Category Archives: House & Home

This is STILL a nightmare, going on—what??—six months now? Seven? Eight?

A few weeks back, we got notice that Farm Bureau was cancelling our insurance because we hadn’t paid something (I think it was). Well, we had paid, but they hadn’t received it or the agent had to confirm something or whatever. Whatever it was, we received a cancellation notice. So we got that taken care of and thought we were done. We received the “cancellation rescinded” notice and thought great, we’re REALLY done.

Then we received our mortgage escrow analysis…with a new mortgage payment about $400 more a month! 88| Yeah, turns out they still had the incorrect insurance premium on there. I guess it was confusing since it was our primary residence, then it wasn’t but it was empty, and then we got renters…so actually I should have been surprised if there WEREN’T problems with the statement.

So anyway, since they hadn’t gotten the updated insurance amounts, they said we would have like a $3,000 deficit, which would raise our mortgage payment by like $400. I called to request an escrow REanalysis and they ended up having to call the insurance company to get the correct premium amounts.

So, we did get it figured out, but we still have a shortfall that increases our monthly payment like $150. Which is better than a $400 increase, but still…instead of being in the hole $250 each month like we are now (since we couldn’t rent it for what our actual mortgage was), we will now be in the hole $400 a month.

WHY COULDN’T THE DAMN HOUSE HAVE SOLD? Ugh. XX(

So we thought our previous bills of about $200 were bad… This month? Just over $300!! >:XX

The summer months had BETTER make up for this, because this is INSANE.

That said, we think they screwed up this month. Why? After last month’s $200+ bill, we turned the heat down, we turned the water heater down, etc. so the bill should have at least been the same, or less.

And then we started thinking…no one came to the door to read the meter! (Normally they wouldn’t come to the door, but since we have the fence up, they can’t just get to it on their own, and last month the guy told me he’d have to come to the door. And no one came.) So we are thinking they just used last month’s figures to extrapolate this month’s figures…and it was way off. So we have to put in call to them. Maybe next month will be WAY cheap!

I have honestly HAD IT UP TO HERE with homeowner’s insurance. Or maybe it’s Farm Bureau. Or just our local agents.

So Tom just called me to say they need a credit card for some authorization or whatnot. Fine. I assume it will be so we can pay the monthly $250. Fine. We decided we’d rather do that than have the bill sent to the mortgage company, so we don’t have to deal with a refund when the house sells or rents.

So he calls back and says “No! They wanted to charge the entire $3000!” Um, NOT. >:XX

So why the hell would they break it down into a monthly payment (in their email to us), if we are not allowed to make monthly payments? Give me a >:XX break. It’s like these people are telling us as little as humanly possible and then acting surprised when we have questions or are confused by something.

So now we apparently have seven days to get the mortgage company involved and payment made, so we don’t lapse coverage…which we could have been doing ALL THIS TIME had anyone told us we needed to do that.

I hate insurance companies.

I just want to cry. :'(

So we got the new quote for unoccupied homeowner’s insurance: $2939/year. Yes, THREE THOUSAND >:XX DOLLARS A YEAR.

We called USAA to give them another chance. They don’t even insure unoccupied residences. They said “Here, let us transfer you to one of our referral agents” (or whoever). Once I gave her the address? “I am sorry, we are restricted from insuring anything in that area.”

Of->:XX-course.

Round and round we go, with no one being able to insure us, except those that want to charge an arm and two legs.

This house better sell, because this insurance BS is enough to drive me to drink.

Good god, will someone please rent or buy our house?

After dropping USAA because they doubled our rates (they want to get out of the Wind & Hail insurance), we had to research a bunch because apparently NO ONE wants to insure anything in North Carolina due to hurricanes. >:XX We eventually ended up with Farm Bureau who were a little cheaper.

Fast forward to us actually moving, and calling them to let them know. And oh, what a nightmare (I can barely remember all the specifics but basically) first they say they can’t insure us since we live out of state, then they say they can but they have to rewrite the policy, but then they say they can’t insure an empty house and give us 30 days to sell or rent. Then we get a notification that they are going to drop us, effective such and such date—but after we called them, they said they can change the policy for an empty house, but it will likely quadruple the price. >:XX

I told hubby we might have to check back with USAA and their $2600 might now be the best price (if they will even insure an empty house).

This is just such a pain in the ass. I can’t believe we’ve had so much problem with insurance. It’s like we’re the only people in the history of the world that have had an empty house in a separate state that needed insurance.