Help Ashley and Erol Rebuild their Hurricane-Flooded Home

I (Erol) am a music teacher in the Tampa Bay Area, and my lovely little ray of sunshine wife is Ashley, who is a curator for our local Little Free Library and is currently disabled due to health conditions. This little ray of sunshine has stopped traffic on the highway to save kittens in the road when returning from Hurricane Ian evacuation. She even tried to save a "dog" in the road that turned out to be a coyote.

Erol and Ashley are currently vagabonds thanks to Hurricane Helene. Our beautiful little home has been here since 1951, and in 73 years our neighborhood has never experienced flooding like the devastation brought by the recent storm.

Our garage and crawlspace were inundated with two feet of storm surge salt water mixed with debris and sewage backup. When we returned from evacuation, we thanked our lucky stars that water didn't get into the house. We tried our best to help our neighbors by going over with a moisture meter and helping them clear debris since we were among the luckier ones. But then our master bathroom started to smell like low tide. Then our guest bathroom. And now the entire house to varying degrees. Due to the extensive damage to the subfloor, all of our flooring and countertops will have to be gutted.

The water mitigation service is estimated to cost around $13,000. Keeping our family of 2 adults, 2 service dogs and 2 cats together, we are looking at least $13,000 for 4 months in a non-furnished short term rental while we also continue to pay our mortgage and utilities in our home. Our contractor said that 3-4 months would be the hopeful likely scenario, but to be prepared to be out even longer. Short term rentals, additional living expenses, storing our non-damaged contents in a POD, moving our contents, evacuating, fencing damage, certain contents that were damaged, and a handful of other items are not covered by Flood Insurance. Even with Flood Insurance, we are looking at $10,000 in deductibles. With just the deductibles and a place to stay, we are looking at at least $23,000 out of pocket. When factoring in all of the exclusions and limitations of the policy, we are facing an enormous amount of out of pocket cost that will not be reimbursed by insurance.

Considering the house has never flooded in 73 years, it still doesn't seem real. My heart sank when we heard that we would displaced from our home for months. Packing up our old foster dog supplies today, Ashley sobbed. Walking around for a few minutes outside to get some "fresh air" as we passed by house after house on our block with gutted contents and building materials sunbathing it's radiant stench throughout our area, Ashley sobbed. It has been a heart breaking whirlwind, and we are both recovering from the shock of this situation.

Because there was so much damage across the entire county and state, finding contractors has been a challenge. The company we found is planning to start work on Sunday, which means we have to put up a down payment to start the work. If if we lose our place in line, our house will continue to rot until we can schedule with another company.

Thanks for reading our novella. Please do not hesitate to reach out if you have any questions, and please share. We know finances are tight for everyone, but every little bit helps. If want to help but are financially unable, we are more than happy to accept any help with packing out our house before Sunday.