Blackwell

Background The events underlying this case arose on January 19, 2012, when a wind storm damaged Larry Blackwell’s mobile home. The mobile home was insured by a “Foremost Platinum Manufactured Home policy” issued by Foremost and serviced by Tina Andreatta of Farmers Insurance Group. On February 3, 2012, Gordon sent Andreatta an e-mail informing her that “my dad got some wind and rain damage at his home in the last storm.”3 Between the date of the storm and the report to Foremost, Gordon performed repairs under the name “Dev. Co. Inc.” On February 8, 2012, Mercy Arapas, a property adjuster with Crawford U.S. Property & Casualty, met with Larry and inspected the property. She initially recommended that Foremost set its reserves at $25,000. She also asked Gordon for written estimates from contractors he was planning to use for the anticipated repairs as well as documentation for the work that had already been completed. Gordon assured Arapas that he would have the “info” by the end of the weekend, three days later. In addition to his own bids from Dev. Co. Inc., Gordon provided a $25,856 estimate for “New Roof and Repair” from Kriege Construction. On February 28, 2012, Foremost sent…