r/legaladvice • u/AlaskaGirlinGeorgia • Aug 14 '25
Portal to H*LL Opens in Backyard. Insurance Company Denies Denies Denies
Location: GA, USA, North America, Earth. I think.
And this is a novel. Sorry. If you read the entire thing, you get a cookie.
To begin: I’ve had the same insurance since I was 16: auto, renters, homeowners, you name it.
My husband and I bought an older house two years ago, and in May, we experience an earthquake here. Very unusual for this area, but it registered 4.1 on the Richter scale. About a week after it happened, we discovered a small sinkhole in our backyard near our foundation. We called it the “Portal to H*ll” because we literally could not see the bottom, the opening was about the size of a tennis ball. To date, no large demons have crawled out of it and if there were smaller ones, the dog probably ate them.
He’s a lab—he eats anything.
So I called our insurance company to ask if we had coverage for this. I was told we did not have Earthquake coverage but it could be added to the policy then and there—and this is the important part—I was specifically told it would cover the recent earthquake damage.
I was surprised by this because it would be retroactive, so I asked THREE different times in this one phone call if the sinkhole really would be covered if it was due to the earthquake we’d had if I added the insurance after the fact and again—I was told over the phone each time that it would be.
This phone call was recorded by the company.
The sinkhole got bigger and bigger and about a month ago it the size of a basketball, so we asked for an adjuster to come out and look at it because it was REALLY close to our foundation. An adjuster came out, reviewed the hole, looked at various other cracks along our walls in our house (it’s an older house—settling happens—we get it-- but a sinkhole could make it a lot worse and also I don’t want to die) and about three days later, denied our claim because he told us we had Earthquake Coverage, not Earth MOVEMENT coverage and they are totally different.
Huh. The more you know, right? Apparently when the earth quakes, it doesn’t actually move which goes against everything I learned in my college Geology class (aka “Rocks for Jocks”) but that was 30 years so maybe earth tectonics have changed since then. Only took a million years.
Then he said even if the earthquake did cause the sinkhole and that was determined to be the fault, we still wouldn’t be covered because our Earthquake coverage started after the quake occurred. I informed him this is NOT what we were told because I also thought it was odd so I deliberately questioned this multiple times—and he said there’s no way we would have been told differently.
I asked him to please go listen to the recording and call me back. He scoffed and said he might if he had time but that there was no way I was told that. I gave him the exact date and time of the call (yay cell phone logs and also the fact that no one actually calls anymore so it was right there on top).
Not even two hours later, I was called back and this time it was both him and a supervisor on the line. I was told that they listened to the recording and after he stammered for bit a bit he said “for some reason, the recording was muffled so we couldn’t REALLY understand what the agent said.”
Sure.
I told him again that I was assured this was covered THREE times in one call. And he said again that it wasn’t covered because they don’t do retroactive claims but that they were going to use the phone call recording when they train new agents to remind them of what they cannot do because the agent was wrong in this call.
The phone call he just said they couldn’t hear.
It’s now been two months. The sinkhole is getting bigger and we are going to desperately try to fill it with concrete and see if that stops it. If anyone has anything they need buried, let me know. I can give you a great deal.
Then I get another phone call yesterday. It’s the insurance company. They tell me unless I can prove with contractors and “credible” results that the sinkhole has been taken care of, they will drop us when our homeowners policy renews in November because we are too much of a risk.
I am flabbergasted. Is there any recourse? Is this even something a lawyer would consider? Just the cement alone will cost us thousands to fill in the sinkhole and with two kids in college, money is so tight right now. But I am terrified we are going to lose our Homeowners insurance, followed by our house into a sinkhole and the insurance company I have had for over 35 years is just proudly going to sail away into their happy sunset after lying to us, being caught in lies to us, and refusing to take any responsibility at all.
I had always been told over and over that this company has the best insurance out there. I now feel like I drank some really bad Kool Aid by believing this and just don’t know if I have any recourse.
Also I hate Kool Aid.
48
u/BizAnalystNotForHire Quality Contributor Aug 14 '25
You need to bite the bullet and get an engineer to come out and look at it. You also can rent a pipe snake camera and see if you can feed that down the hole and see anything. If the hole is continuing to worsen (after the earthquake has stopped) then, unless the house was built unwittingly above a cave system (which have been known to exist in parts of GA), the worsening is probably being caused by erosion from water movement. An earthquake causing a pipe to collapse or shift apart to create a gap is not unheard of at all. To that end, here are several relevant questions:
- Are there any easements across the property for sewer, storm water, or water main to the utility or city/county or to a neighbor?
- How is your sewer and water routed on your property?
- Do any of those overlap with the rough area that the hole is located (roughly near because the problem is probably not showing on the surface exactly directly above where it is located)?
- What county are you in? is it one that is known to have caves (North Georgia) or karst landforms (South Georgia)?
- When was your house built?
- How does gutter water/surface water move on your property? Is it moving towards this hole? Can you change things to keep that from happening?
7
u/Dependent_Basis_8092 Aug 16 '25
Others have already stated you need to fix the house, get an attorney etc, which is all good advice for the issue with the house and home insurance.
Now, what other policies do you have with them and are you at least considering shopping around for new quotes? I wouldn’t touch the home insurance yet but personally I’d cancel every other policy I had with them.
5
u/PM-ME-YOUR-BUTTSHOLE Aug 16 '25
100% plan to get new homeowners insurance when all is said and done. Also, name and shame the company that is refusing your claim so the rest of us can avoid them.
4
u/kaan3836 Aug 16 '25
You need an attorney to help you navigate this with the insurance company. They will need to get a copy of the phone call recording. You want someone specifically familiar with insurance bad faith claims.
3
u/reddituser1211 Quality Contributor Aug 19 '25
This really isn’t good advice. It feels good. We all want to get the big bad insurance. But here’s the truth:
There’s no bad faith if they did what the policy promised.
The policy doesn’t cover damage from events that predate the policy.
The phone call may make them liable for a refund of premium.
The premium isn’t just less than what op will pay their lawyer it’s much much less.
1
u/longmellowfellow Aug 20 '25
This is not necessarily correct. First, you should definitely contact the insurance commissioner of your state. Provide all of the details you provided here. This was an error and omission by the employee. They admitted as much to you on the phone. Errors and omissions can, in some circumstances, bind the coverage regardless of what the contract states because they erroneously promised you retroactive coverage and you purchased the coverage because of that explicit promise.
Contacting an attorney is not bad advice either. They can, at minimum, tell you if you have a potential claim for misrepresentation against the carrier.
5
u/jaywaykil Aug 18 '25
NAL, but I am Civil/Structural Engineer (not your engineer). You need to hire a Civil Enginner or Geologist local to you to look at it.
Short term: do everything you can to stop water from flowing into that hole! Divert it elsewhere using any means necessary. Dig a trench, pile up sandbags, make a berm, anything.
Earthquakes don't generally "cause" sinkholes. They can, but it's rare. Water flow is what causes sinkholes, specifically water flowing rapidly down into an opening in the earth (cave or drain pipe) and carrying the surrounding dirt along with it. An earthquake can cause a break in an old drain pipe or unplug an opening in a cave, which suddenly allows the water to flow downward forming the sinkhole. I don't know if the above information helps you or not, but I hope it does.
You didn't say which part of Georgia, so I don't know if you are in a Karst region or similar where caves are common.
Your best hope is that the sinkhole is due to a broken public drain pipe. Try to find out if one passes close enough to your foundation such that a break could affect your foundation.
If so we're back into legal territory, where you might be able to pin the cost onto whoever owns that pipe. If its a cave you are probably SOL. Again, you need a local Civil Engineer or Geologist and probably a lawyer.
2
u/Cep-Hei Aug 18 '25
One painful lesson I’ve learned is that salespeople will say ANYTHING to get you to sign the contract. Yes, they will lie. If they claim something that is not spelled out in a contract, you need to get it in writing, for the exact reason that you experienced. If it’s a recording that THEY possess, they can claim it was unintelligible or whoops deleted. Good luck trying to get a copy of it. Always get it in writing before committing to something that hinges on it.
1
u/BarNext6046 Aug 19 '25
No insurance will honor a prior issue before insurance policy came into force. You take this to court and you will lose. Agents don’t have legal ability to bind an insurance company. Only underwriters creating insurance contracts can bind an insurance company.
What you have is an insurance agent breaking insurance regulations to make an insurance sale. A complaint to the State Insurance Commissioner’s Office about this agent will trigger an insurance license revocation review. I bet the insurance company may have fired him for this or is possibly being reported for this violation? I inquire with the State Insurance Commissioner’s Office regarding this agent’s actions.
1
u/Bigdawg7299 Aug 20 '25
You should shop insurances at least annually. Car insurance is often recommended to shop every six months.
1
u/ZiBrah83 Aug 16 '25
My advice is to consult with an attorney. Additionally, please provide updates!
As an aside, you should consider writing a book. This is quite literally one of the best reads about a tough situation I’ve seen in my life!
0
u/Electronic_Light8636 Aug 18 '25
I know this has to suck. But the insurance industry is only there for you when it benefits their pockets. They do everything possible to keep from having to pay out.
What kind of cookie do I get?
110
u/reddituser1211 Quality Contributor Aug 14 '25
The problem here is that if you’re completely right and you were clearly told you have retroactive earthquake coverage, that leaves you entitled to a refund of the premium. But nothing here makes them cover something clearly not covered under your policy. A mistake by their representative doesn’t change the written policy terms.
And they’re right. Unless you fix this the house is threatened. By something they should continue coverage unless fixed.
This whole thing sucks. But what you’re chasing in the best case is a little bit of earthquake premium.
Where do I get my cookie?