National restoration expert warns Ringle tornado victims about insurance claims
A restoration expert who toured the Ringle tornado damage says homeowners may have more leverage than they think when dealing with insurance claims.
Andrew McCabe has spent 20 years in the restoration business. He speaks nationally, and has provided restoration services from some pretty famous names you would recognize.
Even he seemed surprised seeing the devastation in Ringle on a recent drive-through.
McCabe, who lives in Bend, Ore. and speaks on restoration topics nationally, wasn’t in the Wausau area on a sightseeing tour. On Wednesday he rode through the damaged area with Clay Rice of Northstar Restoration. Thursday and Friday he spoke to contractors, hosted by the restoration business.
The main thing he wants to get through to them, and to homeowners who suffered damage from the Ringle storm: be wary of the insurance companies.
Often what the insurance companies will tell you is in the company’s interest, not the homeowners’, McCabe told The Wausonian from a dinner table at Day’s Bowl-a-Dome in Wausau before the drive-through.
The truth is homeowners often have more rights than they think, McCabe says. And part of his visit is to convey that to contractors who can then convey that to the homeowners.
Most would see the obvious damage. But McCabe points out that even homeowners who think they escaped the worst damage might want to have an assessment done. Sometimes a homeowner might not realize minor damage would lead to larger damage over time, and by then it might be too late.
At a meeting in Ringle hosted by the town and the Community Foundation of Northcentral Wisconsin, leaders there said many hadn’t been able to start any restoration work because an adjuster hadn’t come out yet.
But it’s actually in homeowners’ best interest to start repairs right away, McCabe countered. In fact, insurance policies often require a homeowner to mitigate further damage, such as from water or mold.
McCabe strongly recommends homeowners pay for a professional estimate of the damages; ideally one that’s notarized. “A free estimate is worth the paper it’s printed on,” McCabe says.
The restoration expert said having an official estimate can dramatically increase insurance payouts to homeowners.
Another tactic, McCabe points out, is that insurance companies will often offer a much smaller settlement to settle a claim. Homeowners, who already just went through a traumatic experience, might be eager to simply have things resolved. But they’ve paid a lot of money via their premiums, and McCabe said homeowners should make sure they receive the full amount they are owed under the policy.
“The insurance company wants you to think that they have all the power,” McCabe says. In actuality, “contractually for the policy, you have the power as the insured. And the clock is ticking on them.”
He cautions that Ringle residents should be aware and cautious, and take steps to protect themselves as they navigate the next steps in restoring their homes and getting back to normal life.
Public-service note: The Wausonian is making the key storm-recovery advice in this story available to all readers. If your home or property was damaged in the Ringle tornado and you need access to the full story, email brian@thewausonian.com and I’ll send you a free link as soon as I am able.
A ride through Ringle
McCabe has worked on restoration projects for 20 years, and seen the devastation of plenty of natural disasters in that time. And even he had a strong reaction when he drove through the tornado-damaged areas of Ringle on a Wednesday afternoon.
“Holy smokes,” he said, observing a damaged house amid a cluster of trees that appeared as if they’d been cut down by a giant scythe.
A ride through Ringle surprises everyone in the car. While roofing contractors were already busy at work on some houses, others looked untouched since the triage repairs that immediately followed the storm.
The homes in the subdivision are in a mixed state. Some look completely untouched by the storm. Others are now only foundations. One in particular is a front entryway and not much else.
In one yard, snowmobiles sit outside, their handlebars bent.
On the way to the subdivision, we stop at an area with rows of pines cut. Rice mentions it looks like a logging operation, if you didn’t know better, with fresh cut logs stacked well over the height of an adult man and stretching in two rows for nearly a city block’s length.
Challenging the insurers
McCabe tells Ringle homeowners to be leery of offers that he says amount to sometimes as low as 50 cents on the dollar. They rely on the pressure homeowners feel to return to their homes in a timely manner. But MCabe says insurance companies owe the money they’re policies require them to pay, and homeowners should hold them to that.
Rice says some insurance companies require an insane amount of documentation — pointing to one instance in which an adjuster asked for photos of each garbage bag.
McCabe says the industry has changed over the years, and their practices have become much less favorable to homeowners who’ve experienced serious damage.
To be fair, I asked if some of the reasons insurance companies have changed is because costs have risen. After all, building costs have risen dramatically since COVID-19. And while building inflation has historically outpaced inflation, that’s been even more the case since the pandemic and the supply chain shock that followed.
Reuters in 2024 reported that home insurers specifically had the biggest loss this century in 2023. A big part of that, the report says, is that more people are moving to higher-risk areas. Building costs played a role too.
McCabe in response points to what he says have been more recent record profits for those companies. Global credit rating agency AM Best reported the insurance industry swung from a $21.3 billion underwriting loss in 2023 to a $22.9 billion underwriting gain in 2024. “No one should ever feel sorry for the insurance companies,” he said.
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Thank you for a very informative follow up to the Ringle disaster and Mr. McCabe's contribution. I would love to see this followed up by a story on which companies came through for homeowners and which were not helpful. As a business owner, our insurance has skyrocketed in the last several years; while receiving notices regularly from the insurance company that insidiously chip away at various "coverage benefits". The last paragraph of this article says it all.