UK insurance might be VERY different from here in USA, but typically flood insurance only covers floods. The home/landlord/condo etc policy would cover pipes.

For context, we had around -4c (~28f) for 5 days straight, it didn't change during the day and most of the UKs water suppliers had issues with main feed pipes freezing up in the ground so smaller water pipes inside properties never really stood a chance. Most people were at home with heating running so weren't too badly affected but if the building was empty then yeah, those pipes were gonna freeze.

From my understanding, this isn't flood damage. It's classed as "Escape of Water". Totally different insurance coverage than floods.

400k probably includes the cost to replace ALL the drywall. It will all have to be replaced. Plus any insulation in the ceiling and walls. floor boards replaced, just everything has to be replaced due to mold growth potential.

I'm a P&C insurance underwriter. This could easily be over 200k in damages (counting the building, personal property, and business interruption). Not only is his entire floor flooded, but there is certainly tons of damage to units below. Water damage from burst pipes is NOT the same thing as flood in terms of cause of loss (not exactly sure how it works in the UK tho). This would be covered under most basic US business owners policies. If he was renting, hopefully he had a business owner's policy for his business personal property (and his insurer will certainly subrogate against the building owner's policy if he files a claim). If he did not have a policy, he can likely sue the building owner, which would then put the claim on their insurer (not sure if he would actually win tho). If this is a condo unit that he owns, he should have a condo unit owner policy. How much Preach gets will depend on the valuation method of his policy and his policy limits. ACV (Actual Cash Value) will subtract out depreciation, but replacement cost will replace as new. I would be utterly astonished if he has a business owner policy and is not covered for this. This is my personal opinion and not financial or professional advice.

This is 100% on the building owner. This is the problem with landlords today they only want to collect they don’t want do any of the work that goes along with it.

Preach explained what happened on stream - there was a big ass water tank on the roof, which froze and burst, flooding the entire building from top to bottom. It happened on Friday afternoon and the flooding was only discovered on Monday.

ill tell you what the amount of respect i have for preach watching it for the first time live on stream. it just... hits different knowing hes seeing all of this for the first time.

Haven't seen water damage this bad in a long time, goddamn, i hope they can get everything sorted out.

I can almost guarantee you in his lease for the building it mentions something about keeping the thermostat at a minimum temperature to prevent the pipes for the fire suppression system from freezing. It sounds like they left the office for xmas break and someone completely shut off the heat..

Yea that sucks. My townhouse has those sprinklers on the ceilings and some walls and I am always thinking I hope that thing never goes off on accident. Where they installed in the kitchen my one cabinet opens right into it and I'm always afraid the little glass tube will break one day if someone smacks it with the door to hard.

This has just happened in my friends new house. The pipes in the attic werent insulated and the sprinkler system froze and burst and flooded the entire house from top to bottom. The company then went and checked all the other houses and none of them were insulated. All the pipes were bare. So they are the ones that are stuck with paying out since they are liable. So Preach might be in luck if he is renting that space and the pipes havent been insulated when they should have been. So whoever owns the property might be stuck with covering the cost of everything damaged by pipes that should have been insulated to protect them against the cold.

I hope he doesn't actually trash most of those electronics. Take em apart if you can and just dry them out and make sure not to plug it in until it dries.

This is so sad he's been so proud of this studio doing his own reno and design on stream every step of the way.

Can confirm a depreciation schedule is thing here in the UK with regards to insurance. My tools were stolen out of my van and my insurance company took 20% of the full amount for "depreciation" even thought 90% of my tools were new.

I just came home after the Holidays and I also had my pipes burst open. I luckily had the water shut off, so it didn't flood, but it was a sharp reminder that I need to drain those pipes completely. This is an even more devastating reminder of the precautions to take during winter.

The standard thing for the UK while renting is that the building damage is covered by the insurance that the owners have on it, but it is up to the renter to insure the contents, which he stated at the start he didn't have. Standard contents insurance does cover all water damage, unless you live in a area at high risk for flooding and either have to play extra or they wont cover water damage at all.

In the uk we have a setting on radiators for winter so it keeps the flow moving, we have had a really bad winter lately and its the freezing water in the pipes which causes burst pipes, so if that was the case it depends on the heating of the office and also the contract he had

dunno about UK insurance companies, but here in denmark, the way they handle paying out insurance money, is that first they check to see if the items covered have been used, if yes, then they slash the initial cost of the item in half, then if you have owned the item in question for more than 6 months it get's halved again, so you are looking at 25% of the total cost of items that you get paid for, that is if they even pay you, in cases like these you typically see that they pay nothing because "it was preventable"

it seems like in the UK its common to put water heaters in the attic. Syndicate just did a vid and had this happen to 2 houses next to each other due to cold weather pipes froze and burst fittings

bro down in texas and warmer areas like that, you can prepare for the occasional freeze, but in places like wisconsin, you really cant. sure you can take some measures to try to prevent it, but it gets so cold for such a long time that older houses freeze up and pipes burst all the time.

Water damage to your property is usually covered as a standard feature in your buildings insurance policy. Often referred to as 'escape of water' by insurers, it can be caused by several issues, from burst pipes due to freezing temperatures, to a leaking dishwasher or an overflowing blocked toilet. nothing to do with flood damage, as this wasnt a flood...

Maybe rent a few industrial size dehumidifier's and heaters. You might be able to save some of the stuff if u do it quick enough.

As someone who worked as a commercial underwriter for an insurance carrier, most commercial insurance policies have water damage excluded unless you purchase that back separately, such as water/sewer line or flood coverage.

One of the major problems with water damage is that you may be able to save most things. Among other things this means that insurance will demand you make the attempt to save things while you may look at something and decide that its just a better idea to replace it. Situations like this are why its really important to be really friendly with your insurance agent.

Just watching Preach's soul slowly leaving his body while he is watching a big part of his life absolutely destroyed is so heart wrenching

Journeyman Plumber here, lots of things can cause a burst water line, in Canada we have frozen lines often, could be an old Poly B pipe install that are prone to pinhole leaks and failures which is why it isn’t used anymore, crimp ring failures, solder joint failures, heating system leaks. If he is renting the space it will likely fall on the Land Lord who will have insurance that covers certain types of failures and damage. Can be super devastating though, tough to see people when their homes are destroyed. Edit: the Land Lord might not necessarily be negligent, could have just been an unlucky circumstance.

I’ve heard loads of these stories recently. In the UK we had extremely cold weather a lot worse than usual in December and it’s damaged all the pipes and they’ve burst. Not good for the infrastructure

Happened to me and it destroyed all my childhood items and collectables. Estimate damage was 10k and insurance was not responsible for water damages.

My insurance did not cover water damage from pipes bursting two years ago during the big freeze in Texas. We left the faucets dripping, but forgot the garage has a separate pipeline for the front garden hose. Luckily, the garage took most of the damage that ensued. This previous week, with the nationwide wind chill, drained water everywhere and shut the valve every night for a couple days. Didn't take any chances. Don't forget the pipes outside.

Doom guy still ripping in tearing

btw, what ive heard, this is very very common in the UK during winter, always pipes burst..

I have worked in insurance for 25+ years. If he was renting that space, he should have had some sort of Business Owners Policy (BOP) for liability + business personal property coverage. It would cover the items that were damaged, less his deductible. Here in the states he would not need flood coverage for that, but I'm not sure if that is different in the U.K. Edit: A BOP would also typically have Business Interruption Coverage, which would cover his loss of income from not being able to use that space. The landlord's policy is not responsible for their tenants' belongings. They tell you this in the lease agreement. This holds true for residential as well. It amazes me how few people carry renters insurance if they live in an apartment. The landlord's policy will not replace your stuff. Basically, if you are renting get renters insurance, it's cheaper than you think.

Pipes are usually covered by the home/building owner's insurance.

"Unless you got attacked by Poseidon" Yeah it really feels like that's what happened. But the fact it hit everything in every room though is just stupid in how the pipes were arranged in the attic or whatever.

It depends, in my state if he had a Article Floater Policy on some of his equipment he can be covered, if he has insurance on his building depending on what package he has depends on what will be covered or not. Yes u are right that some items will be ACV(Actual cash value) - Depreciation, but at the end of the day it depends on what exactly he is covered for. Every state/country is different. Hopefully he had proper percentages placed on the building. Even if this was the owners fault of be Negligent, there has to be proof of it.

As a lot of other people have already said, burst pipes fall under a different category for insurance other than flooding. And from my experience with dealing with clients who have suffered from burst pipes, the insurance companies tend to pay out 100%.

I believe in most places regardless of country, a Landlord/Renter arrangement has anything structural as the responsibility of the Landlord. The only exception I believe would be if the renter did something either intentional or accidental that interfered with the structure. Things like cables and electronics that had no power going through them could be salvageable if they are dried out correctly. I have had an entire laptop accidentally get submerged for 2 days (was outside by a Koi pond and had a family emergency cme up where the laptop was the farthest thing from my mind. The table blew over while I was away and the laptop fell into the pond. The battery was drained and it was unplugged BTW (I was preparing to work on replacing the HDD at the time). When I got back 2 days later and fished it out, I opened it up and dried it out with medium heat hairdryers for 3 days and it powered up fine. While mine had a faulty HDD in it to begin with, I can't account for if it would still work, but when I replaced it and installed the OS, everything worked fine electronically and it booted up. This would lead me to believe the internal battery didn't have enogh current to cause major issues. Even if the HDD got ruined, I would rather replace that than the entire piece of equipment. I would also think SSD's would dry out the same way a circuit board would. Plushies, if less than 2 weeks in water, can definitely be wrung out carefully, put in the washing machine with detergent and dried and be just fine. Since the pictures are hanging, gravity is keeping them from entirely shriveling, you need to carefully dry them while keeping them stretched the whole time. If you get the idea of sandwiching the pictures between two heavy objects to keep them flat, put silicone sheets between the object and the picture so that nothing sticks as it dries. At the same time, another part of me is saying if the Landlord has to pay you the cost of everything you lost, then just go for new stuff. Though do give thought to sending it to a repair channel or something to tinker with so they can get content from it instead of binning it. At least if it is repaired it can be given away or sold at a low cost to someone who couldn't otherwise afford it. If un repairable, parts that still work can be parted out to someone who may need it.

As far as I know, burst pipe should be covered by any standard insurance. Given that it is an office and that this is usually mantained by water companies, I'd say it was probably their negligence that caused this... That's just an estimated guess how things are usually run in europe, though I'm not from the UK! Hope he gets paid for that mess... Absolutely devastating to lose so much personal, irreplaceable stuff :(

Electronics pcb these days often have coatings on them to protect them a little. So as long as they weren't on/plugged in, u may be able to save them. If they were on, well I hope u k ow someone thats really good at following power and soldering. Or just insurance and forget it.

That landlord owes him so much money dude.

We had a leak in my apartment, in a closet, from the upstairs. Caused $3k in damage. When we dealt with insurance, it was painless. In CO water damage isn't uncommon from freezing and stuff, so they didn't bat an eye at our claim.

Why it very well could be 400k is because of the renovations needed to fix it. Just the drying process needs special giant fans you need to rent that will need to be on for months depending on how bad the water damage is even a year, then there is everything that can't be recovered that needs to be replaced flooring, dry wall, electricity and then there is building materials and contractors. Then there is the equipment on top of that.

I find it odd the owner of the building doesn’t have insurance that covers bursted pipes. It is required in most states in the US if you are leasing out.

In the US insurance will cover all the damage due to burst pipes, however they only pay what the items are worth not the cost to get new items so he will still be out of pocket.

generally, as long as there was no power going to the electrical equipment when it got wet and it is allowed to dry properly then that should be fine, unless there is a residue leftover when it dries, which is hard to tell.

I'm not sure how it is in uk.. But in Denmark you have a mandatory houseinsurance.. That covers damages on the house etc... If you are using the space for living you would need an insurance covering household goods... But this is considered a workplace so you would need a business insurance covering the goods in the rented space... They can be quite expensive and a lot of rules about depreciation etc.. But it will always be the tenants own insurance which should cover it and not the owner of the building's insurance.

People, even if you are not home owners, please be aware of how vulnerable your homes are to weather and take precautions. The work you put in is worth avoiding some of the financial and emotional toll. I hope Preach is able to bounce back from this soon ❤

Even if you have flood insurance and something like this happens, you tell the insurance company and they're like "sorry, flood insurance specifies that the water has to come up from the ground"

One of the problems is that if they weren't in the office. It likely wasn't even 'their actions' that caused them to burst. It was probably another tennant in the building didn't leave water running in their appartment during a freeze, and they attempted to turn it on with the pipes backed up. Causing it to burst.

Water damage on electronics is tricky. They are salvageable unless there was any sort of power going through the circuit. If there was no power, then just put them somewhere to completely dry out for like...a month.

Never be able able to get the mouldy smell out of there. Without replacing all the walls and flooring etc.

ironically electronic devices are likely to be fine if they were not connected to power at the time of water damage if you don't let it sit wet and corrode before you do something. a bath of pure water (if it's dirty maybe a bath with dish soap befor that) and a bath of 99.9% isopropanol (it will mix with water underneath chips for example but evaporates quickly and the water with it) + ~2 weeks time drying and it should be fine

LOL, I have the exact same plastic shelves as temporary storage

charity livestream for Preach and his team would be immaculate

We had our apartment flooded because a radiator had blown open. This was just covered by basic home insurance and we didn't have to pay a thing for any of the damages. I highly doubt you need "flood insurance" for insurance to cover it. I live in Denmark, but I'm guessing UK insurance isn't that much different.

Had this happen at our office. floor above us flooded and we were out of the office for 2 weeks. Damn mess and tons of damage.

i used to do water restoration for a while... basically any water that comes from outside of the residence is considered flood water, any water that comes from inside is considered a water line break. you can see the dirt from outside that was pushed into the home from the water during flood damage cases unless obviously a pipe is found broken outside the home. Also, where i live, flood insurance is a different coverage not included in your home insurance. just a heads up for any new home buyers who think it comes with!

As a renter in the uk this is a nightmare situation. Our shower has been broke for like a year and nobody wants to fix it. This would be awful

So, I've gone through this a few times in my life and regardless of whether it was an actual flooding, or a pipe burst you must have insurance otherwise you will be liable.

Always always always store your equipment in sealed, waterproof containers.

I don’t think this would count as flood damage like a building that is flooded by a rising river etc. this would come under water damage which generally doesn’t have to have additional insurance. As long as he has building and contents insurance he should be covered. If the office is part of a shared building then he would be contributing to a shared building insurance. As to liability in the UK you generally go through your insurance company who reimburse you and then claim from the other insurance companies that are involved, if any.

A couple years ago, actually like only a month before the pandemic lockdowns started, the local sewer in my area backed up, and because our house is low elevation relative to everyone else on the street, we got swamped first and the worst. More than 6in of unholy nastiness trashing our finished basement. Across the hall from my bedroom, I saw the shower drain erupting like all the evil in Pandora's Box. I won't go over the list of what we lost, but it was a lot of stuff in addition to the floor, walls, a couch and the wooden furniture. A lot of sentimental stuff too that money can't replace. It was the town's fault for the backup, and our insurance covered us for $20k of damage. We knew a guy, a family friend, who happened to be a contractor, and he was cool enough to quote us exactly that much for a whole basement renovation, and he did a spectacular job with that budget. He didn't even need us to pay him anything up front until the job was done. However we had to seriously twist the arms of the insurance company to give us the money we were entitled to. We did get it and paid him, but we had to jump through an unreasonable number of hoops for something that wasn't even our fault.

1:58 thats actually a really weird misconception about computers, as long as they are off they can get wet, so long as you properly dry them afterwards, and give them time to air out, if you do that then there is a solid chance that it will still work perfectly fine

one time at my parents house there was probably close to 3 ft of snow outside and it all melted within a day or 2 cuz there was an extremely warm spring day so the water had no where to go, it found ways thru the cracks of the basement and flooded the entire thing. So much stuff lost. Floods are horrible but at least it was old stuff and lots of junk. This however is all expensive stuff. That sucks.

Been there Mike & feel for you. Water damage is terrible.

The worst part is going to be all the mold that will start growing if they don't manage to dry everything out within several hours

Wow he wasn't insured?! Very, very risky.

I just had this happen in my office, I’m the building I own. A pipe burst and flooded an area about 1200sf. Probably 15k worth of damage. Insurance is covering it under normal property insurance.

2 weeks before I was going to move in to an apartment a few years ago I got a phonecall. A radiator in the apartment had broke. Total 3 apartments had gotten water damages. Mine was the least with "only" new roof and floor. It did take them almost 6 weeks to fix it. The apartment it had happened in took about 4-5 months. This suuucks. And even if an insurance covers it, or the landlord is responsible. It is still headache.

Also, alot of the electronics could be okay, might need to be in a very dry, non humid room for a few days with the week turns out, but I bet 50% of that works and if it wasn't on or charging. The displays for sure. I know this. As a kid, I spilt a huge cup of water on my display. I immediatly yanked the powercord out.... turned it on 2 days later and it worked! So that is the good knews....probably is, no telling how long they were we, if they were soaked for awhile....then dried in a dirty , damn enviroment....mold...rust...etc.

quick freezes are usually the cause i live in Canada, we shut off our outside tapes in winter to stop this.

i had a flud this summer, lost my whole collection of manga in my library as well as many books i had collected and all my retro console

Looks like pipes in the roof void froze and cracked during the cold weather in the Uk. Its flooded the ceiling void and run down the walls. If this is rented commercial space this damage should be the responsibillity of the building owner.

This exact thing happened at my job. Pipes bursted and the ceiling tiles collapsed, water everywhere and it ruined the equipment.

Water damage is brutal man, houses can collapse or can incredible ants of damage from it

If you have massive water damage a lot of times you can save items using "Weed Killer".. It sounds fucked up but mold is plant based and spraying things down / cleaning with weed killer is a easy way to keep things as it sets and dries.

I feel this SO much. My home caught fire on Christmas Eve and our insurance is taking care of everything. It is still a living nightmare trying to just have a normal life.

this is why i have renters insurance

Rip his office

When you try to save on heating cost during winter.

Insane, I just had a 3 pipes burst at my work a week or so ago, water damage sucks

I live in the UK and in regards of the floods, Insureance of owner of the property that flooded the property below will pay for the damages. In terms of the deprecation of the value, they will pay what you paid for the property that got destroyed, or offer you a replacement that they usually can get from their partner suppliers, but it is down to you to choose. I flooded my neighbour below me once, my landlord insurance was paying for the damages. I destroyed my TV during the moving between the houses, they sent me the replacement that has the exact market value(that was months from when i got one, but i was offered the money that i paid for it).

this is why you drain the house if you leave more if its on freezing temps

That happened to my sons house in the Feb 2021 storm here in DFW, the buildings Insurance should cover this, he needs to do a detailed inventory of absolutely everything and file a claim with them via the building management company. and if he has homeowners/renters insurance file with them as well

Most of the electronics stuff can be salvaged. You just need to let it dry out.

The water coming down the wall would be normal since most interal walls are non load bearing and made out of plasterboard which would absorb the water leading to what you can see.

In the UK a house is assessed by a surveyor and the local authorities on the flood risk in area and then the mortgagee will make it a requirement to have sufficient insurance in place, (if they are going for a mortgage and don't own outright), also if the flood risk is too high, many banks won't lend the mortgage. If this is bust pipes that would come under "special requirements" within the insurance if not already part of the cover and you'd have to pay extra premium to cover this. Mostly it depends on your insurance company. There would be a "reinstatement cost" decided before the policy starts and this is the max that can be covered and the rule in place is for the insurance to 'return the building to to its original state' nothing more or less. I believe this to be somewhat the same in the US? As a broker I have dealt with landlords in the US and offered specialist lenders to mortgage their properties but I don't know the full mortgage and insurance law for the US as I have never studied the USA equivalent of mortgage law and practise.

could have been a lot worse, I've seen a house that had a pipe break in the ceiling during winter, with the temps in the low teens, like 11F, it was a vacation home so no one was there for a few weeks, or months during the winter, ice did all the damage, there was so much ice it ripped thru the front of the house pushing out a window frame & the wall around it, this is how it was spotted. The water was from the heating system, so the house's heating system kept feeding the busted pipe. All the hard wood floors buckled, internal walls where pushed out, the amount of ice within the house was the size of two SUVs, that against a 100 year old wooden framed building, the ice swallowed or pushed & shoved ceilings, floors, & walls. If the owner wasn't a building contractor the house would have been written off by the city, but the city gave him the needed time to fix everything, & within 6 months & only working on the weekends & a couple of full weeks you'd never know by looking at it. I've seen pipes break in mid summer, it always ended up being just a flaw in the pipe unseen from the outside, a spot on the pipe where it is thin, & like a time bomb with no dial it goes off. But the 100 year old wooden framed house was the worse I've ever seen, & it was Karma because of the own, his wife, & adult children were all dicks, & would scam their own neighbors, as I said he was a contractor, he'd help out a neighbor with a kitchen install, & then turn around and sue them because all of a sudden they (this family) decided they needed to be paid for helping out a neighbor, & they use to have each others families over for dinners, & sit together on the beach, go fishing together, & BOOM, "Oh by the way, me leading you a hand will cost you 20 grand for them helping". And all they did was help lift a few cabinets into place, & point out the best way to do things, & what brands hold up the best, etc. So like a single 6 hour day's worth of help, where 80% of the time he just watched, drank the homeowners beer & ate his food, mostly just hiding from his wife.. And this family did this up & down the street to all of their neighbors that weren't warned about them. Last I heard the father & son are both in jail, no clue why, but it wouldn't be hard to make a guess, & the wife has cancer, only good thing about them is they sold the house 6 years ago, & haven't been seen since.

thier is isnurance for it damage protection. the value is different then most think they will get alot of cash for their junk, vs what an apprasier will value the items for.

Minmaxing plumbing do be going like this when speed and efficiency takes over quality. I'm quite shocked buildings don't collapse on our heads.

Depending on how new the building is the plumber who installed the piping may be responsible for the damage to the building. It's not very uncommon for crimp rings to eventually come flying off if not crimped correctly. If the plumbing company was found responsible (within a warranty period) he may be able to get them to cover some of the equipment. But they'd have to be found liable. Although he should have a commercial policy he was probably required to purchase to rent the space. On that he'd have the option to also add contents which would have covered this loss. And flood insurance is certainly not applicable to this situation. Also if any of that equipment is not business property and his personal property then he should have limited coverage under his home owners policy to claim that under.

What the insurence company has to pay really depends on the contract. Some pay back the purchase value and some will pay you the current value if you bought the item today.

This is why my parents always told me to shut off the water valves to a house/apartment when you're not going to be using it for a while, after seeing this I'd urge other people to do it too (especially during winter).

Even in the US the contract is huge as well as how the pipes burst.

Yeah flood insurance basically doesn't exist in the UK. We have cover for burst pipes but to this scale...that's fucking rough.

Insurance will also not cover water damage over time, which is up to them to decide. So if you have a leak you don't know about immediately they could just laugh at you.

Dude, I remembered back in 2015, my house started on fire. It took 3 months to remodel; the following summer, we had a massive storm, and my basement, which was renovated, was destroyed by floods. I feel his pain.

My downstairs toilet overflowed 3 years ago. I dont have flood insurance but it was covered as water damage. Hopefully something similar happens here.

5 years ago while I was away for Xmas a pipe burst due to a faulty heating valve. Everything that wasn't ruined by water was ruined by steam. If I hadn't been away from home I would have been scalded all over & my pets would have died. Insurance covered the current value of some things, but not everything. The gold necklace my grandfather gave me for my 18th before he died was stolen by the workers who went in & tore up the floors, shoved all my belongings around (ruining more sentimental things), etc., all before I was able to get home to see everything... Building owners kept dodging my inquiries & never took accountability. The stress of dealing with all that (insurance covered clean-up & packing) and trying to find a new, affordable home mid-winter, losing so many sentimental things....... It was beyond awful. I really feel for Preach and wish him all the best.