How To Leverage Your Attorney/Contractor Relationship with London Crounse, Partner at Daly & Black

Want clarity on how and when to work with an attorney? It’s not if, but when you need an attorney in your GC or Roofing business. If you find yourself squaring off against an insurance company, whether you are a sophisticated business or an individual, you have to level the playing field.

In this Training you will learn about:
-Attorney contractor relationship
-What about attorney fees?
-3 things you need to get on every claim
-A Case study about a 1M claim
-UPPA issues
-Q&A with London Crounse at the end!

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Transcript

Dylan McCabe: 0:11

Awesome, London. Thanks for joining the show, man.

London Crounse: 0:14

glad to be here. How's it going?

Dylan McCabe: 0:16

It's going really good, man. We're staying busy over here. And as you know with Texas, you know my business partner owns rain tight general contracting. So we are just covered up with water mitigation work right now.

London Crounse: 0:28

Right on. Yeah, the big Texas for you snowpocalypse has been affected a lot of our clients. Got a lot of existing clients in a lot of trouble right now. We're trying to help out. So yep, you guys are feeling that.

Dylan McCabe: 0:41

It's crazy man. We walked 30 units of a big multifamily property yesterday. 40 units roughly are destroyed. About 10 of them are complete guts. I mean, it's just crazy. And it's just the tip of the iceberg. So but man, I'm really excited to have you on this show. Because we met at src. Got to talk a little bit, I was really impressed by some of the things that make you guys stand apart from other law firms. And then I got to learn more about you. I got one of your awesome hats, which I have right here, which I wore last night to me casino Mexican restaurant. So just really looking forward to having you on the show. And you guys decided to become a corporate sponsor for limitless. So we're just super excited about the synergy. We're excited to let people know about Daly and black. And excited to get into this show. We've got a lot of cool stuff. So before we do that, I want to share about our newest sponsor daily in black. When insurance companies under pay, delay or deny you need an 800 pound gorilla like daily and black on your side, they fight to win and they have the record to back it up. Here's just a few key facts. They tried more cases than any of their competitors. They helped draft the Texas insurance code and they testify in the house in the Senate on your behalf to make sure laws are fair and balanced. And when other law firms want to want to speak with experts they call Dalian black. So we at limulus recommend one law firm to level the playing field for you against insurance companies. So if you need a fearless trial lawyer, you can just call Dalian black at 833-574-5677 or you can go to their website at daily black.com. That's right now we're not plugged you while you're sitting there. Let's give people a little bit of background London How did you get involved with Dalian black and kind of share a little bit of your story getting into this industry?

London Crounse: 2:40

Sure. So I needed a job out of law school. But before that, you know, we went to Virginia Military Institute. I grew up in Virginia. My father was a navy seal. When he got out the navy seals. He was the land man and we also did a lot of contracting work. So a lot of land excavation. I grew up very blue collar. Went to Nelson County High School, public school. It's one of the questions I asked our young lawyers today if they be an organist Did you go to public school and, you know, grew up very humble and modest means in Virginia, West Virginia Military Institute, which actually stands for very miserable individual because that's what everybody is that ever goes to that place. I don't know how I got signed, there was free. That's why I went there kind of scholarship. Really, VMI was really good to me, though, and found my way to UVA law school, after that didn't go very far was about an hour and a half away. went there for three years graduated. He did a job out of law school and ended up finding a way to work for a gentleman by the name of Andy Porter Shiro and he worked in insurance defense. So he was an insurance defense lawyer for 24 years before I began working for him. And when I started his firm, we have four clients State Farm Liberty Mutual nationwide and Allstate and we represent those clients on a number of different defense matters. But my background in contracting found my way to working in this area property damage you know, determining exact tomates I was working directly with adjusters You know, a lot of the things that go on behind the curtain I was dealing with at that time for about four and a half years. So I built ours you know, I ended up you know, worked my way up from representing all states working up and working on State Farm commercial cases. found our way you know, as far west as Texas and ran to Dalian black I decided that I wanted to switch to the other side because what I was doing for the carrier's was not enabling me to sleep well at night. I've had You know, just as a example, I've had, you know, executives and carriers Tell me, you know, son, I'd rather pay you $50,000 to defend this case and lose than ever pay that resident, or that residential insured $50,000 to settle this case. So difficult to it was a good job. I mean, don't get me wrong, it was a good living. I liked the working at that firm. But I didn't like our clients. And, you know, problem is, when you only have four clients, I don't like them, you don't have a lot of options. And so the things that I learned on the defense side enabled me to then turn and go to the plant side and give up a different perspective. You know, I'm here, what contractors are dealing with, with adjusters today? I'm thinking, what is going on behind the curtain that they might not know about? And oftentimes, you know, my, my hypothesis about what might be going on is correct, based off my experience. So I think, you know, if you have an opportunity to work for the other side, I mean, you take it, you know, a lot of people that were, you know, receivers in high school, go on to play football and they're in their cornerbacks more or vice versa. So, but but it makes you a better skilled, and I think my favorite line of, you know, in the loitering world, is from Charles Dickens. And it says he is no lawyer who does not see both sides. And so when I look at a case today, I'm looking at it from the defense perspective, not necessarily what are our calls or actions, but how would you defend said cause of actions, and oftentimes, I'm able to decipher a course of action or game plan, if you will, that's, that's better than someone who maybe didn't have that perspective. It's hard to say, but there are cases in the game plans we have been putting together been doing pretty well. So that's my background of how I arrived in Dalian black. But, you know, it's dealing blacks top firm in Texas at the time, it's growing to be the top firm in the nation for property damage. And other areas. The law, other is a first party, we have life insurance cases as well. But my main area of expertise, or what I focused on is large loss commercial claims.

Dylan McCabe: 7:19

You know, I think it's just huge that it's, it's part of your story, in your experience that you were on the other side, and there's just no way somebody can match your level of skill and expertise and detail, having not had that journey. So I think it's, I think it's interesting that you were on that side, you decided to switch and, and now you're fighting for the other side. But when you do that, you already, you already have a behind the scenes look, you already know a lot of things that the average person just has no clue about, much less just talking about the legal world, I mean, the gap in knowledge between somebody who's an attorney, doing what you do day in and day out, and the owner of a general contracting company is that gap in knowledge and skill set is vast. But then there's another gap there when you take somebody like you that that your clients were those carriers, and now your clients, the owner of the the GC firm, or the roofing company. So I think that's huge. I mean, another one of our partners is Max for claims. And, you know, we we take a long time to pick a partner, the reason we landed on you guys is because I know some pretty powerful things about you know, you guys have never lost a case, you guys like to go to you, you will take it to court, you'll take it to litigation, quickly, if necessary, you guys fight to win. And same thing with Max for you know, part of their story is the guy that founded max for he was a senior file examiner at a large insurance company. And there are some and they're a supplement company. So when you take somebody that literally trained hundreds and hundreds of desk adjusters on how to deny, and delay, and now you, you get him to switch sides, I mean, it's just a halt. So that's what you guys have going on, but but for, for for contractors as an attorney, so so one of the things that stood out to me as I was getting to know you guys was that you've never lost a trial. So that's, that's huge. I mean, obviously, there must be some criteria that you guys use to say, Okay, this is a good case to go after. This is a case where we think the contractor really stands to win or something, but it can't just be that I mean, you have to be very skilled, knowledgeable. So speak to that. What What do you think is the biggest reason you guys have never lost a trial?

London Crounse: 9:32

I think it's because our defendants or insurance companies, to be honest. I don't think it's because we're really the greatest lawyers although, you know, we don't no lawyer ever goes to trial with the intention of losing. You know, have we gotten lucky No, or real trial lawyers, we deliver real results. before we're for Dalian black, I've done a number of jury trials, bench trials, lots of experience despite the fact that are some of Our attorneys are younger, they have trial experience. JOHN black and Rick Daly have more trial experience than any plaintiffs attorneys I've ever met in Texas. And they're the best trial attorneys I've ever met in the whole country. Hands down. So I mean, are we the best trial lawyers in the industry? arguably, yes. But at the same time, our our opponents are insurance companies. And I'll just say this, I mean, in the personal injury realm, let's say, you know, I hit you in the back and you sued me, I had a State Farm Insurance that couldn't be mentioned at that trial, or else it would be a miss trial, because it would prejudice the jury to know that I have insurance in the in the personal injury sense where you're suing me, personally. So that if you take that, and then you expound upon that, to know that, well, you can't hide that fact, because the defendant is the insurance company with what we deal with. I think that has a lot to do with it. And, you know, we're, we always take jury trials, when you pull a jury of the insurance peers in a storm struck area, or an area that gets struck often, which of our clients are usually right in the thick of it, that there's not a single person on that jury that hasn't maybe experienced some denial or underpayment or somewhat reasonable conduct from an insurance company and trying to process their own claim, or their family members claim. Or their neighbors claim that they know that insurance companies cheat people. They know that that's a real fact. So, you know, we consider though the fact that the Fed is the insurance company that we always take a jury trial. And then we have the best trial lawyers, or at least Trial Lawyers with the best experience to go in and handle that case, every case is different. But you know, we may lose one day. You know, right now we're working on, you know, commercial, large commercial projects, we may be remodeling bathrooms and redoing kitchens one day, but you know, right now, things are going well. And we've got some good traction. And we right, we haven't have we're undefeated yet still, but I'm going to challenge the carrier on that any day.

Dylan McCabe: 12:09

Yeah. And it's one of those things, you know, I put it in the description, as I, as I send an email out about this particular this particular episode was that it's not it, but when you need to bring an attorney, and especially obviously, if it's a large loss claim, but even on some of the residential claims. I mean, we're doing a water mitigation deal right now in Texas, and it's a 9000 square foot home. It's three stories, the entire house was destroyed, because the sprinkler system froze the pipes burst. Well, if the carrier says, how we don't think the damage is that extensive, we've got a problem. I mean, the house is destroyed, a homeowner is going to be out of the house for at least nine months to a year. So we're already thinking ahead about that. And then my friends, you know, when you get to when you host a podcast, you get to make a lot of connections. And I've got a lot of friends in commercial roofing. I've got guys that fly all over all over the nation that do large law stuff. And I mean, they've got a handful of attorneys they rely on regularly, it's just a part of it. And it sucks, but it's just over and over again that insurance companies try to delay or deny things and underpay and it's just it's just such a battle. But I love the fact that that you guys are there to fight that fight. And we're going to get into some specific things. And even as I got to talking to you, you know, when we did our discovery call, I told you I said, you know, let's address the elephant in the room. And that's attorney fees. So we're going to talk about attorney fees. We're going to talk about what's what are some things that people should gather on every claim, like just specifics that the contractor should gather, we're going to talk about up, we're going to talk about when to bring an attorney in and stuff like that. So let's address the elephant in the room. You guys already have an impressive background. When people do their research, they're going to find that you guys stand out. So right away, it's like, Well, that sounds expensive. So So how do attorneys fees work? Let's clear the fog on attorneys fees for all the owners of roofing and GC companies listening to this? Sure,

London Crounse: 14:12

yeah. So in the States, we practice our fees are paid by the insurance companies. That is a law. That is not the law in any other room, other than in first party litigation, which is what we do. So the fees are paid by the insurance companies. And then the question would be well, if you're going to take my case and settle it, if that's the compensable fee at trial, which is treble damages, plus attorneys fees, especially in Colorado and in Texas, treble damages plus attorneys fees, that's our leverage going to court. And that's why we're able to settle the case for what our client needs. That is the contractual damages the policy benefits that they're do plus our attorneys fees. And so if we take a good case, if there's a good case, and we assess it, and we believe that there is a reasonable, or there's no reasonable basis for the denial of the underpayment. I don't care what the situation is whether the relying upon exclusion, prior damage, lack of maintenance, you know, faulty prior repair. I don't care what it is if the basis doesn't hold water. That's a good case. That's a case where we can convince a court or a jury that the benefits that we're asking for or that the policyholder was simply asking for, before we got involved. Were in the reasonably denied. That amount could be treble or triple by statute, and attorneys fees assessed on top of that. So when we look at that case, if that's the case, we're willing to take to trial and argue that that's the case, the carrier should be willing to settle for the amount of contractual damages. That's the policy benefits that are due or still outstanding, plus RFPs. Because the alternative is an exponential number upon that. And so the question would be nine times out of 10 on mass, well, then how do you settle the case? The answer is we have to settle it for them out that makes you whole or gives you the policy benefits that you were do plus our fees, who settle it for 100% of what you're owed, then we would be doing you a disservice because attorney has to take a contingent fee. Some attorneys work hourly, we work completely contingent. No client ever receives a bill or an invoice from us. It's only the insurance company that pays our fees. Our clients put in writing authorized exactly what they will agree to receive a settlement. So there's no dispute there. In addition to that amount, we have to go get attorneys fees, because here's the fact if attorneys, not just Daly and black, but the attorneys in this area in this realm do do exactly that. They settle for what the carrier owes, and then take a portion out of that depriving the policyholder of the full benefits they were do then they're giving the insurance company's overall a license to lowball. Because worst case scenario, they go through all the trouble of getting an attorney, maybe an appraiser, maybe a public adjuster. And at the end of the day, the carrier owes 100% of what they should have paid from the very beginning. Oh, they'll roll the dice on that every day. So when we do get the case, which is probably less than 1% of the time that a policy was actually denied, do we get the phone call, right or unreasonably denied that is we get that if we settle those cases for only one is Oh, then we're given the carrier license lowball. So we have to assess is it unreasonably denied? And if so, can we take that case and settle it for what are insured our client needs what the roofing contractor needs to perform the work plus our fees and we do every time, we're able to do that every time. And because we do a really great job of assessing cases in the beginning, we're able to deliver that that expectation those results. But the problem is when attorneys go taking cases without assessing everything upfront. And then they find out later that actually, I know you're looking for $1.2 million in policy benefits. But there's this policy exclusion that affects the code coverage at the time of loss. And it actually only provides you about 700,000. Well, that could have been addressed at the beginning. So that's exactly what what I do what our partners do on the large loss field, assess the damages, or what the potential compensation would be in the trial situation before ever even taking on that case, to create an expectation that's real.

Dylan McCabe: 18:47

So you guys must spend a lot of time doing preliminary research just to make sure that there's coverage where there needs to be coverage, and that that you want to go forward and win. I mean, I imagine you you spent a fair amount of time researching and yet. I mean, what is there a percentage of where you have to go back and say, You know what, we know that you need to you need to fight a battle here. But unfortunately, there's coverage issues.

London Crounse: 19:11

Absolutely. All the time. In fact, some of the better cases that I've been referred as been the result of turning down cases that were you know, attempted to be sent to our firm at first and explaining why but I won't just turn down a case I'll tell the contractor or the insurance why or what the situation is and then try to provide another alternative for them to be made whole. I can't tell you how many times you know I've recommended you know policyholder calls. It's not exactly right for you know an attorney to litigate the matter and we refer it out to an appraiser a public adjuster happens all the time. So you know, no, no claim is there's no one way to resolve every claim. There's no avenue of attack that's best over the other ones. It's really just particular to the scenario. So I mean, I act as a gatekeeper all the time to listen to you know what the grievance is what you know what the policyholder thinks they're being unreasonable not to try to match that up with what actually would come to fruition in a trial scenario. And if that's supported by, you know, the evidence, then we'll take that case,

Dylan McCabe: 20:19

after that's awesome. But you guys are your contingency based, you're gonna get the insurance company to pay what's owed as far as scope of work damage, etc. And then you're including your fee on top of that, and it's contingency based, so you guys are really betting on yourselves at that point. That's right. And I love that I love that. I mean, that gets me excited, that's like, okay, the people that I'm partnering with, so believe in their process and their skill and their ability to win this thing, that they're not even going to ask me for payment unless we win. And that's, that's a powerful testimony to the kind of work you guys do.

London Crounse: 20:55

roofing contractors are the same way they work on a contingent basis, you know, there's no promise to be paid unless the job is done. And that's, that's exactly how we feel, you know, we're on the same. In fact, you know, same way roofing companies have bifurcated, you know, their residential commercial departments, we've done that at our firm. We operate our firm much the same way. A lot of roofing CEOs operate their their business, but it's overhead. And it's time and, and, and, you know, the better cases that you take, the better we'll do, the better claims you take on, the better their overall revenues you're going to be, but if they take on some claims that, you know, may not have all the things that they need to generate coverage, you waste a lot of time and burn up a whole lot of overhead during that time. So and we're not interested in that.

Unknown: 21:42

Oh, yeah.

Dylan McCabe: 21:43

Right.

Unknown: 21:44

You case. I

London Crounse: 21:44

mean, we were willing to take that to trial.

Dylan McCabe: 21:47

That's great. Well, when when you and I were discussing what to talk about, you know, obviously attorney fees is a big one. And so we've cleared that up. and other one is you'd mentioned to me, there's really a few key things that should be gathered on every claim by by whoever's running that job. And you mentioned a few things like data loss, parallel, etc. So let's get into those. What are the what are the three or four critical things that need to be gathered? And why? Sure,

London Crounse: 22:15

so number one, and this is always missed, you have to have a covered peril. Okay. covered, meaning? How do you know whether it was covered or not? You have to have a date. Because there's a policy, you know, foreseeably, there's a policy that, you know, renews on an annual basis, and you don't know whether it renews in July or January. So what is your date? You have to determine the date and what is your peril? So once you determine the date and the peril, they have a covered peril, is it is it hail? Is it wind is hail and dorwin? And then is it covered, you have to determine that by data loss, very simple, but missed all the time. I think, you know, every roofing contractor should have access to some sort of weather, reporting data and know the information on that property before they even engage with the client about a potential claim. Right? Once if you don't know, then you have to do some investigative work to figure that out. Maybe talk to the neighbors, but you can't tell them what they're made of losses. But you can present them with information. And ask them if that helps them determine what the data loss is, and what the covered peril was. Next would be, you got to get the policy. Once you know what your covered peril is, you got to get the policy or copy of the policy. So you know what coverages are available there, or your policy holder does. Or if you go into the trouble you can call a public adjuster or an attorney and have that policy available. There's so many times I get the call. And they're discussing what coverages the carrier's offering. And I need to see the full policy to determine what's available. And if they're being fair in that offer. So that's the next thing. Once you have a covered peril, you know what the data loss is, you need to ask the insurer to pull the policy, usually they don't have it, it's usually a declarations page. You know, if it's under 30 pages, I can tell you, that's not the full pass. That's to get the full policy in effect at the time of that loss. So if it's two years ago, they call the agent they have to ask for last year's policy or the year before that, or just specifically asked for the one in effect of that date. So we can get the coverages that are issue or the exclusions that are an issue. Whether the deductible that's an issue, you know, what you're up against, when you get the copy of the policy. Nine times out of 10, the insured has never seen a full copy of their policy, even if they've been insured for 20 years. They've only ever received a declarations page, which is just a summary cliff notes of what the policy is or what's changing in it being added or taken away. It doesn't tell you really anything. thing. So good topic policy number two. Number three, you have to do what I do what I would call like the CSI effect, some sort of crime scene investigation. But really this is a this is a damage scene investigation. So you have to do some sort of investigative work. Often, oftentimes, like I said, to determine the data loss even, but if that's your data loss, and you know, you're in a position where you've reviewed it and found it, you've taken photographs of this for placement is warranted. Well, wouldn't it behoove the roofing contractor to go and talk to the properties northeast, south and west of that is sure to find out if they received a roof replacement from that side? What was their date of loss? All that informations health? You know, there's no bit of there's no question, bad question in that scenario, as to see if they've got pictures of the hail from the day asked to see if, you know, the end of the cars outside got damaged by that? Do you have photographs of that? And be inquisitive? To try and get as much information because the policyholder has it. I was several years ago, I was in an insurance home. And the issue was they're being denied because the hail that struck their property, according to the carrier was not large enough to damage the title on their roof. And they specifically stated that, you know, anything over an inch and a half in diameter would have been sufficient. And that's the issue. We're sitting there dealing with it. I'm sitting in the living room, and we're talking about how can we, you know, asking the same questions, do you have any evidence to the size of the heylia photographs, they had the hailstones, two, two and a half plus inches in diameter in their freezer in the basement?

Unknown: 26:46

Wow,

London Crounse: 26:47

they didn't think to pull them out until I asked. But they had the report. So you can't rely on these you know, the policy, you have to ask the question. They might not have ever thought of that. But you have to show demonstrate your investigative mindset on trying to gather the information needed to support their claim. And then at the end, you need to estimate you'd provide some sort of estimation for what actually you believe the work is going to cost. And I think a lot of roofing contractors pull punches, or they try to hide that number. Because, you know, the insurance, the concern is that they that the insured is receives a call from the carrier saying that, you know, your your contractors asking for $500,000 on this claim. We're only offering $80,000 in coverage. And unless you want to be out of pocket, you know, suggest maybe you work with a preferred contractor, we have some that won't challenge what we're willing offering. And that's what happens all the time. And so it's because that I guarantee you, there's a roofing contractor that's listening to this right now, that has not been burned in that situation. You know, whether it's legal or not, whether it's contractual infringement or not, it's still happened to them. And it's still a real concern, which is why they're afraid of submitting their their full price. The answer to that is to have the policyholder, submit your full press sit down with the policyholder, because you get to sit down with him first. And tell them what the number is, versus the carrier calling them and saying, did you know about this number you were unaware of? And them telling them what they want to offer. So the number is 500. And you have some idea that they're only going to offer 20% or less of that. If you sit down with the policyholder and have them submit your estimate. The carrier calls back Did you know that your contractor was issued? sp 500? Yes, I did. Because I sent it to you. That's what they'll say. And I also asked for you to please release so undisputed funds, and give me a reasonable or give me a reasonable basis why you won't pay any line item in this estimate. So creating the estimate is key. submitting it for what you really believe the full value of the claim is, is key. And the policyholder has any question about that you can sit down with them and ask them simply do you ever plan on transferring ownership of this property? Either during your life or after? The answer is yes. Do you think the buyer's inspector is going to find more or less issues with this property? If we do this restoration job for less money? Very simple. Or policyholders that don't want to challenge that, you know, let's say they do some of the estimate. The carrier comes back with 100 and your estimates at 500. And they don't want to press the issue. They just want to well we'll just work with what we've got right? How many times has it occurred where policy or thereafter has received a letter from the underwriting department that says we've inspected we've reviewed your property and it looks like your roof is in disrepair due to impact damage. And you need a new roof by the end of the policy period or we're going to drop you all will offer you an opportunity to exclude the roof and double your coverage or double your premium and reduce your coverage. So that that's a real concern as well. But those are all reasons why the estimate and having the policyholder submit the estimate is key, in my opinion. There's some different opinions out there. There's some contractors that think they could submit an estimate for 80 and supplemented up to 500. I think that's asinine, but it's a way it's been done. And it works in some time. So I can't argue with it. But I think there's a more effective way to do it overall, which is to push your price first. You wouldn't try to sell your truck by, you know, putting it out in the parking lot to say, make me an offer was you. You want $20,000 for your truck when she put, you know, 20 $25,000 on it, or at least 20 and say and have some explanation as to why. That's how that's gonna go. I think that's key document. Investigate, estimate. That's the that's the last step. Really, it was a lot in one step. But if all that's done, and the policyholder submits your estimate, there's no need to do a mutual inspection. It might be beneficial to talk the adjuster into paying for it, but it's not necessary. The burden has been met by the policyholder, they've provided information of a covered peril. they've submitted it to the carrier, they've asked to release on disputed funds, or give me a reasonable basis. Why not? You Java's stuff, is the carrier's opportunity to respond that and if they don't respond within the time, you know, the time of the prompt Pay Act and that state, they're in trouble.

Dylan McCabe: 31:33

That's so good. You know, we deal with it all the time at rain, tight general contracting, and we are a true general contract. We do a ton of roofing work, but we do GC work, a fair amount of just your typical GC work. And we just got a house for water mitigation last week. The homeowner has 80 year old wood flooring in his home that was custom milled, per his specs, very expensive. And so there's all in addition to that he's got this crazy, huge granite island in his kitchen. That's, that's been, you know, custom textured, and all this stuff. And we're just immediately thinking, Okay, not only do we have to tear the floors up, we're probably going to have to move the island, the islands, probably the granite is probably going to get cracked, or broken, something's going to go wrong somewhere. I don't know what it is. But But something's going to go wrong somewhere. So I'm kind of coaching the homeowner on that, but we're also coaching them on the insurance process. Right? And on on the battle that's about to ensue. And so I just got a text today, hey, Dylan, my, my agent told me I need to get three contractor bids. Do I have to do that? And I said, Okay, Mr. homeowner, you're gonna have to get three different bids from three different water mitigation companies, three different bids from cabinet makers, three different bids from countertop people, three different bids from sheet rock, or people that will do sheet rock work, three different bids from painters, okay, so let's see, we're up to at least 20 different companies, you're gonna have to call. That's insane. number one. And number two, you're not required to do so. Not in this state, you and I already have a contractual relationship, you've signed our agreement, what you need to do is respond and say I'm already in a contractual agreement with rain tight general contracting, here's my signed agreement, we've decided to go with him conversation over. But it's just these games that these games that they play, and I don't want to paint all all agents or carriers is bad, because I do have some friends that are terrific agents and wonderful to work with. But unfortunately, on a lot of them, and on this one in particular, we're already engaged in the battle, you know, right. So having said that, based on what you just said about going into CSI mode, and dealing with the carrier, as a contractor, or as the owner of the roofing company, how far can you go? Because we don't want to start getting into into up issues. So can you kind of clear the fog on that over the next couple of minutes?

London Crounse: 34:03

Yeah. So I would just deal with it as an appraiser would deal with it. You deal with facts, only the damage in front of you only, you're not there to interpret coverage, you're not there to interpret when it occurred. Not there to interpret whether or not the damage that exists is covered, then identify it. Estimated, do a little bit of investigative work to verify what you do claim this covered peril that you've identified is true or substantiated. But beyond that, no opinions ever needed need to be levied. The fact is that the roof is damaged. Now, here are photographs of it. The fact is this is how much it's gonna cost to fix said damage. Here's an estimate representing that. Beyond that, the carriers job is to create you know conferences. decision or make an opinion as to whether or not those facts Mark coverage. But it's not the roofing contractors job to tell them why coverage should be extended. In fact, it's the opposite is the carrier's job to tell the roofing contractor and the insured, why coverage won't be extended, that's been requested so long as it's been requested. And then the burden shifts to the carrier. So as long as you toe the line between facts and opinions, the roofing contractor can never cross the line of authorize public adjuster. But the second they say the damage is clear here, here photographs of it. Yeah, estimate is this. And I review the policy and in my opinion, you know, coverage should lie here or that exclusion should not apply. Now we're crossing that boundary. And and so but but appraiser would never do that. I mean, and if appraiser was trying to do that a roofing contractor would be probably justifiably upset, because that's wrong. appraisers are not there to do that. So they operate under that same accord, they'll always be okay. But the threat is there. Right? The threat is there so much that Roofing Contractors aren't even willing to do that. They think, you know, propounding an estimate and asking for, you know, a release of undisputed funds and to provide a reasonable basis, why they won't pay it is somehow crossing the line. But it's not. It's simply a fact. And it's for the carrier to determine what their opinion, you know, as the coverage would be, once those facts are presented. So that's how I try to explain it. There's a lot of roofing contractors to get into trouble, or situations where they're, and it's just because they're arguing. I mean, arguments are opinions. But it's they're just restating facts, you can't cross that line. So not only my opinion, overall is up EPA is total BS. It's designed to try to deter, you know, contractors from doing the right thing and presenting the right information in the right order. But contractors, I mean, have gone astray. And that's that's a fact. I mean, there's evidence that examples where they actually have crossed that line. And that was, you know, in fact, correct. When they're advising consulting, insurance and things of that nature. That's that realm is purely the advising and consulting, determining coverages only able to be done by public adjusters and attorneys. But, you know, insured also can represent they can do their own job to read their policy, and they can argue coverage with the carrier, which is why you might want to have the copy of their policy in front of them if they're a smart insured. I mean, you don't know if your insurance a doctor or lawyer, somebody who's, you know, really gonna want to read those 140 pages and dig into it. But if it's available, it's helpful. But But you can't do that. The contractor can't dig into that. I'm only asking for the contract, request the policy so that it's available to determine coverage, not so that they can determine filters themselves.

Dylan McCabe: 38:19

Now, that's good. So just stick to the facts, focus on the damage, focus on the scope of work and what it's going to cost. And then and then. And then let's say you do all that. And we all know that many times they come back and say oh, no, it's it's they play games on the cost issues, which is just crazy. To me. We were just talking at lunch today that an exact teammate, at the time of the recording of this show, I think exact teammate has like $4 per per foot for hardy board. And if you talk to any if you talk to any citing guys, they're they're saying no, it's about$10 or whatever. We had this long conversation at lunch about it and use that as example. So exactly, it's terrible when it comes to up to date pricing. But But let's say you do all the all this stuff, right? You scope this job? Let's say it's a commercial job, you know, insurance insurance project, they filed a claim you've got your scope together and everything. When is a good time to pull you guys in because sometimes it gets a little confusing for the for the contractor like okay, should I use a PA should I put this that there was a really good time to pull you guys into the situation? So there's

London Crounse: 39:28

never a wrong time to call? You can always call you know, and one thing that sets us apart at our firm is that you know we are real trial lawyers, we get real results are not interested in telling people what they want to hear. We might not tell you what you want to hear if you call but we'll tell you the truth. And we'll tell you what we really think and if we think at that point in time, based off of sort of the chronology of the claim, if you will Then it's ripe for litigation, we'll tell you, if we think at that point in time that you know, covers decision hasn't been made. And, in fact, the policyholder missed the date of loss hasn't provided proof of a proper cover peril, will tell you, and might recommend that you go by another avenue of resolving the claim, the use of use appraisal or a public adjuster, and then maybe if that doesn't resolve the madness, to come back, and to call us back. But it's hard to say, you know, at this point in time, once, you know, once 123 has been checked, you know, and you hit Step four, now, every state is different. There are prospects, I think when you're being unreasonably delayed, and denied, obviously, that's when you might want to make that call. But I could also say that there's not one area avenue that that will work, in every claim scenario. Some of the most successful claims we've had daily and black, were sent to a public adjuster first, then they referred and found found their way to us, and then we hired a competent appraiser to appraise the loss, then then go and fight over the damages later, during the litigation. So and who would ever thought that would be the chronology of experts that were used? I've seen cases go to an appraiser then go to an attorney. There's, you know, a lot of successful cases that use all three avenues of resolving that it really depends on you know, what, what's the appraisal, provisional plank? You know, what are the laws for public adjusters and attorneys in the state? And, of course, what are the particular facts of this claim? But I think we, every contractor who's been doing this long enough, has a spider sense, if you will, when they're being unreasonable, because they've gone through several claims, obviously, they wouldn't be in business, if they hadn't handled a number of claims that went well, with you, Carrie actually came out and did the right thing. That's your baseline for when, you know, your senses start going off, and they're doing the wrong thing, you're probably right. And, you know, I only get the call when they are doing the wrong thing. But I can tell you, I see specific fact patterns that are pretty identical, regardless of what state they're in, or what type of claim it is. And their bad faith practices. And I think any contractor out there, we could talk, you know, could probably have a whole separate episode about what kind of bad faith practices are out there, and you know, what to look for. But I think that, you know, those that are listening this podcast know, when something is awry, when something doesn't smell right. And when it doesn't smell right, it's probably time to at least talk to somebody be an attorney public adjuster, about what the potential is there. And a good attorney, a public adjuster will give you their time for free, give you the best advice, whether it's to retain us Now, granted, the oftentimes you call a surgeon, they're going to recommend surgery. But we're not like that, because I'm not trying to cut anybody that doesn't need to be cut. And I don't, we don't need to go down that road if there's a quicker or more expeditious way of resolving it, because litigation takes time. But it is a great way to preserve your rights, and to ensure that you're compensated fairly, because you have the right to settle for least at our firm, you have the right to settle and put in writing for what you agree to settle for pre authorized before that ever occurs. So I think the best thing I could recommend is to call earlier, you know, I get the call, often times and their explanation is it's been nine months, we completed a covered peril. Nine months ago, the carrier has gone through three different engineers and consultants and given different opinions. The one person I talked to the startup, you know, getting in line with what we were saying when on sick leave, even though I pretty was handling somebody else's claim yesterday. You know, I mean, we all know what went that mean, that's a great example of when your spider senses should be going off. But that is also an example of bad faith practices. They do that all the time. You know, they try to bewilder the contractor with a number of different consultants and engineers and you know, the the insured is intimidated by the stamp, the engineer puts on it and makes them think they're dead in the water when covered us, you know, at issue. And the contractor must be wrong because he doesn't have the credentials of all these people that they call that Well, before that happens when they start booking the you know, the consultant engineer or that person goes on sick leave, it's probably time to make the call. And we'll tell you where it's at and what's possible based off the state that it's in. But I think a lot of attorneys would do that. You know, I would hope that attorneys aren't out here. Just say, Oh, yeah, you've got a case we'll sign you up. No problem. We'll take it on without ever really reviewing the facts to seeing if it's right to do that at that time,

Dylan McCabe: 45:02

right right, which gets everybody involved can get everybody involved in trouble so, so for guys listening to this that think, yeah, you know what, that'd be great. I'm convinced Dalian black sounds like a strong firm work on contingency they'll take things to court. This is some powerful stuff here thinking I'm busy juggling 20 different balls, I got a sales team of 10. Guys, you know we're trying to hit 20 million a year we're getting into commercial stuff. I'm just drinking from the firehose, I don't have time for this. Let's share a quick story about a case you guys did and the contractor didn't spend any time hardly at all talking to the insurance company.

London Crounse: 45:44

Yeah, so that that contract from chick fil a is 24 years old at the time. Trevor Baker out of reef experts LLC owns his own company. first big commercial claim he landed upon, had a great rapport with the client. It was it was a Chubb policy. And, you know, they provided the proof of their cover peril he sent in his estimate for what he believed it to be. And it was a seven figure estimate, carrier only came out and was willing to write an estimate for $30,000. For minor repair, when he then elevated it to have the insured send in his estimate, with a request to release on disputed funds, or please provide a reasonable basis why you won't pay every line item at this estimate. They came out at an engineer firm come inspect, and then told the insured that they needed to file a date of loss from a different cover peril, because the damage over there, that if you put two and two together with the minor repair they had already adjusted for would warrant a full roof replacement. Well, that damage over there occurred from a different date of loss. Now, a carrier is in no position to be advising an insured, what date of loss to file for the same way a contractor is not. It's the it's the insurance burden to provide the proof of the cover peril. And to determine what that is they need to determine what the parallel is. And when it occurred. Once they've done that deal, the burden shifts and the carrier's job is to respond why they won't pay it. Now, if the answer is they won't pay it because this is previous day of loss. And that's damages not from the debt the covered peril this year, providing us Mr. insured, then then that's the answer. But they should not be compelling the insured to file for a different date of loss incur another $150,000 deductible, and only to get a minor repair because what they were trying to do was bifurcate the client, they have $150,000 deductible, they're gonna run a$30,000 repair over here, and a$30,000 repair over there. Even if they wrote $149,000 repair on each one, they still would have generated $0 on the client. But overall, again, the full Roof Replacement on this commercial property was a seven figure claim. So because he had prepped the policyholder for that and because the pot what when the when they responded with you know we send an engineer out you need to file a different date of loss. policyholder had already submitted his estimate with that request. I believe that's what prepped them to get mad. You know, they were ready and waiting to hear response. And the response was you need to file another claim that didn't sit well with that. And there's but the insurance spider senses were going off. And that's why they asked for counsel. But it's hard to play Monday morning quarterback on it. I don't know if but I believe if you want to publicize that if the shirt hadn't sent that in, and the carrier respond to that, it would have been a different story. I don't know if the insured would have had the ammunition to get mad. Or they just would have done what the carrier told them to do. Which would have put them in a precarious position to where they never would have gotten a roof replacement that was eventually paid for. Now, they did not add the roof replacement. So the insurance stuck by their guns and said no, I'm not falling. This is my date of loss. I need you to issue a coverage decision on that. And they stuck with a $30,000 repair. I think they tried to increase it but it still didn't generating any value on the claim. That's when they hired us We sent in a 541 notice letter demanding that they have 60 days to pay the amount that is requested in the estimate or else be sued. And they settled it in 18 days.

Dylan McCabe: 49:39

Oh man.

London Crounse: 49:40

Now, that was their decision. We can't force a carrier to settle in 18 days. So don't think that's a representation of the type of result we can get every time. But I think the point of the story is went was prep properly. The insurer had met their burden and issued the estimate that they wanted them to pay provided You know, ever any insured tried to get that covered peril off the track, basically. And they stuck by their guns, there was not much the carrier could do. And so the contractor prep them, they did that. And he never walked, he never add any he did walk through for the insurance company, he did go up there with the engineers, but he never spoke to them. He never talked, he was just there to observe, he's just a fly on the wall the whole time. He let the insured direct the communications to the carrier. And I think that's what helped get the job done. You know, now, he could have gone in there. I mean, I don't think there's anything wrong with talking to the carrier. And I tried to say that, I'm just saying, you know, it's an example of how he had no interaction with the carrier whatsoever. And that's what a lot of contractors think they have to do is they have to interact with the carrier to push them and tell them why they should pay for these, you know, their claim their estimate, but that's not so. And so it's kind of a less is more idea, but it was a factual. And I think it's a great example for what contractors could do going forward, you know, with how they could handle claims and probably maximize the number of claims that they're able to provide, you know, a covered peril on without having to argue it so much.

Dylan McCabe: 51:19

See, I like that story, because as a business owner, you think to yourself, okay, I've got a decision here with this, this potential job. Do I want to fight this? And if the answer to that is going to be yes, I really need two things to happen. Number one, I need to know I can win, or it's highly probable I win. And number two, I know it's not going to suck too much time out of my life, because it's not the only thing I have going on in my business. And so for you guys, a big part of your criteria is making sure you you, it's highly likely that you'll win the battle. And number two, you guys are going to do all the heavy lifting. So I think it's great. That's why we're excited to have you guys as as a partner and to send people your way. And so I think the last thing is, how can people get in touch with you?

London Crounse: 52:05

Sure. Call me on a cell phone. I'm always on the road. I'm in the Denver office of the Houston office and back and forth. But they can call me on my cell phone that 7209250 75 I don't know if we could throw that on the screen anyway. But 7209 to five, zero 75 You can call me any time.

Dylan McCabe: 52:27

That's awesome. Well, yeah, we'll put that in the show notes. And just so everybody listening to this and attorney, a very, very effective attorney just gave out his number for free. He's not gonna be billing you when you call him. Now he's really there to help. So these guys are legit. I really enjoyed getting to know you guys dsrc conference. And if I'm not mistaken, you're also moderating the legal panel at the wind the storm.

London Crounse: 52:51

That's right. Yep. I think we're giving another speech on some interesting things daily and I are about to release what that speech is going to be on. So we've got some mainstage president when the storm will also be speaking next week at the blue collar American Dream conference in Miami. So come check us out there. Are you going to that, by the way, if you come into that,

Dylan McCabe: 53:14

you know, we are swamped right now with all this water mitigation stuff in Dallas. So we're, yeah, we're dealing with that.

London Crounse: 53:22

There's a lot of people that aren't going because of that reason I have to go because I'm speaking there on Saturday. But you know, I'll be back in Texas as soon as I'm done. So,

Dylan McCabe: 53:30

yep. Well, London's thank you so much for joining the show. And for those of you listening to this, I'll put his number in the shownotes. You'll be able to catch this on our podcast and iTunes, you'll be able to see it on YouTube. And of course, you can go to our Facebook group, the limitless roofing CEO Facebook group and see the entire video recording as well. So, again, London, thank you so much for joining the show.

London Crounse: 53:53

Appreciate it, man. Take care. Talk to you soon, guys.