In 2012 we suffered a devastating fire to our home. We were able to flee our burning home in the wee hours of a freezing cold morning a few days before Christmas. We were fortunate an individual delivering newspapers saw the fire, called 911 and awakened us. God was watching over us that cold morning in December. We lost many personal belongings but not our lives. That was an important fact that we reminded ourselves of over and over in the months following the fire!
4 Lessons We Learned While Rebuilding our Home After A Fire
- Insurance: We were insured, however we had inadvertently picked a dishonest and disreputable insurance company. We only realized that after our home was damaged! Hindsight is 20/20 as the old saying goes...... We tried to save money by choosing the lowest price thinking we probably would never need it. Right. Wrong, wrong, and wrong again. They had massively under-insured our property and found ways to delay payment for nearly 4 years. I know crazy right? We learned a painful and costly lesson. Read the small print, pay the extra for a reputable insurance company, and always know how much your home should be insured for. Lesson learned.
- Contractors: In the heat of the moment (no pun intended) we chose a contractor for our re-build. This was the same individual who came to board up our property to prevent further damage. In hindsight we were not in an appropriate frame of mind to do this at the time. And our mistake still haunts us to this day. Some work has still not been completed by this contractor going on 5 years later. Their complete bill has been paid for awhile now and we just have to accept that this is the outcome. We learned a lesson in this area as well. Take a moment after something as devastating as a fire to get some estimates and references before choosing a contractor.
- Rebuilding: The rebuilding was a long and frustrating process. Each choice we made had to be considered from multiple aspects. Not being sure of how long we would remain in this house affected some of our design choices. We had to carefully combine our tastes with finishes that would appeal to others if we decided to sell this house later on. Money was a strong consideration. I shopped deals like crazy in order to find the what we needed for the best price. My husband had to do a lot of the finishing work that was left incomplete as well as the changes to our home that we made that were unrelated to the damage from the fire. Remember to be kind and patient to your family as well as others during stressful situations.
- Less: The fourth lesson we learned was the most important. Less. We can survive and even thrive with less than we had before. I never got around to replacing all of the clothes I lost in the fire. The funny thing is I don't need more than I have. I can only wear one outfit at a time. I used to have a packed closet full of things I rarely used. So many of our personal belongs were destroyed in the fire and yet we learned we did not need all of that stuff. We are happier with a less cluttered home. Every year I used to have a garage sale to sell the things we no longer needed. What that really means is each year I accumulated so much junk I had to get rid of some of it! The funds were not available to replace all we lost in the fire and in some ways that was a good thing. Less stuff allows us more time for the things that are truly important for our soul.
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