Thursday, June 20, 2013

That One Time my House Caught on Fire


Nearly a year ago (already?) my brother was staying with us freshly after he graduated college and thank goodness for that because not only did he help around our house i.e build us a fence and clean out our entire garage he saved our house from burning down.
our 1970's rental 

My parents have been telling us for years to get renters insurance because "stuff happens" Every time I thought about it I  would talk myself out of it because we are not counting on living here for much longer-we say that, then another year goes by. It's so easy I'm not sure why I never did anything about it.

All of a sudden we all started smelling a burnt-fiery smell. For a split second we thought it was outside because we live in a dessert and fires run high throughout June and July because the wind is intense as well. Great combination. We searched the rooms-nothing. Appliances-nothing. Garage-nothing. My genius brother thought maybe he should check under the house because the smell seemed to be in our downstairs family room. Thankfully he did because that is something Cameron would never do. (that was one thing holding him back from becoming an electrician, going under houses due to his fear of spiders)

After my hero of a brother crawled down into our crawl space he yelled for water and next thing I knew he was out of there and grabbing his tools. He told us it was a fire underneath because of a screen rubbing against another type of metal (don't ask questions because I don't get it, I was just happy he fixed it.) He said it was about a foot wide and tall. That is enough for me to freak out right there because if my brother was not living with us I'm certain our house would be gone along with everything in it, even though we are living in a rental we cherish this home along with our beloved belongings. 

After that event I have looked around at many types of insurances but have never followed through. Can you say stupid? I've put it on my "to do" list and I'm determined to cross it off. If you are in the market for insurance I hope you check out Polygon. They offer services for water damage, leak detection, fire damage as well as humidity control. They are also available in countries other then the United States.



4 comments

  1. Whew! So glad your brother thought to look under the house. It's so scary, could happen any time any where. My Aunt & Uncle had a house fire in Paris TX. They weren't as fortunate as you guys. We lost my 16 year old cousin in the fire. Now, naturally, my whole family is terrified of fires. {PS - sorry to be Debbie Downer}

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  2. How scary! A fire sounds terrible - thank goodness you are all alright. I had heard horror stories about people without renters insurance, so back when I rented I bought some. So cheap!! Especially when you start to think of how much all the individual items in your house cost... never mind the sentimental values.

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  3. That is SO scary :( We rented for a year or so and honestly renters insurance didn't even cross my mind! That would've definitely been smart in case something like this happened! Yikes! Glad you were okay!

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  4. It was likely the friction between the two rubbing metals that caused up the fire. Your brother was a brave genius for figuring it out and stopping it before it spread. You mother's right, “Stuff happens”. So aside from insurance, you might want to have a security or fire alarm system in your house. Cheers! Alexander @ AccessSecurity.com

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