Farmers Home Insurance

On the week of February 20th, our city and throughout southeast Michigan had a wind and ice storm which impacted the durability and integrity of our roof. A few days following the storm, we noticed staining on the interior ceiling within our house. It appears the storm may have deteriorated the integrity and protection provided by the shingles, and corresponding infrastructure, allowing water to proceed beneath and enter our home's interior. Our roof has held up against the elements – protecting the interior of our home against the snowstorms and rain we’ve had since owning the home. It wasn’t until the storm on the week of the 20th that we faced this problem. Please note our home's roof is free of trees, branches, leaves and debris which generally accelerates the deterioration and longevity of roofs.

On Monday, February 27, I secured the opinion of their roofer, asking him to inspect our roof as well. The roofing company climbed atop our roof and identified the vulnerabilities, ice/wind related caused deterioration, and areas which may have contributed to the leak. The roofing company’s opinion is there are certain material items which are no longer effective and used in the industry, vulnerabilities in the valley, lifting of vents because of the ice/wind, and identified areas where water could have gotten underneath resulting in leaks within the home. The roofer made a few corrections to ensure the leaks don’t happen again while I work through the claims experience.

When filing the claim, I asked the CSR whether the roofer should be present during the Farmers adjuster visit and they said no. On Sunday, 3/5, Farmers sent their first adjuster out who didn’t go on the roof, inspected the damage via inside the house, and claimed the issue was because of ice damning. He then closed the claim without letting me know, stating the repairs are below the deductible so nothing will be paid.

I called and talked to Farmers, questioning why the claim was closed without any follow up or communication. They indicated the status isn’t really closed, ice damning isn’t covered, and the claim can open back up at any time should more evidence become available. I then requested a contractor, through Farmers, come out an inspect the roof since the initial adjuster didn’t go on the roof. 1.5 weeks went by before the Farmers contractor arrived. He went on the roof and said he couldn’t find anything, likely because the roofer corrected the issues.

I then filed an appeal in which three individuals came out this morning, 3/22. Farmers sent another adjuster, the adjuster’s manager, and another contractor to support the roofing inspection. After 20 minutes, the manager came down and said there’s nothing visible with the roof that they can see that caused the issue and it's likely due to the construction of the house (the pitch/angle differs by 10 degrees above our kitchens peak) and the way the shingles were put doesn’t provide adequate protection against leaks.

The manager's conclusion was the initial adjuster was wrong, and that the issue likely existed for many years, but never made its way down to the inside of the home (shocking speculation). His claim was that the water likely got beneath the shingles and made its way to the roofing board but dried up before making its way inside. Also, if it made it way inside previously, likely absorbed by the insulation. All in all, I’d like to state that if you’re in the market for homeowners insurance, DO NOT go with Farmers. They’re quick to qualify you for insurance but when you’re in need of their support for a claim – find reasons to deny the claim than to honor it.

Luckily, I have a great lawyer and I think this might turn into a class action lawsuit judging by all the horrible reviews I have read. I also have a friend that worked for Farmers and was unlawfully let go because she basically refused to be dishonest with her customers. So good agents get fired and agents that are willing to be dishonest and corrupt stay at Farmers. Horrible Company. I will never do business with Farmers ever again. Maybe if they treated their customers right and were honest, they wouldn't have to spend so much money on advertisements.

When I called Farmers yesterday to figure it all out I learned 2 things... #1 - someone either at Metlife or Farmer's made a data entry error and they had an incorrect mailing address for me. This was admitted by 5 different representatives on their side (supervisors of supervisors, etc...). I hadn't received any communications from Farmers. And #2 - my policy had now, in fact, really expired/had been canceled since I hadn't received any billing requests. AND NOW, since it's been over 45 days they claim to be unable to reinstate my policy.

I'm actually on hold with them now trying to get a 6th supervisor in the US to reinstate. AND, what I've learned is that when you go to buy a new policy, from any provider, there are 2 questions that now affect the cost of the policy - 1. Have you ever had a home-owners policy canceled? and 2. Have you ever missed a payment on your policy? These questions/answers affect your rates FOREVER. $$ damages?

I know many others must be having these exact issues. This policy transfer was a massive failure. Farmer's Insurance is refusing to make good on its error. And as I sit here my home and family are not covered. Also, my bank informed me this morning that they got in touch with Farmers and that they sent the bank a "current" policy showing coverage beginning in June 2022 and through June 2023. The reps I talk with on the phone today say this policy is canceled. Going on 4 hours on the phone/hold. Should I get a lawyer? Is there a class action in progress? Does anyone at Farmer’s give a crap about customer satisfaction or is it entirely about the profits?

(On hold for an underwriters supervisor now.) Now their underwriter is saying that even though they made an error and had my address wrong causing me to never receive any mail of billing notifications from them because they have no record of my mail being returned as undeliverable, they can not reinstate my policy and I would need a new policy written at almost $300 more than what it was stated to renew at in July. Still on hold....

I kept calling asking when the inspection would be done because they weren’t sending us the home policy until it was. We had paid for a year of home insurance in advance and paid 6 months in advance for our vehicles. After almost 2 months, they sent me an email which I happened to see in my junk mail the same day. It was from the Farmers inspector denying our home insurance due to a damaged roof. It was actually granular wear, no major damage, no missing shingles. We received no phone call from the agent or the inspector, just a denial and a 2-week time limit to replace the roof. They had done the inspection 6 weeks earlier and now gave us only 2 weeks! We then switched our agent to Jeff ** in Carson City and met with the Regional Director, Brian ** who assured us that they would take over our policy and there would be no problem extending the date the roof had to be completed.

We were told that as long as we showed them a signed contract with the approximate start and finish date for the new roof, that our policy would be reinstated. Mr. ** gave us his cell number and said to call or text if we needed assistance. Later when we did call him, we were told by Jeff ** not to contact Mr. ** as he does not speak to customers. Since Covid, businesses have fewer workers and prices doubled for materials so getting a roofer out to even give us an estimate was very difficult even though we started calling roofers the very day we received the denial. We were fortunate to find a company that came out a few days later to give us an estimate and said they could do the job in about 3 weeks.

We immediately took a copy of the signed contract and start date to Farmers but found out they had told us another lie. We were then told that their inspection underwriters were going to raise our deductible to $10,000 but that they were sure they could get the policy back to the original lower deductible because they had never heard of anyone doing that. We then continued to wait while Jeff ** and Brian ** told us of how they had so much trouble reaching out to their inspection team in Texas that they couldn’t speak to them on the phone but could only wait for them to respond by email/chat.

In other words, Farmers has no control within their own company. All the control is in the hands of their underwriter inspection team. A couple weeks later we went in to see Jeff ** who then told us that the $10,000 deductible would remain and that we could go to another company if we didn’t like it. Every roofer and every other insurance company we spoke to said they had never heard of a company doing that.

Our roof had no major damage, no missing shingles, only granular wear, and half of the roof was only 19 years old. We had a 30-year warranty. Farmers told us that even after replacing the roof, that the $10,000 deductible would remain because they couldn’t trust us now that there had been wear to the roof. We were lied to so many times and of course Farmers never returned our startup fees of $70. After several weeks, we got a prorated portion of the policy money returned but never an apology for treating us so badly and never an explanation.

This was a very stressful time in which we would have had no home insurance. Jeff ** kept saying how Farmers is such a great company and how well they treat people and how few complaints they have. If they have good reviews overall, they aren’t in this area. Go with any other company even if you must pay a little more. Farmers and the local agents here are not to be trusted. I prefer to write positive reviews but, in this case found it necessary for others to beware.

The ads they are running about restoring your property regardless of the limits are true. Some 30 years ago my property got listed with the county nearly 1,000 sq ft less than its actual size. Nobody, even me, noticed it. This could have been a real legal nightmare but our agent and adjuster worked with us to get the house rebuilt 100% and I never had to spend a dime of my own money. All of this in the middle of the Covid pandemic with construction costs and delays going through the roof. It may have just been that the people assigned to our claim were great (every large company has its jerks).

I cannot say enough good things about Farmers and our agent. I had no problems getting through to them at any point in the process and the one thing that really stood out was the comments from the sub-contractors when they would asked what insurance we had. When I said Farmers, they smiled. Nothing makes a contractor happier than knowing they will get paid on time. It never ceases to amaze me how people immediately go on offense when dealing with a large company. All this does is put them on defense. On defense they will win every time. By working with them I gave Farmers the opportunity to help us and they did - big time.