Trying to deal with contractor.
Contractor submitted his bid to our insurance company for work that needed to be done after our house fire. The insurance company cut us a check to pay for his work. Our contractor wanted $15,000 up front and then $7000 after the work was done. We gave him the $15,000. Unfortunately, my wife and I had some unforeseen expenditures arise in the form of our mortgage. We used the $7000 that we were going to pay our contractor to bring our mortgage current and to pay for my wife's dental work that she needed done immediately otherwise she'd lose two teeth. I apologized profusely and wanted to work out a payment plan with him. We are not trying to turn a blind eye to what we owe him. We simply don't have the money anymore. He doesn't seem to want to work with us. He is only interested in filing a lien on our home and trying to foreclose on it to get his money. He is also holding allegations of insurance fraud over our heads. My question is can he bust us for insurance fraud? Once a lien is in place what processes would he need to go through and how long would it take for him to foreclose? We simply want to pay him and get him out of the picture but we are broke and want to work out payments. Thanks for your advice and time. God Bless.
Re: Trying to deal with contractor.
Mr. Gibbs is right. An insured can do whatever it chooses with the insurance proceeds. They are not earmarked for repairing the damage covered by the insurance. There may be limited exceptions but this is not the way insurance payouts normally work. You do, however, need to find some way to pay the remaining $7,000 balance before the contractor's threats are turned into action.
Re: Trying to deal with contractor.
Mr. Gibbs is right. An insured can do whatever it chooses with the insurance proceeds. They are not earmarked for repairing the damage covered by the insurance. There may be limited exceptions but this is not the way insurance payouts normally work. You do, however, need to find some way to pay the remaining $7,000 balance before the contractor's threats are turned into action.
Re: Trying to deal with contractor.
Mr. Gibbs is right. An insured can do whatever it chooses with the insurance proceeds. They are not earmarked for repairing the damage covered by the insurance. There may be limited exceptions but this is not the way insurance payouts normally work. You do, however, need to find some way to pay the remaining $7,000 balance before the contractor's threats are turned into action.
