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My wife and I started a business and house in l981 by moving out of two nice homes and into a 75 year old barn. Over the years of cleaning, building and personalizing such an unusual building, we fought to get insurance to cover our belongings and the facility.
Always in the back of my mind was, if it was so difficult to get insurance, where would we be if we ever need to file a claim. It was always a source of worry, knowing we would face what most people encounter - fighting the insurance company for the protection we had paid for over the years. Then when we met Mike and Cindy Hartman, something clicked that we should learn more about their service. Once we signed on, they took an accurate and detailed inventory of our eclectic home and business.
This was two years prior to an event on the evening of Friday, May 30th, 2008 that would change our lives. The whole month of May, 2008 consisted of cleaning, organizing, planting flowers and a garden in anticipation of a wonderful summer with family and friends. As a kick off to the summer, we invited friends to come for the weekend. While putting tools, mowers, etc away, we got a weather report that thunderstorms were expected, but no severe weather was predicted. We decided to not mess up our kitchen, went out for dinner and retired early to be rested for the weekend.
When we went to bed at l0, I closed the windows, as there was some lightning and it was lightly raining and coming in the window. I am a pilot, so I watch the weather each day very carefully. We never imagined that we were facing an unpredicted super cell developing at that very moment. No tornado warning, no news blitz, etc. Comfortable and secure, we fell asleep.
I awoke at l0:40. The power was out; there was cloud to cloud lightning and absolutely no wind. I immediately grabbed Alora and told her we needed to get downstairs. In 27 years, we had only done that 3 times. In that same 27 years, we had ridden out hundreds of storms, even a tornado in l989 that took out a barn south of us. Living in a building that had survived thousands of storms before I was even born, we thought we were immune to this type of thing. But something or someone got us going downstairs as fast as we could in total darkness. As we approached the doorway to go to the lower level, we heard the sound of a train going through a tunnel at l00 miles per hour (the best way I can describe it). We dove into the landing as the building came down on top of us.
Were we lucky; was our guardian angel helping us? You can answer those questions. As the water poured down on us and all our personal possessions - computers, furniture, artwork, plus all our business contents - inventory, power tools, hand tools ... 27 years of work and sacrifice, I became calm and determined. We had just survived a natural disaster with scratches.
Now an even more dangerous situation was in front of me. Could we survive the turmoil, stress and fight ahead of us? My calm came from knowledge that we had insurance and were still alive. I had no reason to think, that the most challenging time of our lives was ahead of us.
Over l00 volunteers, including our guests (remember them), helped us salvaged what we could, before a month of rains were to come, starting 3 days later. Our comfort was that our insurance would put us back where we were. Our homeowners company representative, who was from Texas, called me on a cell phone to tell me he was inundated and would be there in a couple of weeks. FEMA stopped by; no help. Our business insurance company sent their representative on Sunday, two days later. As we got into the middle of the cleanup, rebuild, bids, ordering, running a business out of a damaged building, one fact stayed constant and was my pillar of strength, THE HARTMAN INVENTORY.
As we progressed through 6 months of round the clock camping at our facility and rebuilding, that Photo and Document record was our ace in the hole. When the homeowners rep eventually showed up 2 weeks later, he wanted us to produce a spread sheet for him on our computer (duh, no computers) so he could e-mail it to his home office. The Hartman Inventory became our sword to cutting through all the BS the company produced to slow or stop any settlement. The one constant that eventually got us a settlement was that portfolio. Without that inventory, we might still be fighting them.
My point is this: Insurance companies will fight you over every cent. The problem is they will reduce it to salvage value or deny it altogether if you don't have proper documentation.
Any catastrophe will take its toll on you and your family. You need to protect yourself, and never assume the insurance company will be there for you.
We had a 42 year old neighbor; his house was extensively damaged in the same storm. He continued to work night and day on the house and at his job and fought the insurance companies up until the day he moved back in. He was still trying to document and get them to settle. The night he moved back into his house, he died of a heart attack.
Protect yourselves with every arsenal you can, and for god’s sake, have Mike and Cindy keep all of your possessions and facility recorded and up to date with an INVENTORY.
~ Mark & Alora Westra
Barn Sign Works
"I am such a passionate advocate of Hartman Inventory that I had an inventory of my house TWICE! WHY? Because life has a way of changing unexpectedly. I bought my home 3 years ago and decided that it was important to know what I owned & if I was properly insured. The Hartman's came to my home and did a wonderful job of counting & photographing the contents of my home and asking lots of great questions. They were professional, thorough and even made me think of things that I had long forgotten about in the move. 2 years later, my son and my mother came to live with me, and with them came a whole new household of belongings. My very first call was to the Hartman's to let them know that my original inventory needed updating.
In my mind, it doesn't make sense not to have an inventory. The trauma of losing your home and its contents can be emotionally and financially devastating. Insurance alone is not enough. Your agent can only help you sufficiently and quickly if you can provide a list of your belongings and their dollar value. The time to think about that kind of list is NOT when you are pumping out water from your flooded basement or sifting through the rubble left from a tornado or fire.
This is not about fear or unnecessary worry; for the same reasons that we lock our homes when we leave, it is about taking control of your life and being responsible homeowners. In times of strife, wouldn't you want to recover your losses as quickly as possible? I cannot think of a better investment for your peace of mind than a full inventory of your home or office.
Besides disasters, there are other reasons to have an inventory compiled by Hartman Inventory - estate and financal planning, when moving contents to a new residence or into storage, prenuptial agreements and divorce settlements.
Hartman Inventory has earned my trust, loyalty and gratitude by providing peace of mind and a professional service to compliment any insurance policy. They have my highest recommendation and I urge all property owners - commercial and personal - to have them take care of you."
~ Michele Urban, President/Owner
Ncompass Group, LLC
"What a wonderful service! After having our home and business inventory done, I felt great about spending the money, because I felt like I did something important for my family. It is a comfort knowing that if something happens, I can focus my energy on my family, and not on trying to remember what we owned. When there is an emergency, material items are not a priority. Trying to recount them would not be possible for me.
I am grateful that I will be able access a complete list of my belongings, should the need arise. Thank you for providing your service in such a respectful, professional manner."
~ Deanna Gray, Operations Manager of Steve Gray Renovations Inc.
Steve Gray Renovations
"Hartman Inventory methodically and completely inventoried my home and business. Their process efficiently and easily helps procrastinators get an inventory off their “To Do” list and keep it up-to-date annually. Cindy and Mike were great fun to work with, so I regularly refer them.
Hartman Inventory helped a successor trustee client inventory and value his parents’ assets for State Inheritance Tax purposes. The job was too big for him and freed his time to do other important estate work.
No one knows just how important an inventory is until disaster strikes. A fire due to faulty wiring caused another client to wish they had used Hartman Inventory. This is because of the mess they had to overcome to recover from their insurance company and get their business back up and running."
~ Jennifer Ruby, Attorney-Owner of Ruby Law
Ruby Law
"After seeing numerous television stories about disasters, and listening to a friend tell of her home being burglarized, I am so grateful the Hartmans inventoried my home. I now have peace of mind when I see or hear tragic stories such as these.
As a business owner and a CPA, I see a real value in what Cindy and Mike bring both to the individual home owner and to the business owner. As a CPA, I am very detail oriented and I was extremely satisfied with the thoroughness of the inventory. They have earned my trust, loyalty and gratitude by providing peace of mind and a professional service to compliment any insurance policy."
~ Susie Keaton, CPA/Principal of Keaton CPA Group, Inc.
Keaton CPA Group, Inc.
"I spent years advocating what a great idea an inventory of our assets would be. Never having experienced a disaster, the idea always got shoved down the priority list. I'm lucky that to date I still haven't had a disaster, but I now have an inventory of my business and my home done by Hartman Inventory. Their process was very efficient and fairly priced and the final product was very professional. Mike and Cindy were a pleasure to work with and I would certainly recommend their service."
~ Tony Schafer, President of Desktop Resources
Desktop Resources, Inc.
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