Hello,  Our windows were damaged by hail.  The insurance inspector from our homeowners insurance company recommended that insurance cover the replacement of some of the windows based on his inspection.

Question:  Should we ask the insurance to company to reconsider and authorize replacement of all the windows and garage door?  Our model of windows is no longer manufactured.  If we replace the windows facing the street, as the insurance inspector recommends, that leaves side windows, rear windows and garage door a different color and model.

We are concerned that this will affect our property value.  We live in a part of town where property values are high and residents are expected to maintain their homes accordingly.  Our neighbor's aluminum siding was damaged by the hail on two sides and their insurance company covered full replacement of ALL the siding.

How should we proceed?  Should we just forget about these concerns and accept the inspector's recommendation? 

Please send your response to Valjean:  junque100@yahoo.com

We appreciate any insight you experts can give us. 

Have a great weekend!

Thank you for the insight.  So, who should  we talk with at the insurance company to ask them to reconsider and authorize full replacement?

Our local agent?  The inspector who made the recommendation?  Or someone else up the "food chain"?

Appreciate your help.

You should start with the immediate supervisor of the person who did the inspection.  Many window manufacturers recommend replacement if the casing/wrap is damaged by hail because of the effect it has on the life of the window, and therefore the lifetime warranties.

The prior answer you received regarding matching is correct, although every state is different as far as exact policy language.  For example, I've done a great deal of work in Minnesota, where if you cannot match an item such as siding, the entire house must be re-sided.  There way be some wording your policy which would trigger some coverage in your instance.

Mickey McCully

Not knowing what state your loss occurred in...I don't think it matters.  Your adjuster was likely correct in his assessement of allowing to replace just the damaged windows with a reasonable like-kind quality.  Windows are individual components vs. siding such as your neighbor's loss.  The siding "as a whole" is a component, and while some states will mandate all 4 or more walls of siding if a "reasonable" match cannot be obtained, windows are a different story....along with the garage door.   And it has to be due to a qualifying cause of loss.  If the neighbor's kid hits a baseball & cracks one panel of your 15 year old obsolete vinyl siding... well, I hope you have a small detached garage or storage shed with the same material, so you can put in a patch on the house.   And then put the cracked piece on the shed out of site.  Because the neighbor's carrier is going to owe you ACV on the one panel, and your own HO carrier is going to owe you RC on maybe the one panel, or just the one elevation if they feel sorry for you.

A word of advice to anyone putting vinyl siding on....buy a couple extra boxes for future repairs, as the styles/sizes/colors change about every 4 years.  When you throw up that rock from the lawn mower, or the grill gets a little too close, whatever...you can avoid a big headache for the price of about $200 ahead of time.  Put it in the attic, peel out the old & snap in the new when it happens.

Now Steve I know you  as well as I have supervised catastrophe adjusters who have several years  storm experience that will disagree with you. This is in regards to wrapping the entire house or a similar "direct" loss matters.

Can you think of a softer landing answer to:" thats not the way I was trained", other than, "well you were trained wrong".

Re-siding the entire house will be required in certain states, even if just one elevation is damaged.  Missouri comes to mind.  The "reasonable match" still plays, but when you have hail damage to 8" aluminum siding or even straight 8" vinyl siding that was installed in the 70's or 80's...there is no reasonable match to be found.  There are even some newer vinyl sidings by mfrs that went out of business that cannot be matched "reasonably".  By newer, I mean 10-15 years old, compared to the prior example.  Sometimes though you can settle with reasonable insureds when there is a detached garage with the same material as the dwelling.  Siding panels can be moved to the one damaged elevation on the dwelling, and you simply agree to re-do the entire detached garage with new siding.