumer's point of view,

again, it's like, there's a lot of learning to do, right?

And so what I'm hearing now from a consumer's point of view,

what they should ask when they call someone in

to look at the mold or whatever,

are you following the standard?

I'm sorry, I forgot the terminology.

The name of it.

IICRC.

Yeah, okay.

So at the very least ask that question.

And not that everybody or some contractors are gonna lie,

but how would a consumer know

that they actually do follow it?

What would they look out for?

Well, you can go to the IICRC.org website

and type in, find a professional near me.

Oh, okay.

So you can go to their website.

There'd be a great place to start.

Cause if you want somebody for doing a fire job

or you have a unique odor you wanna get rid of

or mold or water or clean your,

you've got some really fine silks or a pulcher in your home

and you wanna find somebody who could properly care for those,

the standards written by this organization

cover anything that pretty much is immaterial in your home.

Okay, so I go and I do a Google search

for mold removal or whatever.

And I find John's mold removal, just some company

and I call them in and they give me a quote.

What is, and I ask, are you following the IIRR standard?

They start to do the job.

And me as a consumer, I really don't know what to look for.

So how do I quality check the work?

I have the answer for that.

You go to lasvegasmold.com and look at procedures

and on my website and I spell out step one through 15

of what should happen, set controls,

establish negative air.

The guys should be wearing,

and the negative air means that the plastic they put up

on the room should be pulling in and not blowing out.

If it's positive pressure inside that space,

and let's say they put a fan in there

and they're blowing a fan right on the mold

and so much air pressure is being drawn from outside.

They're blowing those mold spores outside

of the contained space.

And that's called cross contamination.

That tells you you hired a fool to do the work for you.

Someone doesn't know what they're doing.

So you have to have controls and negative pressure,

meaning we're drawing more air from inside our space.

That way it can't slip out of our controls.

So on my website, I spell out all the steps

that are properly to be done

for a job to be mitigated correctly.

Yeah, okay.

That's incredible.

I'm thrilled that we got on this call and did this today.

For anybody that will find the video,

they're gonna learn an awful lot.

I know I have, so it's fantastic.

All right, so that, I think that's everything I have.

Is there anything else that you want to cover,

let people know that when they're looking

for this sort of service, what to do

and what to watch out for or anything else?

Just the one thing, I just had a phone call conversation

with an old friend of mine today.

He went in as a cabinet maker.

He's not a mold expert.

And he was replacing cabinets in someone's house

and pulled back the cabinets.

And all of a sudden he saw black all over the back wall.

He took it upon himself and his homeowner didn't,

just to cut it out.

That's the worst thing you can do

because we don't have controls.

I guess I should say,

it depends upon the person's immune systems inside the home.

If the person in the home has a healthy immune system

and they're not gonna be affected by the plumes

of mold spores that are gonna be created

by this hack job handyman carpenter,

if your immune system is healthy, great, no problem.

But if you're a mother who just gave birth

to a one month old baby who was an incubator

for six months or six weeks,

and that baby just came home

and that carpenter removed all this stuff

and plume your air with all that mold spores,

get you and your baby out of the house.

Because that plume of mold spores,

because we're born with no immune system.

That child is born with no immune system.

It's developing his immune system

as it's going through his life.

The worst thing you wanna do is like,

boom, hit it with a bunch of mold spores.

So I would caution people to be

what I call a cowboy approach, hire a professional,

vet them to make sure they're certified,

check their insurances.

You could verify if their insurance broker,

they have a lot of claims against them

because of doing shoddy workmanship.

There's several ways you can check out who this person is

and see if they're worth their salt in the industry.

Yeah, that's another great one is the insurance check.

Yeah, yeah, again.

And go to the website for the IICRC

and they're gonna vet the individuals

to make sure they're following the standards.

I have 11 certifications with the IICRC.

I have two masters, one is fire and one is water damage.

So I hold masters with the IICRC in the industry

that I love and enjoy.

Yeah, okay.

I just thought of something else.

In several houses that I've lived in,

I've seen the air conditioner exhausts

where the air comes out.

There's sometimes, I don't wanna say,

I'm not gonna say mold,

because I don't know that it is,

but there's black stuff.

Is that clean mold?

Are you living in a humid environment?

Florida.

So what happens in a humid environment such as Florida

is there's dust and pollen

or whatever's going on in the house all the times.

And it's gathering on the walls,

it's getting on the metal or the plastic of the grill

that you're describing to me.

The home is humid, the environment is humid,

so moisture is pretty much passing by that,

pollen or dust or dirt that's sitting on there.

Potentially it could be mold,

it could be simple as just a wet rag

with some Dawn dish soap and wipe it off.

And that scenario, because it's on a metal or a plastic.

Metal and plastic and non-poor services

can't sustain mold growth.

They may have it grow on the surface,

but it can be wiped off.

The surfaces you have to be concerned about

are those that are compromised with the organic,

that are paper, drywall.

Yeah, cabinets.

But as far as marble, tile, solid wood surfaces,

metal or plastic, just wipe it off.

Yeah, yeah, okay, all right.

All right, thank you so much for coming on.

I learned a lot and I know anybody that watches

is gonna too, so I truly appreciate it.

Is there anything else you wanna leave everyone with?

Free and home consultations, give us a call.

We'll be happy to come out and look at it.

No cost or obligation, no pressure.

You're getting someone with the standards knowledge,

evaluating your property and giving you a proper estimate

and supporting you with your insurance company.

Home owners don't deal with insurance companies

every day of the week.

We employ a person eight hours a day that does nothing,

but talk to insurance brokers all day long,

helping to bridge that gap between the consumer

and their carrier so we can help get the coverage.

And a lot of times insurance companies will deny,

even when it's in the parameters of their policy,

they'll deny it just because it's easier to say no

and it's up to the consumer to fight and to come in

and try to change the results of that carrier.

So we fight for the homeowner as well.

Oh, wow, is that typical that there's someone on the team

working the insurance angle?

I can't speak for all the companies in this nation,

but I can speak for mine, it's essential.

If you don't have an advocate fighting for you,

you're gonna be walked on and denied.

And even when you're denied,

sometimes I have to steer them towards a public adjuster

because we can't get through to them.

And I've got cases right now where I probably refer over

to a local public adjuster who is not an attorney,

but a public adjuster is someone who has legal knowledge

and they stand the gap between you and the carrier

and they'll fight and they take a percentage

of what's awarded, but at least it's you

not using all your money to cover the damages.

If it's a kitchen mitigating, you're $30,000.

It all depends on how you view your money.

Do you wanna just throw it away

or you wanna pay a small fee to a consultant

who can fight for you and get that money back?

Right, right, right, right, right.

Okay, you know, you just,

we keep uncovering more things to talk about.

I'm thinking about insurance policies

and whether they do or don't cover mold.

Good question.

Two major carriers in the United States,

state farming and farmers don't cover mold.

They back, took a hit on the chin

about 25, 30 years ago in Texas.

And so the state farm and farmers pretty much

took a black sharpie and just erased all their mold coverages,

charged you the same premium,

but they now removed that from your coverages.

So I'd encourage homeowners to check with their broker,

do I have a mold inclusion?

Usually they set the thresholds at 2,500 or 5,000.

2,500 is really low.

It's hard for me to do any kind of job

for that little bit of money.

5,000 is better.

And if you have a home over a million dollars in asset,

go with Chubb, is my recommendation.

If you have a home over a million.

If you've served in the military

and or your mother or father served the military,

I would recommend USAA.

Those two brokerage insurance industry companies,

they seem to be the best ones that handle homeowners.

I see lots of claims.

So when I hear state farm, I feel bad for the person,

especially they're calling me and say,

I've got mold in my house.

State farm just sent their own adjuster out there.

They deny me coverage.

Oh my gosh, my kitchen has to be tore apart, help me.

Right.

Sometimes I can reverse the decision

through logical conversation with that adjuster

and get them to cover it.

Where instead of them coming out of pocket,

we can turn the decision that the adjuster said denied

into acceptance and they're writing checks.

Wow.

Well, I'm gonna go check my policy.

Yeah, I honestly didn't think about it,

especially here in Florida, right?

Oh yeah.

Yeah.

And if you, I always tell customers,

if you have a membership at Costco or Sam's Club,

go through them and get your insurance on your home

because they write it through such a big book of business

to American family or wherever they broker with

that they'll get a lower rack rate for that insurance

that if you went directly to them yourselves.

Right.

So Costco has a better, I don't make any money on this,

I'm not benefiting, but I just noticed in the industry,

that's a smart way to get your insurance.

If you don't have Chubb or USAA availability to you,

then call your local Costco or Sam's Club

and ask them write it through their companies.

Yeah, that's great advice.

And one sad thing about this,

I've been doing this since, well, the 90s.

I remember meeting State Farm, for example,

on a job site back in the 90s

and they would pull up in their van,

look at the job with us, go back in their vehicle,

type up on a computer with their air conditioner,

with a printer, print out a check and the scope of estimate

and walk in the house and hand that homeowner a draft,

a check, and as well as the estimate,

that gets us to start right away.

Those days are gone, that ship has sailed.

Now they're took the exact opposite approach

instead of being proactive and taking care of the homeowner

like a good neighbor,

is they simply deny and refuse coverages

and make you have to fight

because there's no way in this earth

that you can go take a class action lawsuit

and really come against them with any kind of strength

unless of course you know 60 other people

who've been insured by State Farm and been denied,

you're kind of the lone ranger.

As a lone ranger, you're gonna get stepped on.

Yeah, yeah, right.

Those are the things we see.

The insurance industry has gone more towards

the level of denial than I've ever noticed in my life

and they'll cancel you right away.

They'll cancel you.

Yes.

They'll raise your premiums or they'll cancel you.

They are no longer a good neighbor or a friend.

Yeah.

That or they are not.

You'll notice it if you have a claim.

Probably 10% of the people go through smooth,

90% of the people go through with a headache.

Yeah, well, you know, since we're talking about this,

this is a sort of unrelated,

related to insurance, unrelated to mold.

We got kicked out of State Farm for auto

to no fault accidents and usage of towing.

So we used the towing service three times in three years,

I think, and basically they said,

sorry, we don't want you anymore.

Wow.

Yeah, surprising.

So I was, yeah.

The insurance industry,

and here's my personal take on this.

I've been doing this since the nineties.

And I've had, I had almost a million dollar fire loss

in an apartment complex I was doing

for a property management firm.

Yeah.

I fought with the insurance company

and finally got them to agree

and then they didn't release a check.

It sat on the desks of the claims office

for like a month and a half.

And I finally said to the homeowner, the property owner,

I said, do you mind if I take my gloves off

and I go into the ring and start fighting for you?

And they said, would you please?

Cause here's the apartment complex.

They can't have any income.

Right.

It was like a 10 unit complex.

Part of it, probably a third of it was burnt.

So it was unoccupiable.

So I took the string of emails that I had to the adjuster.

I went online and found the board directors

for that insurance company.

And I sent a letter to all the board members.

I said, is this really the way you really want to be known

in this industry of how you take care of your insureds?

Within 24 hours, I had a phone call.

Within 48 hours, they had a certified check sent to them.

So my personal take is these cats in the board room

are saying, hey, if we're gonna,

let's say state farmer farmers or AAA or any of the,

pick a company, it doesn't matter.

They figure in the month of February,

they're gonna pay out a hundred million dollars in claims.

If they set aside a hundred million dollars for claims

they don't pay them out till March, April, May or June.

They're taking that money and they're playing it

in the commodities and whatever investment portfolio

they have, they're gonna double, triple

and quadruple their money.

Meanwhile, you're gonna be sitting there going,

oh my gosh, I can't live in my house.

I don't have my kitchen, my children.

And I can't do our laundry like we normally do.

So when it comes time to take my son or daughter to school,

I'm having to go to the laundromat and do laundry

because I can't do it in my house

because my insurance carers denied me

or I can't cook in my kitchen.

That's the tragedy we're facing

is these companies don't care at all.

All about the homeowners and where they're all about

the bottom line, the profitability

and they'll kick it down the curb for a season

just because they want to better themselves

and keep their islands and their jets.

That's the real world.

That's the real world.

Yeah, well, we could go on forever about that part.

So maybe we will one other day.

It's a conversation that should be had.

Yeah, okay, well, so for the purposes of today,

again, I'm gonna say thanks

and I'll stop asking questions or else we'll keep going.

Craig, thank you very much.

It's been great.

I learned a lot and we're gonna post this everywhere

on a greater town and the social media that we've got.

And I hope it helps you with your business.

Well, thank you, appreciate your time.

All right, have a great day.

You as well.

All right, take care, bye.

All right, that's it.