Rebuilding After A Fire. Asbestos Ruined My Life.

Hello everyone, This was the last thing I wanted to do, but it’s honestly a last resort type of situation. My name is Brian McCarty and at the beginning of November, I moved to Los Angeles, California to pursue my dream of being an entertainer at the age of 19. Everything was smooth sailing until the morning of January 3, 2019. I woke up that morning to my roommate panicking about a fire. At first I didn’t know what he meant by that, but as I got up from my slumber, I noticed that the stove or a pot on the stove was on fire. I immediately started to develop anxiety from the situation, although the fire was still small. We had no idea what to do. Never in our lives had we experienced a fire (which we originally thought was a grease fire, due to there being Oil nearby.) My roommate threw flour onto the flames to try and put out the fire. We both had heard that smothering a fire in Flour would put it out, but this was just not the case. Instantly flames exploded from the stove/pot area and things took a turn for the worse. We were never told where a fire extinguisher was located in the apartment building, but there most certainly was not one present in the apartment itself, which could have caused the situation to be over a lot sooner. I have a 9 month old, kitten who was terrified for her life. She just about jumped out of the window to try and escape the ferocious beast that was the fire. Luckily, I caught her before the flames (or the ground) did. She was then my main priority! We ran out of options so we had to evacuate the building and call for help! The fire department eventually got the fire out, and luckily for us, we were told that it was mostly the kitchen appliances and the kitchen in general that was damaged by the fire. We were grateful because the insurance plan we had would have covered the damages caused by the fire. With that being said, we were told that we we not allowed in the apartment and that we had to leave immediately. The insurance company put us in a hotel, which was meant to be booked through January 31, for safe measure. I had explained to them our situation in full, so they knew what the deal was. January 7th rolls around and the insurance company tells me that they will no longer be paying for the hotel because we would be hitting our limit of 2,000 dollars. We had only been there for about 3 nights! This was ridiculous to me. I wanted to know why they would send us to that specific hotel in the first place. Found out that same day that the Hotel charged 309 dollars a night. Why would they put us in a hotel that charged 300+ a night? We told them to cancel our remaining night at the hotel (January 7th) and we would use the money at a cheaper location. They gave me a hard time at first, but eventually agreed to it. Luckily for us, we were able to stay in a vacant unit on the original property of our apartment in LA. However, the property manager informed us that there would be a nightly fee of 47.50. That is a hell of a lot cheaper than 309. Why did they not give us this unit to begin with? Anyways, the insurance people have been very hard to deal with as I am constantly feeling like they are taking advantage of my age. I feel like it’s been one thing after another. I have a job at a local Mexican Eatery, but my checks are not all that impressive oh at all. Roommate works for a cell phone provider. Decent pay on his part, but still not great. We had been just getting by, buying things for our apartment whenever we could, etc. The fire itself was so much of a problem for me specifically because I had to take several days off of work (which hasn’t been paying me as well as I’d like to be paid in the first place) to talk with the Insurance providers, the adjuster, the property manager, etc. My life had turned into a literal burning hell. Things were bad enough, but just the other day, I received a phone call from the Property Manager saying that the repairmen did some tests on the apartment and results for Asbestos came back positive, which means everything in the apartment was contaminated. Everything we had been working for now has to be thrown away. The insurance is only paying for this unit for a few more nights. We have to buy everything over again because the insurance does not cover asbestos damages. I guess the fire itself activated the asbestos when the firemen knocked a hole in the wall or something. I’m not really too sure how the asbestos was in the apartment (although it was built in the 70s.) Things have been bad for my roommate and I so far in 2019. And while I really hate to ask for money, I really feel like this is what I have to do. We’ve literally lost just about everything we had been working for in the blink of an eye. So I feel as though it’s time for me to swallow my pride and ask for some help from you all. Please help me raise some money to replace the things I’ve lost. Any and everything helps. And even if you cannot personally donate, please share this post so somebody who is able to, can consider. Much love to all of you. Sending love and light always. ❤️