I went down and talked to the people who issue my homeowner's policy about the roof and it would be covered if we decide to make a claim. We have a $500 deductible, which I knew. I was a little worried about it, because since the house is vacant, we had to have a different policy than if we were living in it. One that didn't insure contents since there weren't any, etc., but still insured the building/structures. And there are always exclusions. But we did, in fact, take out the right policy when we moved, so it will cover this water/wind damage. So it is a big relief to know that is an option.

After that an appointment was made for later this week to have a roofer/repairer come and give an estimate. He will be able to track down where the actual damage is and follow the line of the leak. He's been in business 20 years and comes highly recommended. He is one of the few that will make repairs. A lot of roofers won't do that anymore, they will just roof.

And once we have the estimate I can decide whether it is enough to bother with a claim or to just eat it. I really don't want to trash the emergency fund. But I don't want sky high insurance rates in the future either. Right now we get a huge discount for never having submitted a claim on house or car insurance in 15 years/20 years.

I think my break point will be $2000. If it is much more than that we will submit a claim and deal with the insurance consequences. I can handle losing that much from the EF and still feel secure. And if we do a claim, it will be much easier to come up with the $500 deductible.

I forgot to ask if we pay first and then get reimbursed by insurance or if we have the roofer send the bill to the insurance and they pay it. I guess I'll have to do that once we get the estimate.

Right now I am just going to hope and pray this is a repair job and not a full roof job. I'd much prefer it to be a fast and easy fix. We really wanted to get the house on the market when DH comes home this time. Who knows now if that will happen? Depends on how fast it can be done, I guess.