Car crashed into house

Flugelhorn

Go via your insurance company - the potential lack of insurance for the driver makes no odds, that is for the police to deal with and the insurance to "manage" .. well just charge everyone else more on their premiums.

What a shock though - yes hope you can get somewhere suitable for the whole family - hotels are not great for more than a few days 

DullGreyGuy

Inplanesight said:

Thanks for everyone’s replies I’ve just got some more questions;

1. - Will my home insurance go up next year because of this even though I was not at fault in anyway?
2. - If the driver was uninsured what does that mean for my claim (had a text from the driver which is making me think this might be true)
3. - I can see my insurer covers alternative accommodation up to 10K. If we’re asked to move out for a period would a short term rental be likely to be approved rather than a hotel? We have a newborn at home so I’m not 100% comfortable on a hotel given the lack of space and facilities for their care
4. - As above I’ll be able to get accommodation for our dog I think too as I did put that on the policy too? I.e kennel fees covered too
   

1. home insurance is a more basic product compared to motor because the vast majority of claims there is no recover opportunity and so for most it will be a claim irrespective if they can get their money back or not (in motor fault/non-fault is typically defined by recovery success)

2. If you claim on your own insurance then the only issue it creates is trying to get your excess back as you'd be pursuing him personally for it.Obviously if he has no insurance then claiming off his insurance is no longer an option

3. It will depend on how long you are going to need to move out for. A hotel can be organised much quicker than a rental and not all areas have a good supply of rentals that can be had for just a few weeks rather than months

4. Need to read your policy book, obviously make sure they are aware/remember there is a pet too

Inplanesight

Thanks all what should I do about a loss assessor to supplement the loss adjuster appointed by my insurance?

DullGreyGuy

There is no real right or wrong answer to it, comes down to personal preference/confidence etc. There will be some who feel they got a much better settlement because of theirs and there will be others who feel the settlement wasnt improved at all so they just gave a proportion of it away for nothing. 

BarelySentientAI

95% of claims (probably more) will get no real benefit from a loss assessor beyond a fuzzy feeling that someone was "on your side".  Up to you if you think that's worth paying them for.

DullGreyGuy

BarelySentientAI said:

95% of claims (probably more) will get no real benefit from a loss assessor beyond a fuzzy feeling that someone was "on your side".  Up to you if you think that's worth paying them for.

They may not get monitory benefit, and would be interested where you go that statistic from, but they can take out the stress and time of dealing with the matters yourself. To some people that has a real value too.

Didnt do Home claims much so didnt come across too many assessor in my time. I have done file audits/reviews though and I would say its very hard to accurately come up with a statistic on the basis the adjustor and assessor discussed the claim and then a settlement was proposed, there is no way of knowing if that proposal would have been lower had the assessor not been involved. In many cases it's based on estimates obtained by the assessor and so again there is the question of if their estimates were higher or lower than what the customer themselves would have gotten. 

Inplanesight

Thank you all for your help it’s always an amazing place to come for reassurance and advice.
Things are moving now and the loss adjuster has put a big reserve on due to the damage

What will happen to my property value after all this is done, will it decrease? If so should I be compensated for this?

Aretnap

If the repairs are done to a good standard there shouldn't really be any long term impact on your property price. Depending on exactly what repairs are done it could even increase sightly, eg if the front wall has been demolished you could find that your tired old plaster and paintwork in the living room gets replaced with shiny new decor.

(Don't worry, when the baby becomes a toddler it will soon go back to looking "lived in" again 😉 )