6 Months After the LA Fires: What Nicole Wishes She Knew Before Her House Burned Down

I'm Nicole Lappin, the only financial expert you don't need a dictionary to understand.

It's time for some money rehab.

Well, it has been six months and one day since my home burned down and I lost everything.

In the time since then, I have been rebuilding and rebuilding some more and it has been slow.

Normally, I wouldn't have said that six months is a long time at all.

The first six months of building Money News Network went by in a flash.

This has been the longest six months of my life.

As the anniversary got closer, I knew I wanted to put on an episode that basically put together everything that I've done to rebuild in the last six months so that anyone else listening who, God forbid, goes through something similar, has a blueprint for recovery.

And I wanted to share the things that I wish I did before the fire, the little easy things that would have saved me a lot of time and most importantly, money.

When I started talking to our executive producer, Morgan, about this episode, she asked that we do a little planning session on Zoom so that she could help me organize my thoughts.

And as we started talking through all of it, I realized that we were actually just creating the episode we wanted to make.

So today you're going to hear chunks of our conversation and I'll fill in some of the blanks.

But here's where we started.

All right.

So the place that I want to start is just with some logistical-y ones.

Like, what were

all of the like records and pieces of paperwork that you needed to get after the fire?

Oh, man.

I mean, ideally we would have had like some form of identification.

That would have been really helpful.

But all the IIDs, credit cards, debit cards, like global entry, passport, birth certificate, marriage certificate, like all the certificates.

And for Sloane, I think you're right.

For Sloane, although she was a baby and she didn't have them yet.

So we got those for the first time.

But I think there's an office that does like marriage, birth, and death, like all the essential documents.

But yeah, we got all of those major documents.

And then Jared, my husband went like full doomsday prepper.

I think he felt really, I don't know, disappointed in himself.

He obviously shouldn't have felt that way, but he thought he didn't do a good enough job taking care of the family with all of those logistics.

So he got like a special case for all of the paperwork and like this doomsday sort of prepper stuff.

He got a generator, a starlink,

like this

not real gun, but like a very aggressive baby gun type situation.

Go away.

Yeah.

So all of our important documents are now all in this little container, which we didn't have before.

So which ones were the first ones that you tried to get back?

I tried to get my driver's license first, but that was from New York.

And I wasn't planning on ever changing it from New York, even though I haven't lived in New York since.

the pandemic.

It was just a really good picture.

And honestly, I didn't want to change it until I had to.

Yeah, you tried to help me with this.

You can't get an out-of-state license renewal.

So, what did you do?

Did you have to take the driver's test?

What did you do?

I did.

I did.

Yeah.

So, the New York DMV sent over some record.

I had to take that record to the California DMV.

And then I had to take the written driving test, not the parallel park driving test.

You take the written driver's test again.

Yeah.

Oh, my.

Passed.

First time.

It was also like so obvious.

It would really scare me if someone couldn't pass.

Yeah.

Okay.

Fair.

Fair.

But at the time, you didn't even have a permanent address.

So when you have things like your driver's license where you have to list an address, what did you put down?

And also, like, where did you say that they could send these things?

I have my Airbnb address on my driver's license now which i don't want but it's really hard to get one form of identification without any forms of identification yeah how did you do that not sure

i'm not i'm really not sure what what was lucky for me actually was that i grew up in california and so my very first driver's license was a california oh id and so i was in the system so what did jared do because he didn't right he had a new York license or something.

I don't know what he did.

I think he had his passport in his backpack.

So I think he used that, but I didn't, I didn't have my passport or anything.

I see.

Which makes me really sad because obviously you can replace the passport, but you cannot replace the passport stamps.

And I always loved my passport stamps.

Replacing documents has felt like the hamster wheel I can never get off.

I needed document A to get document B, but I didn't have document A.

And in order to get document A, I needed document B.

Rinse and repeat.

I wish before the fire, I created a digital go bag for my records.

The fire happened two weeks after I had a baby.

So go bags were very much top of mind at the time, but for a completely different reason.

We, of course, had a go bag for the hospital that had things like change of clothes and speakers because my husband really wanted to bring the vibes at the hospital.

But anyway, the digital go bag has all of the things that Morgan and I were just talking about.

Digital copies of my driver's license, passport, social security card, birth certificate, marriage license, all of the essential paperwork that is a logistical nightmare to replace.

The digital go bag is just a folder that holds all of these records.

Obviously, I didn't have one before the fire, but I do have one now.

I have my digital go bag accessible in two places.

First, I have it stored in a password-protected folder in the cloud.

And second, I have it on a USB that I keep in a fireproof safe we now own.

But recovering lost paperwork was just the beginning.

The part that has really eaten away at me has been the financial relief or lack thereof.

Over the last six months, I told Morgan some bits and pieces of it, but I tried not to bother anyone with all the bits and pieces of it.

So in the next part, you'll hear me fill her in for the first time.

And even then, I don't share every dizzying rejection, but here's most of it.

And I've just been hearing bits and pieces about all of the crazy stuff that you've been going through trying to get aid and like the normal kind of aid that you should

expect

as

somebody who has insurance, but also

as somebody who like is a small business owner.

And so there are small business.

relief programs when things like this happen, class action lawsuit stuff.

Like I've just been hearing bits and pieces about how it's all going horribly wrong.

So what's happening?

Oh my God.

Okay.

So let's see.

I didn't know any of this.

Like I never read my insurance policy.

My

really comprehensive insurance canceled the year before.

So I had like bare bones

insurance.

But I thought we're never going to need it, obviously.

Famous last words.

And for our office, I was going to get insurance after I came back from having a baby.

And so that was too late for that, sadly.

So on the government side, there's FEMA and SBA.

And then that's the federal government side.

And then below that, there's the county and like government adjacent agencies like the Chamber of Commerce.

Spoiler alert, we haven't gotten any aid for our small but mighty business that was just built right in the fire zone.

Why this is is the most frustrating, maddening thing.

So FEMA gives you, or is supposed to give you $770

in a disaster, but there are these two other buckets from FEMA that are, I think, $42,000 for underinsurance of personal property and underinsurance of additional living expenses.

So when you have a

renter's or homeowner's policy, it's divided into a personal property limit, so all your stuff, and then

some sort of hopefully additional living expenses, ALE component, loss of use.

You mean that you can only insure maximum amount of stuff or there's a maximum value of stuff you can insure?

So for personal property, the coverage, I remember when I went through the broker process to the insurance and I got the lowest one, which I still have not forgiven myself for.

The higher the premium, usually like the higher the coverage.

So you can

say that your personal property is up to $50,000 or $100,000 and your premiums every month would be higher for higher coverage.

So let's say it was $50,000.

You would need to show all of the proof to get you to $50,000.

And then once they paid that out, which insurance companies are the worst, and their whole job is to not pay you out for what you are owed, then it's done.

So, like,

assuming you had more than $50,000, if you had $100,000 of personal property, which most people don't know until you have to know, so you know, pulling receipts from Amazon, from your emails, from

for clothes, for

stuff that you can value that you had in the house.

There are a bunch of templates that people have used, like going through photos you have to provide.

And then once you hit that limit, you're considered underinsured for the rest.

FEMA allegedly helps you up to 40,000, I guess.

So if you had $100,000 of contents, you had insurance for $50,000.

There is supposed to be additional help.

Getting that is a whole different process.

Jared met with the FEMA person at our

burn-down home.

We still haven't gotten any

FEMA assistance.

It's

been six months.

Do you have to go to the site with them?

I think so.

They have to verify that it's gone.

Jesus, it's so bleak.

And then with the ALE, they're supposed to give you what the insurance doesn't cover for like like additional child care, or if you're in temporary housing, that doesn't allow dogs and dog boarding, or you know, what you would spend above and beyond what you normally spend for food because you might not have a kitchen or stuff like that.

We haven't gotten any federal anything despite going through this process.

It gets like just so much red tape.

And then the SBA is

for loans, low interest loans.

There are ones for your home that you're underinsured for and ones for business.

So so far we got a loan that was 2.5%

interest.

So a low interest rate loan.

The interest,

you have to start paying after a year and you get like 30 years to pay it off.

And then we did not get anything for the business.

for a loan.

I'm still fighting with them.

For all these government grants or loans, I've been rejected maybe 30 times on each.

And each time you have to write like a letter of reinstatement or, you know, provide more information.

It's definitely like financial logistical colonoscopy.

I've used this before on the show.

And having

no actual paperwork, like we had our business lease on paper that got burned, it's really hard to pull a ton of this information that they ask for because they ask for a ton.

And our issue was

moronic.

My taxes personally and for the business went to a P.O.

box that also burned down.

And

we did that for security purposes.

You know, we have some special snowflakes out there.

It's in the rules that if your tax return doesn't go to the affected address, you're disqualified, basically.

I could not get get through to anybody who wanted to make an exception or could understand nuance.

So I wouldn't do anything differently.

I mean, I would just suggest to people to keep something like that in mind, but I'm going to open another P.O.

box.

Hopefully lightning doesn't strike twice, but, you know, like using a P.O.

box is legal and legit for a business for a mailing address.

But for a lot of this disaster coverage, they're not about it.

Have you been rejected from FEMA or from the additional aid, or they're just like, we'll let you know?

We're fighting with our insurance company about ALE.

So until that's finished,

FEMA

doesn't kick in.

But we are fighting with them.

And so it sounds like that will preclude us from any

FEMA

additional living expenses.

What's that fight with the insurance company?

Oh,

so

oh my god.

The fight with the insurance company is

around

them rejecting

our new living

situation

because

technically it's two leases and together it would be the same number of bedrooms and bathrooms and stuff like that that we previously had.

But the amount per month was more.

So now they

and in LA at this time, it's impossible to find a rental, you know.

And so

it was just a logistical issue with the management company, but now they won't pay the delta.

So basically you're responsible for the amount that you had previously paid and they're supposed to pay the delta of.

So let's say, you know, your rent was $5,000

or your mortgage and now you have to pay $6,000.

They're not going to pay $6,000.

They're going to pay $1,000 of what's on top of your regular payment.

And that can last for a federal disaster, I think, 24 months with potentially 36-month extension.

The way my policy happened to be written was that there was,

it was unlimited, but I thought that that was a good thing and it's proven not to be.

It's just like at their discretion.

And so they rejected that.

If I had to go back, I, you know, I would have kept more receipts like right after the disaster of what we bought.

But like you're in such a daze and like you're

dealing with so much that like having all this paperwork and all this stuff is just.

You're already like looking for other paperwork and doing other paperwork and like just trying to find the receipts for all of the things that you lost not necessarily accumulate more receipts for the things that you're doing in that moment totally and like not having itemized receipts like they really went through every line item like they won't pay for alcohol if you if you went to a restaurant like they'll take out a glass of wine or something as an additional living expense, which is understandable, but it's like super, super granular.

Like you find yourself.

Yeah.

So for the insurance, we're probably going to get a lawyer to fight for our additional living expenses coverage that's been denied.

I also put a complaint into CDI, which is the California Department of Insurance.

Once you have issues with them, they are supposed to step in and mediate.

So originally, I had like a lawyer friend help write some letters that wasn't taken super seriously because he wasn't known in this space.

Now we've found a lawyer who is really known in this little niche thing,

as well as this company called Policy Holders United that has really helped this woman like should come on the show.

She

just helps people like navigate this, as well as Pepperdine University had a Caruso Caruso-funded pro bono law clinic that we used to try and help us navigate some of this stuff.

So that's like one lawyer that we need to fight with our insurance.

And then everybody who had been affected needs to find a lawyer who's doing mass torts.

So mass torts is like class action, except everybody's damages are different based on what you lost.

So having this itemized list of all of the things that you've lost, you know, they'll take out the amount that you got from insurance and the amount you got from other kinds of aid, like FEMA or whatever.

And then the delta of that is

what

you're hopefully going to get and made whole for minus the cut for the lawyers.

So they're all on contingency.

And everybody, there's a bunch of WhatsApp groups to help guide people to sign up for one of the major law firms in the area.

And it's supposed to take like three or four years to go through and sue LADWP and the city and the county and all of that stuff.

The county had some grants.

We were rejected for the business one because of the address fluke, stupid issue.

We did get a small $2,000 grant, but Now we're being told that the paperwork that we signed to get that grant has language in it

that

indemnifies the county from any future lawsuits.

So now people are really upset because they've like signed over their rights and nobody reads all of that fine print, which I completely should have.

And so that's problematic, but like these mass torts are going after

apparently not just the county, but what happened with Lahaina, they ended up getting damages years later, but against the utilities company and

the city for the reservoir and the empty fire hydrants and all that type of stuff.

But like, I have, I've just been trying

every angle because

I can't

understand where all the funding has gone.

And I think on principle, we should get it.

We just haven't.

Hold on to your wallets.

Money rehab will be right back.

And now for some more money rehab.

The finances of it all have been keeping me up at night, literally.

I have nightmares about FEMA and paperwork and lawyers.

And part of the reason it feels so unbearable is because I'm rebuilding her studio and it is expensive.

I should have money from FEMA and my insurance company to help me, but I do not.

Another part of this is guilt.

I feel shame, honestly, for not insuring the office, and I feel a lot of pressure and responsibility for making it right where I can.

But even more than all that, it is just so deeply unfair.

I know that it sounds small, but that's what's gnawing at me.

It's unfair for me, but it's unbearingly unfair to people who can't make ends meet without the aid that they are entitled to.

What I wish I would have done is take a video on my phone of me walking through my office and my home.

This is something that would have made a dramatic difference in the process of submitting claims to my insurance company and to SBA and to FEMA and all of the agencies.

Now, I know that you're supposed to take these videos documenting all of your belongings, walking through every room, going through every door.

I knew this and I did not do it.

So I cannot stress this enough.

If you don't have a video like this of your home, please do it today.

If I had something like this, I would have saved thousands of dollars and a lot of migraines.

So you might be wondering, what's the big point I'm making here?

Morgan asked that too.

So for the episode, do you want it to be sort of like an update episode?

Yeah, I think, you know, what would be interesting is like what I wish I knew before my house burned down was like a lot of this logistical shit.

Like also all the P.O.

box stuff, which was a complete nightmare.

Like the UPS store is not part of UPS and there's no forwarding.

So if your

P.O.

box burns down, you're fucked.

That I didn't know.

I didn't even think about.

And all of this address stuff, like I, I don't know how I'm going to try to safeguard against that in the future.

But yeah, it's like what I wish I knew about these policies and what what I should have looked for and what I should have done.

Like it's never a fun day to go through inventory of everything you've ever owned.

And then, you know, being so massively underinsured, trying to figure out how to be made whole.

And then also you're like a lot of these policies are reimbursement.

So you're out of pocket like a lot.

Like a lot of people don't have access to cash to pay for this stuff and then get reimbursed.

I think it's like deeply, deeply unfair.

Because then people like go into credit card debt and then if they're reimbursed, are they reimbursed for the interest?

Probably not.

Totally.

Yeah.

Totally not.

And like then Liberty Mutual is just like sitting on a bunch of cash and paying people to like fight you to not give you money.

So yeah, I think like what I wish I had done or knew.

Yeah.

And then like where, where is the money gone?

And then I got identity thefted because a lot of people have been targeted.

I don't know if it was because of that or something else.

So going through that process, somebody tried to open loans in my name and then I had to file a claim for that.

But their insurance company that's supposed to also cover you from identity theft, they say in like some of the documents that they cover like child care that it took you to go through this and lost wages.

But I put in a claim for that because my whole year is all about filling out claims and shit.

And they rejected it because apparently it's not lost wages for identity theft.

It only covers up to the amount if the scammer was successful.

That's crazy.

It just sounds like there's just so many catches that no one ever gets anything.

Yeah.

So many catches.

So many, like the rules are exactly this.

And if you don't have exactly this, then you're SOL because they claim that these programs have been taken advantage of by fraudsters.

I don't know how a fraudster could get through the programs without the logistics.

And honestly, if they could, like they should get the money because I'm completely legit and can't get through the system.

So like

kudos to you for having the patience to go through all of it.

Yeah, it's, it's,

it's,

I, I, I just, I still can't believe how much of it is not resolved six months later.

This is what I think about when I think about the unfairness of it all.

I am one of the lucky ones.

I did take out a loan from my business to rebuild, but I'm not going into credit card debt to put food on the table for my family.

So this is why I'm obsessing, truly obsessing over these questions about where the aid is going.

Because my fear is that my story is just the tip of the iceberg.

The system is impossible to navigate.

I was the valedictorian of my college, and I'm not saying this to be obnoxious.

My point is, I can follow instructions.

I can fill out paperwork.

I can ace assignments.

I know this.

I cannot ace the rebuilding process for the life of me.

And if I can't, with all of the privileges of being educated and having a platform, who the heck can?

Yeah.

And so, is there anything that we haven't talked about yet that I should note as something that you wish that you knew?

I just really feel like I was on it as much as anybody.

Like, I certainly should have gotten our office insured before I gave birth.

So, as soon as you get an office, insure it.

I did not, which was my fault for sure.

Because for so many years, I overpaid on insurance.

Like, I was so over

covered and I never had a claim.

And so when you don't have a claim, you're like, why am I wasting thousands of dollars on like insurance until you really need it?

And so I was feeling like pretty bearish on gratuitous insurance.

You know, I

am mad at myself every single day about the insurance.

situation.

That would be like something that was

felt felt so like out of anyone who was supposed to get insurance.

Like I should have practiced what I talked about.

I don't, I don't know.

So this is where I'm at right now.

It's not pretty.

It's not whole, but it is better than yesterday.

And that's all I'm aiming for right now.

I think the last thing that I wished I knew was that it was okay to ask for help.

I wasted a lot of time not picking up the phone because I didn't want to burden the person on the other line.

But once I got over the discomfort of accepting a helping hand, I got to appreciate just how lucky it is that there are so many good people in this world who truly just want to do good.

And so six months and one day after losing my home and my office and

everything,

that is what I'm most thankful for.

If you've listened to the show for a while, you've probably heard me say this verbatim about my mission after learning about finance the hard way.

I just want to bring back buckets of water for those still in the flames.

And that has a whole other meaning at this point.

So for people who did this for me, for LA, literally and figuratively, thank you.

Thank you.

Money Rehab is a production of Money News Network.

I'm your host, Nicole Lappin.

Money Rehab's executive producer is Morgan Lavoie.

Our researcher is Emily Holmes.

Do you need some money rehab?

And let's be honest, we all do.

So email us your money questions, moneyrehab at moneynewsnetwork.com, to potentially have your questions answered on the show or even have a one-on-one intervention with me.

And follow us on Instagram at money news and TikTok at Money News Network for exclusive video content.

And lastly, thank you.

No, seriously, thank you.

Thank you for listening and for investing in yourself, which is the most important investment you can make.