GREENSBORO, N.C. — It's going to be coming down over the next 24 hours and chances are local neighborhoods are going to have flooding issues.
A deluge of rain can mean the water comes over the threshold, it soaks the floors and maybe you'll need new carpet or to rip up part of it. If you’re thinking, that's what insurance is for…
“A rainstorm, what the country folks call a gully washer, it all comes in at once, we see seepage. We're going to have problems. It's going to depend on the carrier, but a lot of that coverage is going to be declined,” said Christopher Cook of Alliance Insurance Services.
Why doesn't insurance cover it?
Isn’t this seepage and the water from the tree on the roof the same? I mean, it's all water damage inside the house.
Here's the thing, Cook says insurance covers losses that are sudden and accidental. If this water comes because you not cleaning out your gutters or the drain outside your house, it won't be covered.
"If the French drain around your house has always carried the water away and the drain collapses during that particular storm, that would be covered. If the gutter clogged up that one time and it was a failure of the outside system, that could be covered," said Cook.
Water seepage, as it’s called, is not covered by most policies on the original homeowners policy, you'll have to ask for an add-on.
This might be the time you start looking at updating your homeowners insurance policy. Inflation means building your house back to its before-damaged state will cost more than it did last year. Do you have enough coverage or will you have to pay out of pocket?