Running water is lovely — unless it’s running in your house when the roof leaks or the plumbing breaks or both. That’s what happened in Kossack ramara’s house several years back. A roof leak breached the bathroom ceiling about 6 years ago and almost a year later a plumbing fixture failed. She did what she was supposed to. Reported the events to her insurance company, got the bathroom leak fixed, brought in a water-damage restoration company. Since she was on Disability (now Social Security Retirement) — enough to live on and even periodically make a donation or two but not enough for emergencies — she came to us for help with the deductible. Which we raised. Then things went belly-up.
While the insurance company repaired the roof they denied the rest. The restoration company of course stopped work at that point. At least they’d removed the already-mildewing carpet, the totally soaked fiberboard backing to the failed plumbing fixture, and used their big fans to dry things out a bit before taking off.
She was left with one basically torn-apart bathroom adjoining an apparently slightly damaged bathroom (hole a folded plastic trash bag and duct tape could deal with). And so she lived with it, hoping to somehow be able to deal with it later. And of course she never could. When you live that close to the edge, one illness — personal, family, or pet — wipes out everything you were saving back. One really cold winter or really hot summer takes everything and then some in the utility bills.
The breached bathroom wall has been growing mold. Probably for a long time. Like since right after the broken fixture totally soaked the backboard. And getting worse, infesting more of the wall between the bathrooms. Her insurance company doesn’t cover mold. So no insurance, no savings, 69 and disabled, breathing mold and bleach fumes (yes, I’ve relayed information to her already about vinegar, not bleach), and rapidly dropping from Depression into Despair — she’s come to us. Her internet community and family since 2008.
She lives in Catalina, a rural “census-area” becoming but not quite yet a bedroom community of Tuscon, AZ. It’s hard to get folks to come out that far even to look at anything much less give estimates so we only have guesstimates from internet searches for mold abatement — about $3,000. We have no idea as to what the restoration charges will be as nobody will give her an estimate until after the mold is gone. (Thus far she hasn’t found a company that does both.)
Anyone who knows trust-worthy companies or folks for this kind of work in the Tuscon area, please leave contact information in the comments or kosmail her. Anyone who knows of any helping agencies for a 69 y.o. disabled woman dealing with mold and structural damage to be repaired/restored (at least one wall is going to have to come out to deal with this mess), please leave the contact information and/or links in the comments.
And anyone who can help with that estimated $3,000 for the mold abatement — PayPal rport499 at gmail dot com
Thank you. Kossacks are the best.