Sorry that you have to go through this. I hope all these suggestions help.

How scary - glad you're ok, but it's still very upsetting!!!

If you choose the send stuff out to be cleaned, make sure and inventory everything. Take pictures. ALL my quilts were lost some how and they tried to give us someone elses antique furniture. They wanted us to keep it because they didn't know where it was to go. But I never got my quilts back. Some were my DH's great-great-grandmothers

Thank you for all the suggestions. The adjuster did calculate money for cleaning, but the policy is actual cash value, not replacement value (NOW I know the difference). So after they take off for depreciation and the deductible, we may come up short. I'm just thinking ahead, haven't arranged for contractors to give estimates yet. I was just looking over what he listed and thought I could put a couple thousand towards the electrical repairs if the contractors give higher estimates than what was allowed. Doesn't it always seem to be that way with insurance companies?

I should have trusted my gut when buying the place. If I had, I would have backed out. I had such a hard time finding insurance because it was over 50 years old and is a rental. Hubby wanted to help the kids out when they were down and out with a child on the way.

The fire was contained to the back of the house with not too much smoke damage anywhere else. Most of what burned and has the water damage will be replaced, but you can smell it in the kitchen and living room. They lost some "stuff", but fortunately there were no injuries. But being a rental, my insurance doesn't cover their stuff or the rent we would have collected. They didn't have rental insurance either.

It's been a pretty stressful time for us all. The house is 3 hours away, so it's not convenient for them to come here. She stays at her mom's tiny place with the kids. He sleeps on a couch at work. A friend who travels alot used his points to give them several nights at a local hotel. Now they need to find temporary housing.

Luckily no quilts were damaged in the fire!

Glad everyone is ok!

So sorry! Glad everyone is safe!

TSP - Trisodium Phosphate - is supposed to take out smoke smell. Home Depot or a paint store should have it.

Once, my parents hired a 3rd party insurance estimator. it was so worth his fee. he did all the negotiating with the insurance company. some of the things that were total losses were salvaged by my clever parents.

I sent you a PM!!

If you still have smoke smell - once the insurance company has ok'd the cleanup, and after the cleanup by fire and water restoration folks, then do the following:

Check with all your local car dealerships, they probably have the name of a company that attends their facility to place a "smoke canister" inside vehicles where the previous owners have smoked cigarettes. We had a company place two of these canisters inside our RV and it really worked - "bubblegum" was our choice of deodorizing smell, better than smoke smell that it got rid of.

Be sure to keep track of any time that you or your husband spend cleaning or removing items from the fire incident, our insurance company paid us a couple of thousand dollars for our work/time - we also took lots of pictures - which was to our benefit, and submitted notarized statements from our neighbours to attest to our time spent working on this incident.

Don't be discouraged, it will seem like quite a process, but in the end will probably be better than before.

Hugs to you all.