North Bay fire survivors face financial hardship as insurers stop paying their living expenses

Sep. 27--Since retiring from her law practice, Robin Gabbert feels like she's had a full-time job trying to rebuild after the devastating 2017 North Bay wildfires.

Gabbert and her husband, Con Jager, are like thousands of other fire survivors who will not finish building new homes by the second anniversary of the fires in early October. Gabbert and Jager have been hampered by numerous delays rebuilding their Fountaingrove condominium, one of 30 that burned down at the Stonefield condo complex in Santa Rosa during the Tubbs fire.

"It's a constant drain. It's exhausting," said Gabbert, who sits on the board of the condo association and has taken a key role helping neighbors navigate rebuilding challenges.

While fire survivors have dealt with a variety of obstacles delaying completion of their new homes, wrangling with insurance companies has been a common frustration. Now to make matters worse, in less than two weeks most of them face the prospect of having home insurers stop paying for their monthly living expenses.

Gabbert and Jager hope to move into their new condo by next April, however their Allstate insurance policy covers only 24 months of temporary living costs. Allstate has refused to extend monthly rental payments despite Gabbert's pleas, likely forcing the couple to pay $3,500 a month for rent plus the mortgage payment on their destroyed condo.

"It's all about the profits. They say they are your good neighbor, or Nationwide is on your side, or they are the good hands people, ... but you see what their priority is," Gabbert said. Allstate said in a statement it will continue working with the couple on their fire claim.

The specter of thousands of Sonoma County fire survivors still rebuilding, but come early October being forced to pay their monthly living costs on top of mortgages for their burned homes will have significant ramifications. Some will have to dip into their retirement savings, while others might opt to sell their fire lots. Overall, since nearly 85% of fire survivors remain in some stage of rebuilding, the local economy is expected to take a hit as they curtail discretionary spending in order to afford their living expenses without the bulk paid by insurers.

"I'm a little concerned for everybody. It's not going to put us in recession. ... I think we are going to lose some more (residents) because of the October impact," Redwood Credit Union CEO Brett Martinez said.

Fire survivors' futile attempts in recent months to get home insurers to extend coverage for temporary home rental costs is the latest skirmish in what's been for many two years of insurance woes after the 2017 blazes that killed 24 people in Sonoma County. The Tubbs fire, the largest of regional infernos, torched 5,334 homes in the county. That fire, the most destructive in California at the time, caused nearly $9.5 billion of insured losses, while the Atlas fire in Napa County resulted in $4.5 billion of insured losses, according to the Insurance Information Institute.

An estimated two-thirds of Sonoma County fire survivors were underinsured on their homes, with a few more than $1 million underwater, according to a survey by United Policyholders, a nonprofit that assists consumers with insurance information. Some people have sued their insurers. Many were angered their insurers required them to itemize personal things destroyed in their homes to get full payment for their claims, even though their houses were wiped out by the flames.

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