Speaker 1: Yet you need so you don't have a.
Speaker 2: Suspenski Shooter's gonna help, come Man Dix.
Speaker 3: Is the Troubleshooter Show now, Tom Martino, Well.
Speaker 4: John, Troubleshooter Show on a Thursday. Today. This is Suzanne
Speaker 4: Major and we got John Fuller in studio today.
Speaker 5: Welcome to the trouble Shooter Show. Yeah.
Speaker 6: I feel like it's a trial by fire this morning.
Speaker 6: So hey, it's the only show of it's kind. We
Speaker 6: solve problems, answer questions, and take complaints.
Speaker 4: You sure do a lot of them.
Speaker 5: Huh. Absolutely, Let's see those calls light up this morning.
Speaker 4: Yeah, three oh three Martino, that's three oh three, are
Speaker 4: six two seven, eight, four sixty six. You can also
Speaker 4: email us help at troubleshooter dot com.
Speaker 5: It's a really interesting day.
Speaker 6: It is my debut as host of this wonderful show,
Speaker 6: sitting in for Tom and Mark today. So I am
Speaker 6: John Fuller. Most of you know me as a personal
Speaker 6: injury attorney. I've been on the show for a number
Speaker 6: of years. So we're going to be here to answer
Speaker 6: all of your questions today, but in particular, if you
Speaker 6: have questions that have to do with personal injury, auto accidents, insurance,
Speaker 6: anything of the sort. I kind of do that stuff
Speaker 6: every single day, and I'm perfectly willing to answer those questions.
Speaker 6: So bring those on or anything else you'd like to,
Speaker 6: you know.
Speaker 5: Your stuff sometimes.
Speaker 4: Yeah, you know a lot of consumer stuff every time
Speaker 4: you're on the air, you know. And then a personal
Speaker 4: injury for sure, Personal injuryco dot com and that's John
Speaker 4: Fuller three three five nine seven forty five hundred.
Speaker 7: I'll try and keep them in line.
Speaker 4: Sus Hey, doc, you're working on anything.
Speaker 8: I yeah, I have this really complicated thing with a
Speaker 8: dental claim.
Speaker 7: I'm trying to get a.
Speaker 5: Group to represent him.
Speaker 4: What's going on with it. I didn't hear the call.
Speaker 8: Well, this guy had some problems with Elite Dental group
Speaker 8: and then they suit him for back for money he
Speaker 8: owed them, and at first they wouldn't give him his
Speaker 8: medical records. And then we called them and told them, look,
Speaker 8: you're not allowed to withhold medical records because somebody owes
Speaker 8: you money. It's a separate issue.
Speaker 7: So I got the medical records.
Speaker 8: I had one dentist look over it and he said
Speaker 8: he's not sure if there's enough for a case. So
Speaker 8: I'm waiting to hear from a malpractice attorney that specializes
Speaker 8: in dental claims to see if we can get this
Speaker 8: guy some treatment.
Speaker 4: Oh, I didn't know that. So they're trying to withhold
Speaker 4: medical records because he owes money.
Speaker 8: Got the medical records. Oh, after I told them that
Speaker 8: they can't withhold it.
Speaker 5: Oh nice.
Speaker 8: So I have one dentist look at the records, and
Speaker 8: then I'm waiting for a an attorney to give me
Speaker 8: his opinion.
Speaker 4: Ah gotchas.
Speaker 9: So listen, your picture looks really good though the YouTuber
Speaker 9: said I should just keep you up there.
Speaker 10: Actually, welcome to the show. Listen.
Speaker 9: I just wanted to say something for the I just
Speaker 9: had to reboot. I mean that's all I did every
Speaker 9: once in a while. That's what happens. You have to reboot.
Speaker 10: John, Thanks for being here.
Speaker 9: I'll be cutting out a little early today for some
Speaker 9: personal stuff going on.
Speaker 10: And speaking of I want to bring this up some cases.
Speaker 9: We had that one case that we're not going to
Speaker 9: pursue out we didn't mention any schools, but we're not
Speaker 9: going to pursue it having to do with a girl
Speaker 9: who was on a soccer team of two. So we're
Speaker 9: not going to pursue that because the father said, you think, yeah,
Speaker 9: the track team. Here's oh, that's right, cross country track.
Speaker 9: And she here's what the problem was. She's had a
Speaker 9: little school and she wanted to know if she could
Speaker 9: get a waiver to go to another school for that sport. Now,
Speaker 9: with kids that are homeschooled and all of that kind
Speaker 9: of stuff, they allow you to do that, but because
Speaker 9: her school has a team, theoretically she can't do it.
Speaker 9: So he was wondering why there's only two kids on
Speaker 9: the team. They're not getting a really good experience. Can
Speaker 9: she go to another school? They won't let him, And
Speaker 9: then he decided not to pursue it because the school
Speaker 9: is at He loves the school and he doesn't want
Speaker 9: to jeopardize the relationship there and jeopardize the scholarship she's getting.
Speaker 9: And so bottom line is we're just going to leave
Speaker 9: that one alone. But we had another one come up
Speaker 9: with that Bo was working on.
Speaker 10: This guy was really pissed off. Now he's talked to
Speaker 10: a bunch of people.
Speaker 9: He talked to Duffuty, Scott, he talked to he talked
Speaker 9: to Bow again, and then he talked to.
Speaker 10: Other people. I think he talked to the consumer.
Speaker 9: He's saying, you know, I'm being portrayed as a bad guy,
Speaker 9: and I'm not a bad guy. This is a guy
Speaker 9: that took thousands of dollars down sixty feet sixty two thousand.
Speaker 9: His name is Justin Garcia. Now here's what happened. I
Speaker 9: may admit, by the way that Carol might even border
Speaker 9: on a consumer nut And I don't mean that in
Speaker 9: a bad way. I mean there's some consumers that want
Speaker 9: to take control. For example, she went out and found
Speaker 9: a custom package for her log home.
Speaker 10: I believe it was for a cabin, and.
Speaker 9: Then she contracted Patriot Remodeling Services justin Garcia to build it,
Speaker 9: and she took delivery of the materials and then it
Speaker 9: went downhill. Justin says, she's getting to involve. She's not
Speaker 9: letting me do my job. Okay, well enough, even if
Speaker 9: that's true, even if she was a nutjob and she
Speaker 9: went out and found her own materials and she was
Speaker 9: spearheading the project, and even if it fell apart. Now
Speaker 9: she paid twenty eight grand for the pack for the materials,
Speaker 9: she paid sixty two it adjusted. It's been a year
Speaker 9: and a half. He has done nothing, and he says
Speaker 9: she owes him that money because he had costs involved
Speaker 9: and penalties. Well, according to the Contractor's Trust Act, that
Speaker 9: money should be held in trust and you're not allowed
Speaker 9: to penalize people for nothing. I mean, so this guy
Speaker 9: justin Garcia, we had people calling him because I said,
Speaker 9: look at this is serious, this is serious stuff. And
Speaker 9: he says, oh, you don't know the whole story. Well,
Speaker 9: I want to know why he feels he can tea
Speaker 9: take sixty two thousand dollars. Now, Bo said we should
Speaker 9: wait to get him on till monday because we don't
Speaker 9: have a copy of the contract he signed with her.
Speaker 9: And I'm not waiting till monday because he called us
Speaker 9: insisting that he has a right to keep sixty two
Speaker 9: thousand dollars for nothing.
Speaker 10: For nothing.
Speaker 9: Now, I don't see how this guy is going to
Speaker 9: get away with it, but I want to get him
Speaker 9: on today. If he wants to come on the air,
Speaker 9: I want to get him on today. And the hell
Speaker 9: with the contract. I want to know his justification. Okay, Now,
Speaker 9: the reason we don't have Carol's contract is she.
Speaker 10: Had no way to scan it.
Speaker 9: She literally made a copy of it and snail mailed
Speaker 9: it to us.
Speaker 10: But I'll bet you Justin has a copy of it.
Speaker 10: Maybe he can email it to us. So why don't.
Speaker 9: We try to get Justin Garcia on and he goes
Speaker 9: by several names, Patriot Remodeling Services, LLC.
Speaker 10: He also has something else. He calls himself.
Speaker 9: Innate Architects, Architecture, Engineering and Construction, and a host of
Speaker 9: other names in the past.
Speaker 5: Yeah, hey, yes, this.
Speaker 10: Is the one who actually dodged me yesterday. Yeah. Now
Speaker 10: he wants to come on the air, doesn't he.
Speaker 4: Uh, I'm not sure about that.
Speaker 10: Bo call in.
Speaker 9: Okay, I know Bo's listening. I decided I'm not waiting
Speaker 9: till Monday. We don't have to see the contract. I
Speaker 9: want to talk to the guy I want to see.
Speaker 9: I want to give him every opportunity to clear his name, because,
Speaker 9: in my opinion, he sounds like a scammer. Okay, I
Speaker 9: don't know under what on what planet he can keep
Speaker 9: sixty two thousand dollars. The Contractor's Trust Act says the
Speaker 9: money but must be put in trust and spent for
Speaker 9: that project. What does that mean, John Fuller, what does
Speaker 9: that mean as an attorney spend on that project?
Speaker 6: You know, it's almost like money in our trust account.
Speaker 6: At the law firm. I mean, there's some money that
Speaker 6: jis flat doesn't belong to you, and you have an
Speaker 6: affirmative duty under the law to account for that money
Speaker 6: and to be able to, you know, give an accounting
Speaker 6: at any time for all the money that's come in
Speaker 6: and gone out relative to that particular account. So for
Speaker 6: a contractor, it's really no different. You need money up front.
Speaker 6: You know, we don't like that, but so be it.
Speaker 6: But it doesn't just go in his pocket to pay
Speaker 6: his rent or something. It sits in the account and
Speaker 6: gets depleted as they buy materials and whatnot for the project,
Speaker 6: and at any time they should be able to give
Speaker 6: you an accounting of the exact dollar amount there.
Speaker 9: I agree, and I don't understand his reasoning that he
Speaker 9: can keep it. So I just wanted to mention that's
Speaker 9: one we're working on right now and I really want to.
Speaker 10: I really want to get to the bottom of that.
Speaker 9: So that's what we'll be working on soon also, So
Speaker 9: give him a call again, and BO, I know you're
Speaker 9: I've got bo.
Speaker 11: BO.
Speaker 9: You know I gave this, I gave this a lot
Speaker 9: of thought. I didn't get a chance to talk to
Speaker 9: forgive me.
Speaker 10: I have a lot going on today. We need to
Speaker 10: talk about this. He indicated he had a right to
Speaker 10: keep this money, right bore you?
Speaker 11: Sure it did?
Speaker 9: And under what on what planet does he live where
Speaker 9: he can keep sixty two thousand dollars.
Speaker 12: First, I mentioned that Contractor Trust Act and he actually
Speaker 12: spouted off the CRS. And he says, why I have
Speaker 12: something that's above the contractor trustle And I said, how
Speaker 12: could you possibly keep sixty two thousand dollars? And then
Speaker 12: he told me he had some materials, And I said,
Speaker 12: that is the s because the lady Carol bought all
Speaker 12: the materials.
Speaker 11: For the job.
Speaker 12: Even if you did it buy some materials, it didn't
Speaker 12: equate to sixty two thousand dollars.
Speaker 9: Now, this this guy spent the money. You want to
Speaker 9: make a bet he spent the money. You want to
Speaker 9: make a bet he doesn't have it in trust account.
Speaker 9: And I want to know why, he says his contract
Speaker 9: So he said his contract is above and beyond the
Speaker 9: Contractors Trust Act.
Speaker 12: Yes, but he would he would not scan or email
Speaker 12: me the contract.
Speaker 11: So I asked Carol to let.
Speaker 12: Me see the contract she has. She's little old school.
Speaker 12: She had no way of doing it.
Speaker 13: So she now know it to me.
Speaker 12: And she snailed. She's also emailing me the cashier's check
Speaker 12: that she gave to him for the sixty two thousand dollars.
Speaker 10: Now we need to go ahead, okay.
Speaker 14: Dollar told me that he would only.
Speaker 12: Come on the air, which I said, this was hokey
Speaker 12: if Carol gave him permission.
Speaker 15: So I see that.
Speaker 9: Now does anyone even understand why he would say that
Speaker 9: stupid thing?
Speaker 11: Come on at AS nine?
Speaker 12: So I called Carol last night yesterday afternoon. She's in
Speaker 12: a seminar today.
Speaker 11: She's a the person.
Speaker 12: She didn't want to physically talk to him, but she
Speaker 12: sent him a text and sent me a copy of
Speaker 12: that touched me telling Justin that she's giving him permission
Speaker 12: to come on the radio show.
Speaker 11: Now, Tom, I.
Speaker 12: Asked him to come on the radio show last week twice,
Speaker 12: and I asked his attorney to come on the radio show.
Speaker 14: He refused to do it.
Speaker 12: He said he didn't have to.
Speaker 9: Well, well, of course he doesn't have to, but he's
Speaker 9: stupid not to.
Speaker 12: But if you want to state why he has the
Speaker 12: ability or reason to keep sixty two thousand dollars, you
Speaker 12: should come on here and explain it to us because
Speaker 12: he's a scumbag in my opinion.
Speaker 10: That's me too, me too. But I want him again.
Speaker 10: I'm calling him out.
Speaker 9: He doesn't need anyone's permission to come on there. She
Speaker 9: came out and talked about him. He can come on,
Speaker 9: Come on, man, this guy is this is.
Speaker 10: So slippery justin Garcia.
Speaker 9: Come on, bro huh come on right Patriot Building seven
Speaker 9: nine five seven one.
Speaker 10: Zero four to three seven. Come on, Tom.
Speaker 12: If he has a legitimate reason that cupe sixty two
Speaker 12: thousand dollars and I'm wrong in this judging him.
Speaker 11: I'll quitt. I'll quit the show, Tippy.
Speaker 10: I mean, come on now, now what reason? You know?
Speaker 9: Here's the thing there, there is none. I just don't
Speaker 9: want to get into it. I'm gonna I'm gonna take
Speaker 9: a quick break here. This this sucks. I mean, the
Speaker 9: guy doesn't have a right to keep the money. Uh
Speaker 9: you know, and didn't he say something about four hundred
Speaker 9: dollars a day penalty?
Speaker 11: He told dollars he.
Speaker 12: Had four one hundred dollars a day and charges for
Speaker 12: every day.
Speaker 11: That get yeah?
Speaker 15: So yeah?
Speaker 16: Really?
Speaker 10: So where where are his losses on that? Okay?
Speaker 9: Anyway, I'm Tom Martine three oh three seven one three
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Speaker 10: So did we.
Speaker 9: Try calling him again? Uh, that scumbag contractor.
Speaker 10: And went straight to voicemail.
Speaker 9: Tom Hi, Yeah, so justin you know, don't don't give
Speaker 9: don't give me any crap. Don't give me any crap,
Speaker 9: you know, So John Fuller, I do have a text,
Speaker 9: by the way, and uh, I got you up on
Speaker 9: the camera now.
Speaker 10: So on the I tell people, you know, you can find.
Speaker 9: Out roughly what your case is worth, and how to
Speaker 9: how to collect, whether you collect from your their insurance
Speaker 9: company or your own, and.
Speaker 10: What do you do to evaluate a case? Somebody wants
Speaker 10: to know is it does it have to? They heard
Speaker 10: one time?
Speaker 9: And I know you hear all these myths that it's
Speaker 9: ten times the injury expense.
Speaker 10: Have you heard that?
Speaker 5: I wish one time.
Speaker 10: Ten times the medical bills? I don't know. So how
Speaker 10: do you put a price on this.
Speaker 6: So there's a lot of variables Tom that go into
Speaker 6: valuation of a case. And if you just started in
Speaker 6: a vacuum and you said, all right, we've we've got
Speaker 6: economic and non economic damages, you could add up the
Speaker 6: medical bills, and you could add up the wage loss,
Speaker 6: and you could roughly approximate what the pain and suffering is.
Speaker 6: But there's so much more to it than just that.
Speaker 6: You have to look at collectibility. You have to look
Speaker 6: at policy limits, you have to look at which insurance
Speaker 6: companies are involved, which ones are going to make us
Speaker 6: go litigate it to get the full value. I mean,
Speaker 6: there's all of these different things that go into it
Speaker 6: that the average you know, normal consumer just can't possibly
Speaker 6: understand the you know, the relatives of all that information.
Speaker 6: Not that they can't understand there there's.
Speaker 10: No formulas, but there is no formula.
Speaker 5: There is not a formula.
Speaker 6: I wish there was, but in twenty two years I've
Speaker 6: yet to come across a formula.
Speaker 9: So it's a case by case. And this is not
Speaker 9: a text. But going on the topic of what we
Speaker 9: just talked about, what about what someone and I hate
Speaker 9: putting it this way, what someone is worth, what they make,
Speaker 9: what their job is. People some people are owed more
Speaker 9: than others. I mean, let's just put it that way.
Speaker 9: Is that right or wrong?
Speaker 10: John?
Speaker 17: Oh?
Speaker 6: I think that's definitely right. I mean, you know, again,
Speaker 6: you have different categories of damages, and so you know,
Speaker 6: I always tell clients you have one basket of damages
Speaker 6: and it's unique to you. And so in that basket
Speaker 6: we will have all of your treatment, all of your
Speaker 6: you know, your medical bills, any future treatment, any limitations
Speaker 6: that you have on what you do for fun and
Speaker 6: what you do with your family and all these things.
Speaker 6: But then also how much have you lost in wages
Speaker 6: and how much are you going to lose in the
Speaker 6: future if the nature of the injuries keep somebody from
Speaker 6: doing their job. You know, let's take for example, you
Speaker 6: as a radio host. You if you lost the ability
Speaker 6: to speak, that would materially impact your ability to do
Speaker 6: your job as a radio host, right, and so it
Speaker 6: would only be fair that the guy that caused that
Speaker 6: would be responsible to replace that loss.
Speaker 5: And that's that's really as simple as it is.
Speaker 9: So Okay, if somebody is an unemployed ditch digger, what
Speaker 9: does that do to the scenario of that.
Speaker 6: Will drastically reduce the value the case. You mean, it
Speaker 6: is what it is. You know, the relative economic impact
Speaker 6: of a life altering accident for an unemployed ditch digger
Speaker 6: is different on paper than for a you know, world
Speaker 6: famous radio host.
Speaker 9: You know, you know, really though, it has to do
Speaker 9: I guess with what does it have to It has
Speaker 9: to do with what your economic damages are. But what
Speaker 9: about pain and suffering? Everyone probably deserves the same for
Speaker 9: a soar back or not.
Speaker 5: In a lot of respects that loss of life.
Speaker 10: Of enjoyment, that's true.
Speaker 6: But unfortunately those categories are capped in Colorado. So there
Speaker 6: is an upper limit depending on the type of the
Speaker 6: case and a lot of other factors, but there is
Speaker 6: a limit to these non economic, intangible, if you will,
Speaker 6: losses in Colorado and in many states. So really the
Speaker 6: only damages that are not capped are.
Speaker 5: Your economic losses.
Speaker 6: You know, if you had, for instance, three million dollars
Speaker 6: of medical bills, why would it make sense to put
Speaker 6: a cap on the amount of medical bill if they
Speaker 6: are what they are, and then the same logic goes
Speaker 6: along with your wage loss and your inability to earn money.
Speaker 5: That loss is what it is.
Speaker 6: It can't be capped by by some law in a
Speaker 6: different state. So it may be capped by available limit. Yeah,
Speaker 6: but it's not cap by you know, by by law.
Speaker 11: All right?
Speaker 9: Threeh three Martino three oh three six two seven eight
Speaker 9: four sixty six.
Speaker 10: And you can write to us.
Speaker 9: Help at troubleshooter dot com. Whenever you call or right,
Speaker 9: we will get you on the show. And there's no
Speaker 9: need to wait, so you can call in about that.
Speaker 9: We're going to try to get Justin Garcia again to
Speaker 9: come on and talk about why he feels he can
Speaker 9: keep sixty two thousand dollars and do nothing.
Speaker 10: Would you want a contractor.
Speaker 9: Who takes sixty two thousand dollars and doesn't do a thing. Now,
Speaker 9: maybe he couldn't do anything because of circumstances.
Speaker 10: Well, if that's the case, what were you gonna say?
Speaker 5: Give it back?
Speaker 9: That's right, you're supposed to have it in trust for
Speaker 9: the job. And as Deputy Bo said, if you have
Speaker 9: any expenses, let us know about it, all right. Frank
Speaker 9: Duran the real estate man dot com. If you're wondering
Speaker 9: what will my house sell for, he can tell you
Speaker 9: free of charge complimentary. You know, prices have gone up
Speaker 9: just a tiny bit. Demand has gone up, just a
Speaker 9: tiny bit, even with small drop in interest rates. Whatever
Speaker 9: it is, Frank can determine all the factors and tell
Speaker 9: you from experience what your house will sell for. That's
Speaker 9: zero three nine to zero sixteen twenty two. Go with
Speaker 9: a sure thing Denver's best roofer Excel Roofing dot com.
Speaker 9: You don't pay a cent until you're content. Time for
Speaker 9: an insurance check up free, no obligation. In comparison, call
Speaker 9: Compass Insurance paying too much your coverage at dozens of
Speaker 9: insurance companies find out now three all three seven seven
Speaker 9: to one help. You'll think you're his only customer when
Speaker 9: you choose Frank durand the real estate Man dot com
Speaker 9: to list your home with Remax Alliance three all three
Speaker 9: nine two zero sixteen twenty two times, Tom Martino, you're
Speaker 9: troubleshooter three O three seven one three talks seven one three.
Speaker 10: A two five five.
Speaker 9: So John, somebody texted me and you know this wasn't
Speaker 9: this wasn't planned to have a personal injury day. But
Speaker 9: I don't care. People text me and let me give
Speaker 9: those numbers out. You can text me, but on this
Speaker 9: one before I forget Okay, it's on personal injury.
Speaker 10: Somebody wants to know.
Speaker 9: If you have insurance and you get or you have
Speaker 9: accident insurance or some kind of coverage on your own,
Speaker 9: is the other party who's responsible allowed to take that
Speaker 9: into consideration to give you less.
Speaker 5: Short answer is no.
Speaker 6: We call that a collateral source, Tom, And the essence
Speaker 6: of it is that if you were if you were
Speaker 6: savvy enough to go out and buy insurance company you know,
Speaker 6: or buy insurance, you paid for that out of your
Speaker 6: own pocket, you know, through your work, through your paycheck.
Speaker 5: Those kind of things.
Speaker 6: We're not going to let the at fault guy take
Speaker 6: advantage of and somehow reduce their liability to you just
Speaker 6: because you happen to have coverage that kicks in to
Speaker 6: pay some or all of the medical bills. So the
Speaker 6: short answer is no, we don't do that.
Speaker 9: Okay, So in essence, they have to make you whole.
Speaker 9: It doesn't matter what you did on your own.
Speaker 10: I mean, yeah, it doesn't. That's what coverage.
Speaker 5: That's the gist of it. And that makes sense.
Speaker 6: I mean, if you went out and bought you know, again,
Speaker 6: you have imagine that you have one basket of damages,
Speaker 6: right and all of your medical bills and your wage
Speaker 6: loss and everything else is in that basket, and the
Speaker 6: at all person is responsible for everything in that basket.
Speaker 6: If you happen to take something out of that basket
Speaker 6: and pay for it out of your own pocket, you
Speaker 6: would feel like you needed to get reimbursed, right, and
Speaker 6: that wouldn't shock anybody's conscience.
Speaker 5: I paid out of pocket, You have to pay me back.
Speaker 6: The same is really true for these other benefits that
Speaker 6: you've bought and paid for. You took money out of
Speaker 6: your pocket. You paid for that coverage. The coverage kicked
Speaker 6: in and did what it did, but that in no
Speaker 6: way changes the person who caused the damages responsibility for
Speaker 6: paying for it.
Speaker 5: And it's been that way, gotty many years.
Speaker 10: Got it all right?
Speaker 9: So back to this contractor thing. Somebody wants to know why,
Speaker 9: What if this woman changed her mind, wouldn't that be
Speaker 9: I don't think she changed her mind. We're talking about
Speaker 9: this woman contracted for a custom build on her lot
Speaker 9: with Patriot Remodeling Services and paid sixty two thousand dollars
Speaker 9: down to build a cabin provided by another company that
Speaker 9: she and she paid for.
Speaker 11: That.
Speaker 9: Okay, so she wanted a custom build for a cabin.
Speaker 10: Okay, but she bought that. Okay.
Speaker 9: Now, even if she put according to the contractor's testag
Speaker 9: if she put sixty two thousand dollars down for the
Speaker 9: labor and she bought the materials, even if she changed
Speaker 9: her mind, that money is supposed to be in trust,
Speaker 9: and the only money the contractor can keep is a loss.
Speaker 9: What would be a loss? Okay, Let's say he eked
Speaker 9: out some time John to do the job and did
Speaker 9: not book any other jobs for that time.
Speaker 10: Could he claim that as some kind of a loss.
Speaker 6: Yeah, I mean theoretically he could. I mean, that's the
Speaker 6: essence of a trust account, is accountability. Right, You're gonna
Speaker 6: have to detail out every single penny that went in
Speaker 6: and every single penny that went out. And I don't
Speaker 6: think that there's anything in the contractor's trust account that
Speaker 6: allows him to contract out of it applying to his
Speaker 6: duty to protect that.
Speaker 10: Right now, No, you can't wave your rights like that.
Speaker 6: So suggesting that he somehow has a higher power by
Speaker 6: virtue of his you know, wonderful drafting of his contract
Speaker 6: is just ridiculous. You know, I'd like you to try
Speaker 6: that defense in a criminal court. If they try to
Speaker 6: prosecute this guy for, you know, for stealing money from
Speaker 6: this lady, and that's what it'll come down to.
Speaker 9: So Dimitri did some searching on this guy as well,
Speaker 9: Deputy d and we found.
Speaker 10: Well, let's just let me just ask Jim atriam, what
Speaker 10: did you.
Speaker 9: Didn't we find some stuff on him, like some licensing
Speaker 9: actions and other stuff from previous companies.
Speaker 5: No, that wasn't me.
Speaker 18: But I did find that he's been operating with three
Speaker 18: different companies A and I did find that he's listed
Speaker 18: as owner at Innate and they have a Denver phone
Speaker 18: number and a Denver address, as well as a Belle View,
Speaker 18: Washington phone number and address. And I already texted those
Speaker 18: to Deputy Bow a few minutes ago in case.
Speaker 9: What about licensing? Do we know anything about their licensing?
Speaker 17: Bo?
Speaker 18: I remember that Bo gave us an update on licensing
Speaker 18: from El Paso County that was yesterday.
Speaker 10: He said he was license there.
Speaker 18: I think that's what I remember both saying.
Speaker 9: So Bo called justin Garcia at Patriot Building and it's
Speaker 9: also Patriot Remodeling Services. Listen, it could be anything seven seven,
Speaker 9: one zero, four to three seven. And he was pretty
Speaker 9: sketchy he said his contract does not fall within the
Speaker 9: Contractor's Trust Act. He said that he's has losses from
Speaker 9: materials he's purchased, but the license number that he put
Speaker 9: on the contract does not ring true with El Paso
Speaker 9: County and some other names he's gone by is Innate Architecture, Architecture,
Speaker 9: Engineering and Construction, also Patriot Remodeling Services, Patriot Building and
Speaker 9: again seven one nine five seven one zero four three seven.
Speaker 9: Now he said he's going to go after me. Well,
Speaker 9: I'll tell you what, justin, I don't mind if you
Speaker 9: come after me. But what I'd rather you do is
Speaker 9: you give that money back that's in trust, the money
Speaker 9: you didn't spend, the money that you didn't have an expenses,
Speaker 9: and I defy you to come up with expenses. Do
Speaker 9: you realize it's been a year and a half, right,
Speaker 9: it's been a year year and a half. By the way,
Speaker 9: give us a call if you have a problems, and
Speaker 9: give us a call.
Speaker 10: Way before a year and a half.
Speaker 9: Okay, she waited, tried to work things out with this
Speaker 9: guy and then finally called us.
Speaker 10: But Garcia, you're all over our deputies. Off the air.
Speaker 9: Flap in your mouth. You said you wanted to go
Speaker 9: on the air. Come on the air. I promise you really,
Speaker 9: as much as I'm doing this now and giving my
Speaker 9: opinion and calling you down, you come on. I'm gonna
Speaker 9: treat you with respect and let you tell your story.
Speaker 9: I really am, I really am. But I'm gonna have
Speaker 9: some questions too. Okay, you're gonna you're not gonna smooth
Speaker 9: talk me, bro, but you can come on the air.
Speaker 10: Come on, Garcia, come on the air.
Speaker 9: Come on the air and tell us why people should
Speaker 9: trust you when they give you money that you're going
Speaker 9: to do the job or give the money back or
Speaker 9: keep it in trust. And I want to know why
Speaker 9: you feel you can get around the Contractor's Trust Act.
Speaker 9: He's probably meeting with an attorney this morning because he
Speaker 9: didn't realize it was going to go this and again,
Speaker 9: I want to make sure bo. I want to get
Speaker 9: him back up. I want to make sure he contacted
Speaker 9: the El Paso County District Attorney. All right, give us
Speaker 9: a call three oh three, Martino, you can call anytime.
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Speaker 9: paying too much your coverage at dozens of insurance companies
Speaker 9: find out now three all three seven seven to one help.
Speaker 9: You'll think you're his only customer when you choose Frank
Speaker 9: durand the real estate Man dot com to list your
Speaker 9: home with Remax Alliance three all three nine two zero
Speaker 9: sixteen twenty two. Hi Tom Martino here three three seven
Speaker 9: one three talks seven one three eight two five five.
Speaker 9: We UH have a lot of uh information that I
Speaker 9: want to share with you on consumer stuff.
Speaker 10: Okay, it has to do with medical stuff.
Speaker 11: Now.
Speaker 9: John deals with mostly acute medicine, meaning people are in
Speaker 9: trouble and they get emergency help. Oddly enough in America,
Speaker 9: Not oddly enough in America we have some of the
Speaker 9: best acute medical teams in the world for keeping people alive,
Speaker 9: resurrecting them from near death and or reviving them and
Speaker 9: just getting them back to life. That's emergency medical, but
Speaker 9: regular medicine. It's interesting we rank the worst when it
Speaker 9: comes to.
Speaker 10: Developed industrialized nations.
Speaker 9: We're the worst, and yet we're one in acute medicine.
Speaker 9: The high income countries and that have the worst healthcare.
Speaker 10: We're not the worst. Worst. Well, yeah, we are the worst, worst,
Speaker 10: but we're we're in a in a group of.
Speaker 9: The country Sweden, believe it or not, bad, Canada bad,
Speaker 9: Switzerland bad, Germany bad, US bad.
Speaker 10: The US is the worst.
Speaker 9: So the bottom five Sweden, Canada, Switzerland, Germany, US. Now
Speaker 9: the are developed high income countries. Obviously there are countries
Speaker 9: in Africa and around that that have worse healthcare. Okay,
Speaker 9: so the best healthcare in the world for high income
Speaker 9: countries Australia. That, followed by the Netherlands, followed by the UK,
Speaker 9: New Zealand and France.
Speaker 10: I can't I was trying to find a correlation here.
Speaker 9: Now, Sweden, Canada, and Switzerland have socialized medicine, right, I'm
Speaker 9: not sure if Germany does on the low bad countries,
Speaker 9: but then we don't have socialized medicines.
Speaker 10: We are at the bottom.
Speaker 9: As far as as far as access to healthcare. The
Speaker 9: Netherlands have the best, the US has the worst access.
Speaker 9: And I always thought it was good access that anyone
Speaker 9: could go and get treated, but that's not what they're saying.
Speaker 9: By the way, we have more coming up on the
Speaker 9: Troubleshooter Show three h three, seven to one to three
Speaker 9: talks seven one, three, eight two five.
Speaker 10: Stick around for more.
Speaker 9: We're gonna try to get Justin Garcia on, but we
Speaker 9: are taking your calls three oh three seven one three
Speaker 9: Talks seven one three eight two five five or three
Speaker 9: oh three Martino. Go with a sure thing Denver's best
Speaker 9: roofer Excel Roofing dot com.
Speaker 15: You don't pay a cent until you're content.
Speaker 9: Please time for an insurance check up free, no obligation
Speaker 9: comparison call Compass Insurance paying too much your coverage at
Speaker 9: dozens of insurance companies find out now three oh three,
Speaker 9: seven seven to one help. You'll think you're his only
Speaker 9: customer when you choose Frank durand the Real estate Man
Speaker 9: dot com to list your home with Remax alliance three
Speaker 9: oh three nine two zero sixteen twenty two, ripped of you.
Speaker 11: You don't have.
Speaker 16: Come runing just as fast as we can.
Speaker 2: Shoot 's gonna help man.
Speaker 5: This is the Troubleshooter Show.
Speaker 9: No Tom Martino, Hi, Tom Martino here three zero three
Speaker 9: seven one three talk three oh three seven one three eight.
Speaker 10: Two five five.
Speaker 9: So we are here to help you, and we do
Speaker 9: it every single day. Solve problems, answer questions, take complaints,
Speaker 9: and make your life just a little easier. And we
Speaker 9: have this ongoing case that we've been talking about that
Speaker 9: we'll get to. Deputy Bow has been in touch with
Speaker 9: the El Paso County District's Attorney's office and we'll be
Speaker 9: talking to the investigator there about violations of a Contractors
Speaker 9: Trust Act. Right now, Richard is on the phone and
Speaker 9: wants to talk about a quit claim deed, which a
Speaker 9: lot of people call quick as in fast. It's actually
Speaker 9: quit as in I quit my claim and give it
Speaker 9: to you.
Speaker 10: What's going on, Richard, Well.
Speaker 19: It's all first statement call I had my dad did this,
Speaker 19: he quit claimed it to me at the beginning of August.
Speaker 19: And last regards listening to your show, you said there
Speaker 19: are some people think they can do it a certain
Speaker 19: way and it ends up being the wrong way.
Speaker 10: Well, it depends on what. It depends on. How why
Speaker 10: did he quit claim it to you?
Speaker 19: Well, okay, my sister lives there and stood there for
Speaker 19: ten years and she's just not capable of taking care
Speaker 19: of the place and so, and he's getting up there
Speaker 19: in years.
Speaker 11: So I guess he just thought that was probably the
Speaker 11: best and do.
Speaker 10: But why, what was the what was Richard?
Speaker 9: What was the point he wanted to leave the house
Speaker 9: to you when he dies. If he wanted to do that,
Speaker 9: he should do a beneficiaries deed. If he did a
Speaker 9: quit claim deed when he's alive, that's a legal way
Speaker 9: to do it as well.
Speaker 10: Does he owe money on the house?
Speaker 9: No, okay, so a quit claim deed would be strong,
Speaker 9: but it's not wise.
Speaker 10: He accomplished what he wanted. The house is now yours, okay,
Speaker 10: But he screwed you. Here's why.
Speaker 11: How is that?
Speaker 9: Here's why if it was a beneficiary deed or left
Speaker 9: in a will or left in a trust, meaning all
Speaker 9: three of those ways, all three of them happen at death,
Speaker 9: the trust, the will, and the beneficiary deed. The beneficiary
Speaker 9: deed is him on the deed with you taken over.
Speaker 9: So all three of those happen at death. At death
Speaker 9: the day of death, the house has a day of
Speaker 9: death value. That value is presumably market value. If you
Speaker 9: want to sell the house then or shortly after, you
Speaker 9: will have hardly any capital gains taxes to pay because
Speaker 9: you're not going to make that much of a profit.
Speaker 9: If he leaves the house to you on the day
Speaker 9: of his death. Let's say it's worth five hundred thousand
Speaker 9: and you sell it for five hundred, there's no capital gains.
Speaker 9: If you sell it for six hundred, you have one
Speaker 9: hundred thousand dollars in capital gains. Okay, Now, what he
Speaker 9: did by quit claiming it to you, you inherited his
Speaker 9: basis for the property, his value at the time he
Speaker 9: bought it.
Speaker 10: How long has he been there?
Speaker 13: What I would guess he'd probably owned it for ten
Speaker 13: years to it was a will to my grammar to him.
Speaker 9: What did he buy it for or what is his
Speaker 9: basis when it was willed to him?
Speaker 11: Honest time, I don't know.
Speaker 10: Well, let's take a guess what's it worth now?
Speaker 16: Right now?
Speaker 19: According to the City and County stuff, it says four
Speaker 19: hundred and thirty three thousand.
Speaker 10: Yeah, you can't go by that. You don't go by
Speaker 10: the tax assessment.
Speaker 9: Okay, so it's probably more like five point fifty or six.
Speaker 9: But let's say, just for argument's sake, it's five hundred. Okay,
Speaker 9: what do you think, just roughly, what do you think
Speaker 9: he bought it for? Well, just doesn't go ahead, just
Speaker 9: as an.
Speaker 11: Exam it was it was will to him from my grandmother.
Speaker 9: I understand that the day that she died. What do
Speaker 9: you think the house was worth? That is your dad's
Speaker 9: base iss, Let's say for argument's sake, it was two.
Speaker 10: Hundred two fifty.
Speaker 9: Let's say two fifty okay, okay, now that is now
Speaker 9: your basis when he quit claimed it to you two fifty, not.
Speaker 10: Day of death. Out Now, that means if you sell.
Speaker 9: It for five hundred, you're going to pay tax on
Speaker 9: two hundred and fifty thousand dollars, whereas you would not
Speaker 9: have paid that tax if you got it on the
Speaker 9: day of death.
Speaker 10: Do you see the difference?
Speaker 11: Oh my god, yes, it's horrible.
Speaker 9: Yeah, so he cost you right now if the Democrats
Speaker 9: have their will to be more, but right now it's
Speaker 9: twenty percent fifteen federal and five percent state. So you
Speaker 9: are going to pay twenty percent on that. So if
Speaker 9: you make whatever you make, take twenty percent off of
Speaker 9: it on that house, and you don't get to count
Speaker 9: the basis on the day of death. You have to
Speaker 9: go back. So you need to find out what that
Speaker 9: house was worth. You literally need to check the records
Speaker 9: and go back to the day he inherited it. That's
Speaker 9: his basis and that's your basis now. And I don't
Speaker 9: think there's any way to undo it. I think he
Speaker 9: just screwed your But you know, so many people do this.
Speaker 9: Oh so the government loves it because they get a
Speaker 9: lot of tax from people who don't know the law.
Speaker 10: They get a lot of tax. So so if.
Speaker 9: You if you make too fifty on this house, you're
Speaker 9: looking at a tax of fifty thousand dollars.
Speaker 14: Jeez, I was afraid when he said last week this
Speaker 14: is gonna happen.
Speaker 10: When did he quit claim it? When did he quit
Speaker 10: claim it first of August?
Speaker 11: Why?
Speaker 10: I mean he thought he was doing the right thing.
Speaker 11: Yeah, yeah, all.
Speaker 10: Right, that's too bad. You know what I do want
Speaker 10: to talk?
Speaker 9: Can we did you say, Kachina that mackenzie's not available
Speaker 9: this week? Did you tell me he was not available
Speaker 9: this week? Dan McKenzie, you are correct?
Speaker 10: Okay?
Speaker 9: Is Kiling Park available? I want to see we can
Speaker 9: undo this is Kiling Park Triday, damn it.
Speaker 10: I have two experts and they're both.
Speaker 9: Gone for the for the week. I want to know
Speaker 9: if we can undo it. Who else can we ask?
Speaker 4: Maybe David Salisbury he retired.
Speaker 10: I don't know if he I don't know what Tom,
Speaker 10: but he still knows stuff.
Speaker 9: Dan McKenzie's in quart or what is he on an issue?
Speaker 10: By the way, Not sure Tom?
Speaker 7: What if he quit claims it back to his dad?
Speaker 7: Wouldn't that just undo the deal?
Speaker 10: That hold on? Now?
Speaker 9: That's what I was thinking, except now his dad I
Speaker 9: think gets a new basis too.
Speaker 17: I have.
Speaker 10: Yet good point, John, Yes, oh man.
Speaker 9: I wonder who would know? God, this is a really
Speaker 9: important question. We might have you back tomorrow to talk
Speaker 9: to Kiel and Park.
Speaker 10: They're going to be available tomorrow. Let's hope we can
Speaker 10: undo it.
Speaker 9: I don't think you can because I I think once
Speaker 9: it's recorded now it's a whole new ballgame. Now when
Speaker 9: it goes back to him. I don't think that Man,
Speaker 9: gets his old basis back, which might be better. Actually,
Speaker 9: well no, no, no, wait wait wait wait wait if
Speaker 9: he inherits his dad's basis, and then the guy who
Speaker 9: gets a quick claim inherits maybe wait, I don't know, doc,
Speaker 9: maybe maybe let's just wait and see. We're gonna try
Speaker 9: to find an expert today. We can't get one of them.
Speaker 9: We'll get you on tomorrow. Okay, Richard.
Speaker 11: Was great, thank you.
Speaker 9: Yeah, and listen, people, how many times do I have
Speaker 9: to say this, don't try to do a state.
Speaker 10: Planning on your own. You're screwing yourself. Just don't do
Speaker 10: it on your own.
Speaker 9: Okay, you know these quick claim deeds, they're so stupid.
Speaker 9: Here's another stupid thing. When you have these people limiting
Speaker 9: the gifts they're giving to their grandkids and to their
Speaker 9: their kids and their nieces and nephews for college and
Speaker 9: all that, they're limiting it to that sixteen thousand dollars limit.
Speaker 10: There is no limit. Okay, there is no limit. Oh,
Speaker 10: I can.
Speaker 9: Only gift sixteen thousand dollars to my people per year.
Speaker 10: No that's not true, not true.
Speaker 9: You don't pay tax. If you pay more, you can
Speaker 9: give you right now.
Speaker 10: I'm just going to tell you right now, the way
Speaker 10: the law.
Speaker 9: Is, you can give one million dollars of your money
Speaker 9: as a gift to anyone and they don't pay tax
Speaker 9: on it. Right now this year, one million dollars, no
Speaker 9: gift tax. Do you understand that. Here's what the law
Speaker 9: says when it goes over. Please remember this because I
Speaker 9: have gotten a attorneys who don't even know this. Every
Speaker 9: dime over the sixteenth ho or whatever the limit is,
Speaker 9: I think it's sixteen. Everything over the annual limit goes
Speaker 9: against your lifetime exemption. Right now, we have a lifetime
Speaker 9: exemption individually of about fifteen or sixteen million dollars, which
Speaker 9: means we can give away up to fifteen or sixteen
Speaker 9: million dollars in our lifetime without any estate tax. Now,
Speaker 9: if you give sixteen or below, it doesn't count against
Speaker 9: that lifetime limit. If you give more than sixteen, the
Speaker 9: amount above the sixteen only that amount goes against your
Speaker 9: lifetime exemption of the sixteen million, which is thirty two
Speaker 9: million for couples.
Speaker 10: I might have it off a few million, but basically
Speaker 10: the concept is true. You don't have to.
Speaker 9: Limit your gifts unless you're bezos or elon muskers or
Speaker 9: actually anybody that will leave more than sixteen million behind. Okay,
Speaker 9: so don't go through all these conniptions. I had a
Speaker 9: guy worth a bucket of nails who said, oh my god,
Speaker 9: my mom.
Speaker 15: Gave me more than fourteen grand.
Speaker 9: I don't know what to do because at the time
Speaker 9: the limit was fourteen grand. He's thinking he's got all
Speaker 9: these taxes do so that's it. Don't try to do
Speaker 9: a state planning on your own.
Speaker 10: Okay.
Speaker 9: That's why we have people like Killing Park and Dan mackenzie.
Speaker 9: In fact, let me give out mackenzie's number, because I
Speaker 9: was supposed to do a spot form anyway. Dan McKenzie
Speaker 9: McKenzie Law eight three three COO plans eight three three
Speaker 9: co plans. He's live and local, but that's just an
Speaker 9: easy name to number to remember.
Speaker 10: Eight three three co plans.
Speaker 9: Go with a sure thing Denver's Best roofer Excel roofing
Speaker 9: dot com.
Speaker 15: You don't pay a cent until you're content.
Speaker 9: Time for an insurance check up, free no obligation comparison
Speaker 9: call Compass Insurance paying too much your coverage at dozens
Speaker 9: of insurance companies find out now three oh three seven
Speaker 9: seven to one. Help You'll think you're his only customer
Speaker 9: when you choose Frank durand the real estate man dot
Speaker 9: Com to list your home with Remax Alliance three oh
Speaker 9: three nine two zero sixteen twenty two. Hi Tom Martino,
Speaker 9: your trouble shooter three O three seven one three talks
Speaker 9: seven one three eight two five five. All right, So
Speaker 9: Brian has a question about real estate taxes.
Speaker 10: Hello, Brian, what's going on?
Speaker 11: Man?
Speaker 14: All right? Tom?
Speaker 11: Thanks for talking, sir.
Speaker 17: Yeah, so I've got I heard you talking about taxes
Speaker 17: and real estate. So if ye about my specific scenario.
Speaker 17: I bought a new house, moved into it, and been
Speaker 17: waiting to sell my current house. I'm carrying two mortgages whatever.
Speaker 17: I always do things the hard way. We I'm just
Speaker 17: trying to understand what is my capital gain gonna look like,
Speaker 17: uh my burden when when I actually do it to
Speaker 17: the closing table.
Speaker 9: Okay, Now you have a primary residence that you're going
Speaker 9: to sell.
Speaker 10: Is that correct?
Speaker 11: Yeah?
Speaker 9: Okay, let's talk about your primary residence. A lot of
Speaker 9: people think capital gains are contingent upon whether you bought
Speaker 9: another house or not. It's not anymore capital gains. I'm
Speaker 9: going to simplify it. Capital gains were this way, you
Speaker 9: pay capital gains on whatever you make on your private
Speaker 9: residence above the exemption for private residences. Okay, now, it's
Speaker 9: that simple. So it doesn't matter if you buy another house,
Speaker 9: or if you buy a yacht or don't buy anything
Speaker 9: and just piss the money away.
Speaker 10: It doesn't matter.
Speaker 9: It used to be when you bought a house more expensive,
Speaker 9: you deferred the gain. That does not apply to residential properties.
Speaker 9: Right now, it's very simple. A single taxpayer is given
Speaker 9: an exemption. They can make a profit of two hundred
Speaker 9: and fifty thousand dollars and not pay a dime of tax.
Speaker 10: Now, if you own it with.
Speaker 9: Your spouse, you each get two fifty for a combined
Speaker 9: total of five hundred thousand dollars exemption.
Speaker 17: Okay, okay, well that's real simple.
Speaker 10: I'm in the clear, yes now.
Speaker 9: But let's just say you, how do you figure your basis?
Speaker 9: A lot of people figure what they paid for the house.
Speaker 10: But if you put.
Speaker 9: Carpeting in the house or any permanent improvement that's not
Speaker 9: window coverings unless they're built in shutters and stuff. But
Speaker 9: if they are regular, if they are permanent improvements to
Speaker 9: the house, like landscaping, carpeting, painting, new furnace, new water heater,
Speaker 9: any of that can be added to the purchase price
Speaker 9: to give you your new basis. So you're allowed to count
Speaker 9: everything you spent on that house for permanent improvements to
Speaker 9: get your basis as high as possible. Once you get
Speaker 9: your basis, once you get your bases legally to as
Speaker 9: high as possible, then you can also subtract or add
Speaker 9: to it any selling expenses, commissions and everything. So the
Speaker 9: only thing they look at is pure profit. So if
Speaker 9: you have a pure profit under two point fifty, as
Speaker 9: a single taxpayer, you're not going to pay any capital gains.
Speaker 9: Do you own it with your wife or alone?
Speaker 20: So it's in my name only?
Speaker 9: Okay, well I think we're It doesn't matter. It doesn't
Speaker 9: matter if it's just in your name. If you both
Speaker 9: have is it both your primary residence?
Speaker 11: Yeah? Yeah, so it's both of them.
Speaker 9: Yeah yeah, So anyway, you would talk to an accountant
Speaker 9: about that. I believe that you're not going to worry
Speaker 9: about it though, And and do you are? Do you
Speaker 9: have any nibbles on the house? Again, do you have
Speaker 9: any nibbles?
Speaker 10: I mean anybody selling the house? I mean, what's going on.
Speaker 17: Actually we okay, so the day after it was announced
Speaker 17: they're dropping the rate, we went we got.
Speaker 9: An offer and went under contractor oh that's great stuff.
Speaker 11: We're wiping way.
Speaker 17: So that brings up another question. Do I get since
Speaker 17: you said expenditures of of of perch or of selling,
Speaker 17: does that include the fact that I'm paying too more?
Speaker 11: Do I get to wipe that?
Speaker 17: Second?
Speaker 10: Mor Well, what does that mean?
Speaker 9: Well, the mortgage, the mortgage has nothing to do with it.
Speaker 9: In other words, it's the profit you make obviously if
Speaker 9: that if you refinanced, and it's sometimes the mortgage counts
Speaker 9: some of that, doesn't. All you look at is what
Speaker 9: you bought the house for and what you added to
Speaker 9: it in improvements. That's all that matters.
Speaker 10: Okay, okay, Yeah, and then that will count, does not?
Speaker 10: What's that?
Speaker 11: Okay?
Speaker 17: Yeah, the cost of selling that you mentioned, that doesn't
Speaker 17: include the four months of paying on two more?
Speaker 9: No, no, no, no, no, it does it does count.
Speaker 9: It does count. The what you call it does count.
Speaker 9: The commissions you pay will count.
Speaker 8: However, Hey, Tom, does landscaping count or is it only
Speaker 8: the physical house?
Speaker 9: Landscaping would if it's part of the property, permanent property
Speaker 9: if you did a patio, if you did a tree,
Speaker 9: if you did it's all goes to that property.
Speaker 17: All right, man, we're gonna do fine.
Speaker 9: Thank you, Mark, Thank it. I think it's great. I
Speaker 9: think you're going to sell now, especially with it. Oh
Speaker 9: you just said you did, you have a contract, So
Speaker 9: I wish you the best. Three oh three seven one
Speaker 9: three eight two five five.
Speaker 10: So what is your question? What is your complaint? What
Speaker 10: is your need?
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Speaker 9: comparison call compass insurance paying too much your coverage at
Speaker 9: dozens of insurance companies find out now three all three
Speaker 9: seven seven to one. Help you'll think you're his only
Speaker 9: customer when you choose Frank durand the real estate man
Speaker 9: dot com to list your home with Remax Alliance three
Speaker 9: all three nine two zero sixteen twenty two. Hi Tom
Speaker 9: Martino here three O three seven to one three talk
Speaker 9: three all three seven one three eight two five five.
Speaker 10: What's going on? Let's talk? So I have Let me
Speaker 10: just get this one here. Okay.
Speaker 9: I had another question because we were talking about this
Speaker 9: capital gains. Somebody wanted to know about commercial property. Does
Speaker 9: the exemption apply?
Speaker 10: No, it does not.
Speaker 9: But what a lot of people do is when they
Speaker 9: have a rental, they build up a lot of that
Speaker 9: in a rental.
Speaker 10: Then they sell their primary residence.
Speaker 9: They take the tax exemption, They move into their rental
Speaker 9: for two years, and then sell it because it has
Speaker 9: to be two of the last five, and they get
Speaker 9: another tax exemption. Now, there are some builders and the irs.
Speaker 10: No one has ever caught up with them. Now I
Speaker 10: don't I shouldn't even use the word caught.
Speaker 16: Up with them.
Speaker 10: They don't say anything about it because it's illegal. And
Speaker 10: here's what it is.
Speaker 9: They build a house or fix up a house, fix
Speaker 9: and flip or or renovate or whatever. Right, Or they
Speaker 9: build a house and they live in it for two
Speaker 9: or three years, sell it, get all that exempt, They
Speaker 9: get five hundred thousand tax free.
Speaker 10: Do it again, five hundred thousand tax free. Do it again.
Speaker 10: Not bad? Is it? I mean? Really not bad?
Speaker 9: And fix and flippers can do that too, even if
Speaker 9: you sell it out right, but it is a way
Speaker 9: to live tax free. Now, on top of that, if
Speaker 9: you want to make that even better, you can have
Speaker 9: some of the I'm getting really weird here, but you
Speaker 9: can have some of the money that you build a
Speaker 9: house with from your overfunded life insurance and that's growing
Speaker 9: tax free.
Speaker 10: You borrow from your life insurance.
Speaker 9: Policy to do the house. You sell the house tax
Speaker 9: free as part of your personal exemption. Then pay back
Speaker 9: your life insurance policy for the money you put out
Speaker 9: for that house, and you pay yourself the highest interest allowed,
Speaker 9: and that interest goes to your cash value of the
Speaker 9: life insurance. So now you've just made a ton of
Speaker 9: money on your life insurance which is growing tax free,
Speaker 9: so your cash value.
Speaker 10: Is going up.
Speaker 9: Then you made a ton of money on your house
Speaker 9: that you didn't pay tax on.
Speaker 10: Think about this.
Speaker 9: So now if you do that back and forth with
Speaker 9: an overfunded life insurance policy and spec homes and you
Speaker 9: build up now that you keep making tax free money
Speaker 9: from the spec homes, that money, you do anything you
Speaker 9: want with a tax free but when you pay back
Speaker 9: your life insurance, you pay it back with top interest.
Speaker 9: That's going to shelter more and more cash, growing tax free.
Speaker 9: So then what do you do with this big bundle
Speaker 9: of money in your life insurance. Well, we've said that
Speaker 9: a million times again. I'm not saying this is the
Speaker 9: only investment you should have or whatever, and it has
Speaker 9: to be time appropriate. But if you overfunded life insurance
Speaker 9: and built up a ton of cash, the value that
Speaker 9: grew tax free. Normally that would be taxable if you
Speaker 9: took out disbursements. But if you did it the right way,
Speaker 9: you're not going to take your disbursements.
Speaker 10: You're going to borrow from your life insurance borrow from it.
Speaker 9: So let's say you're sixty five, seventy fifty five, whatever
Speaker 9: age you're older. You're retiring. You're not a dumb worker
Speaker 9: like me who wants to keep working. So let's say
Speaker 9: you retire and you take monthly payments pick one ten grand,
Speaker 9: ten grand a month, five grand a month, two grand
Speaker 9: a month, and their policy loans or take it take
Speaker 9: it once a year. You know, a fifty sixty to
Speaker 9: seventy five eighty thousand dollars loan.
Speaker 10: Live on it as income, but it's the loans. You're
Speaker 10: not paying tax on it.
Speaker 9: So what happens to all these accumulated loans on your
Speaker 9: life insurance? When you die, the life insurance proceeds pay
Speaker 9: them off. So I've just given you a strategy as
Speaker 9: a fix and flipper or builder to make money the
Speaker 9: rest of your life tax free and grow a retirement
Speaker 9: fund tax free. There you're welcome. Three h three seven
Speaker 9: one three talks seven one three A two five five.
Speaker 9: So I want to bring up Deputy d right here,
Speaker 9: and I want.
Speaker 10: To bring up there's a reason, well there's a big reason.
Speaker 9: I'm bringing them up because he did some research here
Speaker 9: on the Consumer Protection Act. You're on camera now, so
Speaker 9: on the Consumer Protection Act. D. This is important, John,
Speaker 9: you know about the Consumer Protection Act too. The Consumer
Speaker 9: Protection Act is a wide reaching We always talk about
Speaker 9: the Contractors Trust Act, but.
Speaker 10: The Protection Act is very wide reaching.
Speaker 9: And one of the things that I like about it
Speaker 9: is the wording about deceptive trade practices. God, does that
Speaker 9: handle a lot of stuff. John, I guess you can
Speaker 9: attest to that. I mean deceptive trade practice. That's open
Speaker 9: for a big interpretation. Deceptive trade practice, I mean, think
Speaker 9: about it. So what we're saying is, let me just
Speaker 9: bring us all up here. What I'm saying is is
Speaker 9: that the Consumer Protection Act says this, this, this, and
Speaker 9: deceptive trade practices.
Speaker 10: Right, let me get your mic on.
Speaker 9: There you go, So, d Yes, there were some interesting
Speaker 9: things in the in the Consumer Protection Act.
Speaker 18: Yes, this is the body of law encountered called the
Speaker 18: Colorado Consumer Protection Act. And the part that really excites
Speaker 18: me here in the context of that dirty contractor that
Speaker 18: we just discussed earlier, is that it provides for three times,
Speaker 18: and I'm reading directly from Justia, three times the amount
Speaker 18: of actual damage is sustained if it is established by
Speaker 18: clear and convincing evidence that such person engaged in bad
Speaker 18: faith conduct, plus attorney's fees and cost of the action.
Speaker 10: Wow, John, did you know about that that?
Speaker 9: I never knew the Consumer Protection Act provided for attorney's
Speaker 9: fees and treble damages.
Speaker 10: I didn't know it.
Speaker 5: Yeah, they do.
Speaker 10: The only.
Speaker 5: The only problem with that.
Speaker 6: I mean, as you as you look at all these
Speaker 6: different things, Tom, is you have to kind of really
Speaker 6: look down the road. Is it possible that a judgment
Speaker 6: that we obtain under this act. I mean, even though
Speaker 6: it may be trouble damages plus fees and stuff, what's
Speaker 6: to stop the guy from running right across the street
Speaker 6: and bankruptcy, you know, versus on the other hand, if
Speaker 6: the DA actually decided to prosecute him. In addition to,
Speaker 6: you know, the very real possibility that a jail sentence
Speaker 6: would be imposed. And I've had clients that have gone
Speaker 6: down that road. They get a restitution order that cannot
Speaker 6: be discharged in bankruptcy. I mean, you know, you may say, well,
Speaker 6: the guy's in jail, so he can't pay, but he
Speaker 6: probably is not really going to be wanting to pay anyway,
Speaker 6: even if he's not in jail. But at least your
Speaker 6: judgment is not dischargeable and goes away. I mean, it's
Speaker 6: just like a re victimization if they go to the
Speaker 6: bankruptcy court.
Speaker 18: I found something else on a big time Denver criminal
Speaker 18: defense attorney's website. This is in the context of the
Speaker 18: contractors the contractors trust Act, Truck Trust Act. He says
Speaker 18: that violations of the car to Trust Act UH will
Speaker 18: lie against contractors and even officers, owners and principles of
Speaker 18: the corporation and and the corporate veil will not protect
Speaker 18: them from liability and card under under that act.
Speaker 5: Wow, yeah, that's that's true. But it but bankruptcy will.
Speaker 10: And so then well, unless it's fraud, right, I mean,
Speaker 10: if it's I mean, if.
Speaker 6: There's a fraud exception of course, but I mean you
Speaker 6: still got to get to you fraud. What he's talking
Speaker 6: about there is you know, this, this idea of a
Speaker 6: corporate veil is what people say all the time that
Speaker 6: I can just I could just hide my assets in
Speaker 6: a corporation and therefore nobody can touch me.
Speaker 5: And that's really not true, of course. But you know,
Speaker 5: I don't know.
Speaker 10: No, no, I I know what John, John, I know
Speaker 10: what you're saying.
Speaker 9: If it's fraud, it's not dischargeable. But you have to
Speaker 9: prove fraud or you have to at least bring a
Speaker 9: big enough claim against you know, because financial difficulties, you
Speaker 9: could violate the Find the Contractor's Trust Act through financial difficulties,
Speaker 9: and that would and that would be bankruptible so to speak,
Speaker 9: it would be dischargeable.
Speaker 6: So you know it's I used to do criminal defense work, okay, Yeah,
Speaker 6: back in the day, so to speak. And there is
Speaker 6: nothing that will make criminal charges go better in court
Speaker 6: for you than making your victims whole.
Speaker 10: Okay.
Speaker 5: I mean you've got a choice.
Speaker 6: Don't make them hole and go to prison, or make
Speaker 6: them whole and have the chance of coming out of
Speaker 6: something with probation or something. You'd be amazed how many
Speaker 6: people get motivated to bring something in and try to
Speaker 6: make these victims whole.
Speaker 10: Yeah, I got you.
Speaker 5: It's a beautiful thing, all right.
Speaker 9: We have more coming up on The Troubleshooter Show three
Speaker 9: h three seven to one, three talks seven one, three, eight,
Speaker 9: two five five. Go with a sure thing Denver's best
Speaker 9: roofer Excel roofing dot com. You don't pay a cent
Speaker 9: until you're content. Time for an insurance check up free,
Speaker 9: no obligation. In comparison, call Compass Insurance paying too much
Speaker 9: your coverage at dozens of insurance companies find out now
Speaker 9: three oh three, seven seven to one help. You'll think
Speaker 9: you're his only customer when you choose Frank durand the
Speaker 9: Real Estate man dot com to list your home with
Speaker 9: Remax Alliance three all three nine two zero sixteen twenty two.
Speaker 9: Hi Tom Martino, your Troubleshooter three oh three seven one
Speaker 9: three talk three oh three seven one three eight two
Speaker 9: five five, So get your calls in. If you have
Speaker 9: any questions, problems or complaints. Call has been light today
Speaker 9: for some reason. You know, it's amazing to me how
Speaker 9: some days we can't breathe. But keep this in mind.
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Speaker 9: or not a machine, just leave a message voicemail. We'll
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Speaker 9: four sixty six or three oh three Martino.
Speaker 10: We also have an email.
Speaker 9: Address, help at troubleshooter dot com. Help at troubleshooter dot com.
Speaker 9: So I people are texting me, by the way, and
Speaker 9: you can text me at seven four seven, nine nine
Speaker 9: nine fifty two eighty. That's my personal personal text on
Speaker 9: my personal Google that is forwarded to.
Speaker 10: My cell phone.
Speaker 9: Now, Tom, how many different healthcare systems do we have?
Speaker 9: We have Medicare, Medicaid, Tricare, private employer provided, no insurance,
Speaker 9: no in.
Speaker 10: In self pay. It's ridiculous.
Speaker 9: We need universal, socialized medical That's why we ranked so low.
Speaker 9: You know, I will say that healthcare and medical care
Speaker 9: is one area John, you can chime into. You deal
Speaker 9: with it more than anybody. The healthcare system. I mean,
Speaker 9: we need something. I think I hesitate to call it
Speaker 9: universal or government provided, but there could be a limited
Speaker 9: number of carriers, mandatory participation in a way that saves money.
Speaker 9: The Obamacare that the benefit Obamacare did it trust me.
Speaker 9: There were a lot of people hurt by it. A
Speaker 9: lot of people fell in the cracks where they had
Speaker 9: giant deductibles and they may as well be uninsured. But
Speaker 9: there are also people who were covered by Medicaid that
Speaker 9: were never covered before.
Speaker 10: That's the one good thing it did. It expanded meta deca.
Speaker 9: Now I believe the Medicare system is one of the
Speaker 9: best run systems in the world. Medicare, it's a great system.
Speaker 9: Now Medicare for all.
Speaker 10: I don't know.
Speaker 9: I think healthcare, though, is one of those areas. And insurance, okay,
Speaker 9: because we're talking about health care and insurance are tied together.
Speaker 9: I think that insurance ruined the health care industry. Insurance
Speaker 9: actually put a layer of administration and cost there that
Speaker 9: wasn't there before. You know, if you really look at
Speaker 9: how doctors are reimbursed, for example, for births, and deputy
Speaker 9: doc will tell you this, when insurance came in and
Speaker 9: the prices went up, he didn't get more money for
Speaker 9: delivering a baby. He probably got reimbursed the same radio
Speaker 9: always has been getting reimbursed. But everyone else was making
Speaker 9: money around him, mainly insurance.
Speaker 10: I say they were like the mafia.
Speaker 9: They inserted themselves into the healthcare system. Most of our
Speaker 9: costs right now in healthcare, most of our costs is
Speaker 9: administrative and insurance.
Speaker 10: It's not the actual provider now.
Speaker 9: The actual provider raises those costs because of the insurance
Speaker 9: and the administration. So yes, it appears as if they're
Speaker 9: all charging too much, but they're doing that to keep up,
Speaker 9: just to have enough to keep for themselves. It's it's
Speaker 9: a god, it's it's a complicated situation. So what is
Speaker 9: the answer. What is the answer? John, What do you
Speaker 9: think the answer is? To a healthcare system? Do you
Speaker 9: like some kind of I don't like using the words
Speaker 9: socialized because it sounds because we have we're obviously we
Speaker 9: don't want socialism. But some kind of universal healthcare maybe
Speaker 9: you ought to talk about that.
Speaker 10: I don't know that.
Speaker 9: To me, we need to do something because what we
Speaker 9: have isn't working anyway. Three oh three seven one three
Speaker 9: Talks seven one three eight two five five. We have
Speaker 9: more coming up on the Troubleshooter Show. Stick Around three
Speaker 9: oh three Martino three oh three six two seven eight
Speaker 9: four sixty six. Go with a sure thing Denver's Best
Speaker 9: roofer Excel Roofing dot com. You don't pay a cent
Speaker 9: until you're contents. Time for an insurance check up, free
Speaker 9: no obligation comparison call Compass Insurance Paying too much your
Speaker 9: coverage at dozens of insurance companies find out now three
Speaker 9: oh three seven seven to one help. You'll think you're
Speaker 9: his only customer when you choose Frank durand the real
Speaker 9: estate Man dot com to list your home with Remax
Speaker 9: Alliance three oh three nine two zero sixteen twenty two.
Speaker 1: D need advice, so you don't have.
Speaker 16: Come run in chess as can ye.
Speaker 2: Shooter's gonna help.
Speaker 16: Come man, This.
Speaker 3: Is the Troubleshooter Show. Now, Tom Martino.
Speaker 6: Well, come back to the Troubleshooter Show. This is not
Speaker 6: Tom Martino. This is John Fuller sitting in for mister
Speaker 6: Martino who is out for the rest of the day,
Speaker 6: and joining me here in the studio is the lovely
Speaker 6: Suzanne and uh doc hey John, And we're here to
Speaker 6: take your questions, answer your issues, do our best to
Speaker 6: solve your problems. Give us a call. The Alliance are
Speaker 6: wide open right now at three oh three seven, three eight,
Speaker 6: two five five.
Speaker 5: Many of you know me.
Speaker 6: I am a personal injury attorney here in Denver, Colorado.
Speaker 6: I have been for twenty two years, which seems like
Speaker 6: kind of a long time. But in that time I've
Speaker 6: had a wide and myriad, you know, selection of cases
Speaker 6: that makes me qualified to talk about almost nothing. But nonetheless,
Speaker 6: here I am, and I'm ready to take your call
Speaker 6: and give us a shout. Now, Tom kind of teased
Speaker 6: the last hour with this concept of health insurance, and
Speaker 6: I'm not going to leave that alone. Although I'm coming
Speaker 6: at it from a different perspective because I'm a really
Speaker 6: more of a consumer because my clients are all hurt
Speaker 6: and they're all trying to get medical care, and we,
Speaker 6: as a personal injury firm, are We're interested in getting
Speaker 6: our clients taken care of. We're interested in getting them
Speaker 6: the care that they need. And over the time that
Speaker 6: I've been practicing, we've gone through a system where all
Speaker 6: of the healthcare that was related to car accidents was
Speaker 6: paid for under your car insurance. And that was the
Speaker 6: old no fault system that we had that we voted
Speaker 6: out almost almost twenty years ago, now to a system
Speaker 6: where really there is no mechanism to automatically pay for
Speaker 6: your health care than a voluntary quote unquote mandatory voluntary
Speaker 6: coverage called medpay. And you guys have heard me talk
Speaker 6: about medpay a million times. The only problem with medpay
Speaker 6: is it's not a very big policy. By default, it
Speaker 6: comes in at only five thousand dollars and you can
Speaker 6: get more. But you know, most of the time, if
Speaker 6: we have medpay, it's the five grand and that's what
Speaker 6: we're dealing with. And so my job usually is to
Speaker 6: beg borrow and steal the various sources of medical care
Speaker 6: be it Medicare, Medicaid, private health insurance, medpay leans. You know,
Speaker 6: just doctors having to treat, or at least emergency rooms
Speaker 6: having to treat almost involuntarily because the law forces them
Speaker 6: to take care of people that land in the emergency
Speaker 6: room and everywhere in between. And so I don't know
Speaker 6: what the right answer is. I can tell you that
Speaker 6: you know, in my opinion, medicaid is not the answer.
Speaker 6: Medicaid is great when you're injured very badly and you
Speaker 6: go to the er and they do a great job
Speaker 6: taking care of you up until you get discharged. And
Speaker 6: then once you've been discharged, the challenge becomes getting that
Speaker 6: ongoing care and trying to fit into the rules that
Speaker 6: medicaid dictates on people, such as how many physical therapy
Speaker 6: appointments you have to go to before the authorize an
Speaker 6: MRI or.
Speaker 5: Stuff like that.
Speaker 6: So using medicaid and trying to select your own medical
Speaker 6: providers is an almost recipe for disaster. I don't know, doctor,
Speaker 6: did you get involved in medicaid claims?
Speaker 8: But the point is kind of similar. It often is
Speaker 8: up to the insurance company rather than the doctor, to
Speaker 8: decide what treatment is appropriate. So we have to jump
Speaker 8: through hoops if we want to do something that the
Speaker 8: insurance company says, well, we don't think this is the
Speaker 8: proper motor treatment, and then we wind up having to
Speaker 8: write letters to the medical director and justify it rather
Speaker 8: than just letting us make a decision on what we
Speaker 8: think is best for the patient, which is what we've
Speaker 8: been trained for for all those years.
Speaker 6: And meanwhile the patient goes just waiting, trying to get
Speaker 6: the treatment that they need and suffering through whatever's going on.
Speaker 10: Exactly, I didn't.
Speaker 4: Realize, John, I mean, I'm kind of stuck when you
Speaker 4: said it was way different twenty years ago. I didn't
Speaker 4: realize that. I guess before what you could go directly
Speaker 4: through your healthcare insurance when you're injured in an accident.
Speaker 6: So no, the crazy thing is that in this no
Speaker 6: fault system that we had before, we didn't use our
Speaker 6: own private insurance for the treatment related to car accident.
Speaker 4: What did you use?
Speaker 6: We used our own car insurance, and we had a
Speaker 6: coverage called PIP or personal injury protection. A lot of
Speaker 6: people listening will remember the old PIP days as we
Speaker 6: referred to it, and personal injury protection was this this
Speaker 6: extra policy on your car policy that had fifty thousand
Speaker 6: dollars for medical and fifty thousand dollars for rehab, but
Speaker 6: the rehab could get rolled into the medical. So effectively,
Speaker 6: everybody who had any sort of car insurance had one
Speaker 6: hundred thousand dollars piggy bank of available coverage to go
Speaker 6: and get whatever treatment they needed.
Speaker 5: They could go to.
Speaker 6: An orthopedic doctor, they could go to a chiropractor, they
Speaker 6: could get massage and anything else under the sun, and
Speaker 6: it would give us the ability to kind of custom
Speaker 6: formulate the healthcare that people needed to get better. The
Speaker 6: downside of the system was twofold Number one primary care
Speaker 6: doctors didn't take the auto coverage. They just wouldn't. They
Speaker 6: just wouldn't do it. If you showed up and said Hi,
Speaker 6: I'm here because of a car, they would turn you
Speaker 6: away and be done with you. You couldn't get the
Speaker 6: coverage at your own PCP doctor. I'm guessing doc, you
Speaker 6: had the same deal at your practice is they just
Speaker 6: wouldn't cover them.
Speaker 4: The coverage wouldn't cover someone else. If you were at
Speaker 4: Faull and hurts somebody in an accident, it didn't cover them. Right,
Speaker 4: everybody had their own.
Speaker 6: So all of your liability coverage was still in place
Speaker 6: to cover the other guy. I'm strictly talking about covering
Speaker 6: God's own injuries, whether you were at fault or whether
Speaker 6: the other guy was care after an accident. We got
Speaker 6: all of our care under our own policy. So here's
Speaker 6: the other downside of that regime, if you will. It
Speaker 6: was abused like nobody's business. Okay. You had a number
Speaker 6: of doctors out there that specialized in treating accident injuries.
Speaker 5: That's all they did.
Speaker 6: They ran all these little injury clinics and stuff, and miraculously,
Speaker 6: nobody got better until either the money ran out or
Speaker 6: the three year statute limitation was looming and all that.
Speaker 4: Wow, And is that why they changed it? Because there
Speaker 4: was a lot of fraud going on. Is that why
Speaker 4: they overhauled the system? If you will.
Speaker 6: Yeah, what happened was the insurance companies. You know, in Colorado,
Speaker 6: we have a system that anybody can put just about
Speaker 6: anything on the ballot. Okay, it's a referendum issue. With
Speaker 6: enough signatures, they can put just about anything on the ballot.
Speaker 6: The insurance companies, primarily the auto insurance companies, convinced the
Speaker 6: people of Colorado that a new system was better, and
Speaker 6: that they would all say massive amounts of money.
Speaker 5: And it was actually a.
Speaker 6: Ballot issue that the people of Colorado voted on. So
Speaker 6: they voted to get rid of the old pip days,
Speaker 6: if you will, and implement what we have today. And
Speaker 6: so for the last almost twenty years whatever. The opposite
Speaker 6: of no fault is a pure fault, if you will. Now,
Speaker 6: the person who's that fault is responsible for everything. But
Speaker 6: the challenge is there's no mechanism to get them to
Speaker 6: pay for that treatment as it's being incurred. And so
Speaker 6: the insurance company for the at fault drivers sit back
Speaker 6: and say, look, we may be at fault.
Speaker 5: We understand that we're at fault.
Speaker 6: But the only way we're going to pay you anything
Speaker 6: is if you sign this release that lets our driver
Speaker 6: off the hook completely. So nobody's going to sign that release.
Speaker 6: If you're in the middle of getting treatment, you don't
Speaker 6: know what the future holds. You've got potentially a surgery
Speaker 6: down the road, you've got all this lost wages. I mean,
Speaker 6: there's no way that a week or two after the
Speaker 6: accident you're going to sign this complete release just to
Speaker 6: let the other driver off and unlock some of those
Speaker 6: money so you can get the care that you need.
Speaker 6: So the practical reality is, like I was saying earlier,
Speaker 6: we have to figure out how to front load all
Speaker 6: the treatment in order to get the person to the
Speaker 6: end of that road, so that we can then turn
Speaker 6: around and go after the insurance company and say this
Speaker 6: is the full extent.
Speaker 5: Of our clients.
Speaker 4: I understood, Okay, it's.
Speaker 6: It's just it's kind of the system that we have
Speaker 6: to deal with. I say, We've got a couple of
Speaker 6: callers on the line. Let's take let's take Tommy an
Speaker 6: issue with auto owners insurance.
Speaker 5: Tommy, you're on the air. What's going on?
Speaker 19: Oh?
Speaker 5: I'm on there now, yes, sir?
Speaker 11: Oh, okay. Well, on July tenth, my neighbor who lives
Speaker 11: in the corner house, there's an empty lot between us,
Speaker 11: and he had put new blakes on his truck and
Speaker 11: and everything. He did pump them up or something, but
Speaker 11: he ran into the side of my house and it
Speaker 11: moved the wall three and a half inches. And I've
Speaker 11: been dating with the insurance company, the underwriters and since then,
Speaker 11: and the first two weeks they said they were going
Speaker 11: to send an adjust out. Well two weeks went by,
Speaker 11: never heard nursing, and then we called kept calling, and
Speaker 11: then the lady that was handling it, she went on
Speaker 11: vacation for ten days.
Speaker 6: So, is this the insurance company for your neighbor that
Speaker 6: you're dealing with?
Speaker 11: No, this is the underwriters for his insurance company?
Speaker 5: Okay, and that's Auto Owners Insurance.
Speaker 11: Uh okay, So because his insurance is Weeding agency or
Speaker 11: Collins Okay, So.
Speaker 6: We don't really deal with the agencies too much. Is
Speaker 6: it the actual insurance company, auto owners or who is it?
Speaker 16: Yeah?
Speaker 11: Auto Owners? Okay, I guess they're in I guess they're
Speaker 11: in Denver.
Speaker 5: Yeah, So what are they telling you?
Speaker 11: Well, okay, this has now been about a month going by,
Speaker 11: and we finally did a hold of the lady that's
Speaker 11: got our clone, and then she says that she needed,
Speaker 11: you know, a bid on it, how much it can
Speaker 11: costs to repair it. We send that to her, and
Speaker 11: you couldn't get a holdover for a week or two.
Speaker 11: And then when we did get a holdover, she said
Speaker 11: she needed itemized. Well, sent that to her and then
Speaker 11: she tells us that that he needs to contact them. Well,
Speaker 11: this is back in the first of all, is that
Speaker 11: they hadn't heard from him.
Speaker 6: Okay, tell me we're going to work through all those issues.
Speaker 6: Hang on just a moment, we're going to go to
Speaker 6: a break. We'll be right back. So yeah, definitely we'll
Speaker 6: get to the bottom of this.
Speaker 9: Go with a sure thing Denver's best roofer Excel Roofing
Speaker 9: dot com.
Speaker 15: You don't pay a cent until your content.
Speaker 9: Time for an insurance check free no obligation comparison call
Speaker 9: Compass Insurance paying too much your coverage at dozens of
Speaker 9: insurance companies find out now three all three seven seven
Speaker 9: to one.
Speaker 5: Help.
Speaker 9: You'll think you're his only customer when you choose Frank
Speaker 9: durand the real estate Man dot com to list your
Speaker 9: home with Remax Alliance three all three nine two zero
Speaker 9: sixteen twenty two.
Speaker 6: Welcome back to the Troubleshooter Show. This is John Fuller here.
Speaker 6: We are talking with Tommy right now. Tommy had a
Speaker 6: neighbor who did a break job on his truck and
Speaker 6: apparently mess something up and the truck rolled down the
Speaker 6: hill and hit his house and it has been struggling
Speaker 6: with auto owners insurance. Right now, and we we have
Speaker 6: Brian Burns that's going to be joining us here in
Speaker 6: just a second. We want to hear the rest of
Speaker 6: the story, Tommy tell us in a nutshell, Really, what
Speaker 6: is going on here? They've they've delayed and delayed and delayed.
Speaker 6: I understand that that's kind of par for the course
Speaker 6: for some of these guys, But where does the issues
Speaker 6: right now?
Speaker 11: Well? I sent him an ismed thing on the bed
Speaker 11: that they want to drass.
Speaker 6: This is a bed in your home that got damaged
Speaker 6: when the wall got moved.
Speaker 11: No, no, they wanted they wanted an itemize on the
Speaker 11: cost of all the repairs.
Speaker 5: Okay, what did that come up to? By the way, they.
Speaker 11: Come to fourteen thousand, seven hundred and fifty dollars.
Speaker 6: Wow, that's kind of a lot. This must have been
Speaker 6: more than just a little bump.
Speaker 11: Oh yeah, it's a two fifty four ninety four two
Speaker 11: fifty four pick up with a diesel motor. He had
Speaker 11: put it and rebarsed and started it. And when he
Speaker 11: started coming off his little concrete pad there coming down
Speaker 11: the hill. Well it wasn't slowing down, oh, she wrote,
Speaker 11: And I guess I guess he kind of freaked out
Speaker 11: or something. Hit the gas pedal.
Speaker 5: Oh my goodness, it was actually dry. It when it
Speaker 5: hits your house.
Speaker 11: Oh hit it in the truck with the door shut.
Speaker 21: Now I got to ask here too. Is the house
Speaker 21: structurally okay?
Speaker 16: Still?
Speaker 5: Or you're still living there?
Speaker 11: Oh yeah, yeah, it's it's.
Speaker 21: It's not gonna come tumbling down. It's the strong wind blows.
Speaker 21: Is it Is this.
Speaker 6: A frame house you have here, Tommy? Or is this
Speaker 6: a frame house that you have here?
Speaker 11: Or yeah it's a frame house. Okay, it's a free story.
Speaker 5: All right.
Speaker 8: So hey, Tommy, did you just move here from Boston?
Speaker 8: Your accent sounds a little like you came from back east.
Speaker 11: I'm probably your stab of bread.
Speaker 6: I can promise you Tommy is not from Boston. Okay, yeah, Tommy,
Speaker 6: sounds more like my people there than than yours.
Speaker 11: Yeah. Well, but uh yeah, I mean that's what when
Speaker 11: you hit the gas, I mean things just I know,
Speaker 11: ain't everyone's stopping? Then they just hit the wall. I
Speaker 11: hit about thousand pounds worth of the way on the
Speaker 11: other side of the wall and tried to garage and
Speaker 11: it moved it, you know, the whole the whole wall moved.
Speaker 6: So Tommy, what's going on? You gave him the estimate
Speaker 6: and stuff. What did the insurance company tell you?
Speaker 5: Next?
Speaker 11: Well, they won't answer their phone calls.
Speaker 5: Now, Oh, okay, how long has it's been You're being ghosted?
Speaker 11: Huh?
Speaker 5: How long has it been?
Speaker 11: It's happened this It happened on July the tenth.
Speaker 6: Okay, that's been a while, John, Tommy, what does your
Speaker 6: neighbors say about this? Has your neighbor called the insurance
Speaker 6: company to say you got to take care of Tommy's
Speaker 6: house here?
Speaker 11: Well, okay, I guess probably the first of all. Just
Speaker 11: they told us that they sent him a letter and
Speaker 11: he had two months to respond to it and uh,
Speaker 11: but she said she never heard back from him. So
Speaker 11: I went over and put a note on his door, yeah,
Speaker 11: and ask him the place called me a shance company
Speaker 11: and tell them, you know what happened.
Speaker 5: Tommy. Do you have insurance on your home? Your own insurance?
Speaker 16: Yeah?
Speaker 11: Yeah, I do. And that's the first thing they told me.
Speaker 5: Just who's that with?
Speaker 11: Uh? State Farm?
Speaker 5: Stay Farm? Have you talked to State Farm?
Speaker 11: Well? We did, but you know, I kind of feel like,
Speaker 11: you know, auto owners is hit the insurance great, and
Speaker 11: that's kind of like right, So what's.
Speaker 4: He saying, John, that the homeowner's not doing his part
Speaker 4: in getting this?
Speaker 6: Maybe that might be what's going on. You know, we
Speaker 6: run into this from time to time. Maybe Brian can
Speaker 6: talk about this. You know what I'm thinking about, Brian
Speaker 6: is maybe Tommy should be following acclaim with his own
Speaker 6: insurance company and let them worry about going after the
Speaker 6: other carrier. I mean, do you have any other advice
Speaker 6: about how to make auto owners get off there? Uh
Speaker 6: took us and to get going on this complaint than
Speaker 6: you know, other than dealing with his own company or
Speaker 6: suing the neighbor.
Speaker 5: I can't think of anything else. What about you, Brian?
Speaker 14: No?
Speaker 13: I mean, and as you guys were talking here, I
Speaker 13: was sitting here saying the exact same thing. I think
Speaker 13: that what I would do. Because he has no contractual
Speaker 13: relationship with auto owners in this case, who knows what
Speaker 13: the other driver is saying? The other driver to be saying, well,
Speaker 13: you know I was doing this. You know, who knows
Speaker 13: people people argue and start to make up stories. So
Speaker 13: he doesn't he can't force auto owners to pay.
Speaker 11: It's exactly what you said.
Speaker 13: He either sues the neighbor if the neighbor's not really
Speaker 13: doing anything. I promise you auto owners is going to
Speaker 13: start paying if he's getting sued, or if you just
Speaker 13: don't want to go through that hassle, you make the
Speaker 13: claim on your own policy and let them subrogate. And
Speaker 13: that's exactly what they'll do. They'll suburgate, subrogate against auto
Speaker 13: owners and try to get that money back. But in
Speaker 13: the meantime he'll be out as deductible.
Speaker 6: Well, and and that's a great point about the deductible,
Speaker 6: but I can also tell you, Tommy, if you paid
Speaker 6: a deductible under your policy to get this repair done
Speaker 6: and then State Farm goes out and collects from auto owners,
Speaker 6: the very first dollars that they get in will be
Speaker 6: used to refund your deductible, and so you would get
Speaker 6: that money back. So I guess what we're saying is
Speaker 6: this is a surefire way of dealing with the company
Speaker 6: that you do have a contract with, that has to
Speaker 6: deal with you, that has to go through the claims
Speaker 6: process with you, and then sometimes you just let them
Speaker 6: go deal with collecting the money out of auto owners.
Speaker 4: But I have a question, Brian, if he does have
Speaker 4: to submit a claim through his own homeowner's insurance, would
Speaker 4: that affect his renewal when that comes up.
Speaker 13: I don't think it would affect his renewal. I hear
Speaker 13: what you're saying, Susan. I'm always reluctant to file a
Speaker 13: home claim, specifically because unlike an auto claim, there's not
Speaker 13: such thing as not a fault ultimately on a home.
Speaker 13: But in a case like this, you're talking about a
Speaker 13: lot of money here, and I just I don't think
Speaker 13: it's worth, you know, to sit and wait and wait
Speaker 13: and wait for the other insurance company. But I would
Speaker 13: always be hesitant to file acclaim because it could affect
Speaker 13: him in the future as far as if he's going
Speaker 13: to another carrier, I can see that this is gonna
Speaker 13: be a question that's going to come up that he's
Speaker 13: gonna have to deal with.
Speaker 6: I mean, that's the best way, really, if it were
Speaker 6: you know, if it were me. And here's what I
Speaker 6: can tell you about auto owners. I have a lot
Speaker 6: of clients that have auto owners, and generally speaking, they're
Speaker 6: happy with auto owners. But I've also handled a million
Speaker 6: claims against auto owners for clients that have been hit
Speaker 6: by insurance of auto owners.
Speaker 5: And here's what I can tell you, without exception, they
Speaker 5: are slow to pay.
Speaker 6: They will make the most ridiculous low offer that you've
Speaker 6: ever heard of and Nicol and DIMEU. They will eventually pay,
Speaker 6: and they will eventually pay a fair amount, but it
Speaker 6: takes forever. So what you're experiencing is pretty consistent with
Speaker 6: what I experience with my clients. And the only sure
Speaker 6: way to speed that up would be to follow lawsuit.
Speaker 6: But it's not something that I would ever really recommend
Speaker 6: that you do on your own. But you know, because
Speaker 6: I can't recommend that you spend the fees, that leads
Speaker 6: you with the only other option, which is to go
Speaker 6: to your own insurance company.
Speaker 11: All right, not to what I was trying to avoid
Speaker 11: because you and I only because I don't know if
Speaker 11: that shows up as a mark on her home owner's
Speaker 11: insurance or again share or not.
Speaker 13: Here, I'll give you one more option. Why don't you
Speaker 13: give him my contact information? I don't mind calling the
Speaker 13: contacts I have at Auto Owners and see if I
Speaker 13: could maybe figure out what's going on. I'm not the agent,
Speaker 13: I'm guessing for the person that was involved, but so
Speaker 13: they won't give me details, but I could at least
Speaker 13: try to push it up the ladder to say, hey,
Speaker 13: can you look at this claim that's going on? And
Speaker 13: this guy's sitting here waiting. You know his house is
Speaker 13: destroyed over here. We need to get something going for him.
Speaker 6: So thinks awesome doing that. I think that's awesome, Brian.
Speaker 6: Thanks doing yay.
Speaker 4: Brian Burns with Compass Insurance Theeinsurancehelp Center dot com three
Speaker 4: oh three nine ninety six nine thousand. Thank you so much, Kelly,
Speaker 4: give him, Give Tommy Brian's information.
Speaker 9: Go with a sure thing Denver's Best roofer Excel Roofing
Speaker 9: dot com.
Speaker 15: You don't pay a cent until you're content than.
Speaker 9: Time for an insurance check up free no obligation comparison
Speaker 9: call Compass Insurance paying too much your coverage at dozens
Speaker 9: of insurance companies find out now three oh three seven
Speaker 9: seven to one help. You'll think you're his only customer
Speaker 9: when you choose Frank durand the real estate Man dot
Speaker 9: com to list your home with Remax Alliance three oh
Speaker 9: three nine two zero sixteen twenty two.
Speaker 6: Welcome back to the Tom Martine Show. This is John
Speaker 6: Fuller fitting in for Mark and Tom today on the
Speaker 6: longest running show in the country with the same host, Martino.
Speaker 6: We are here to help you with all of your problems.
Speaker 6: Give us a call today. The number is three oh
Speaker 6: three seven one three eight two five five. My primary focus.
Speaker 6: I'm an attorney. I handle automobile accidents, and I'm privileged
Speaker 6: to be sitting next to one of my dearest clients
Speaker 6: over the years whose a major Yeah, for.
Speaker 4: Sure, I've always appreciated your help, John, and I know
Speaker 4: Mark has two I do have a question for you, though, sure,
Speaker 4: so I how important is it that people call you
Speaker 4: early after an accident? And I only asked this because
Speaker 4: when Mark and I were hit sideswipe there in Castle
Speaker 4: Rock and my face was all busted up, I refused
Speaker 4: an ambulance right. I thought I was fine. I was
Speaker 4: pretty shooken up. I just wanted to go home and
Speaker 4: go to bed. So I know Mark called you as
Speaker 4: soon as we got home. And then a couple hours later,
Speaker 4: I went to get a glass of water and I
Speaker 4: couldn't even make it back to my bedroom and I
Speaker 4: felt like I was going to faint, and Mark called
Speaker 4: you and said get her to the hospital now. And
Speaker 4: so it's just do you do that for every client?
Speaker 4: And how important is it that people call you early
Speaker 4: like that, like within the first couple of hours, even
Speaker 4: if someone thinks they're fine.
Speaker 6: So you've kind of got two issues going on there.
Speaker 6: I recall the phone call from Mark the day that
Speaker 6: you guys got in the accident. I was actually fishing
Speaker 6: up in Wyoming and got a call from you guys,
Speaker 6: and I was glad that I did. I was able
Speaker 6: to help and kind of get things started off on
Speaker 6: the right track. And that really is the important thing,
Speaker 6: is that you know, people don't know necessarily what to
Speaker 6: do when they've been in that accident. You know, what
Speaker 6: do we go to our PCP doctor? Do we go
Speaker 6: to the hospital.
Speaker 5: There's an ambulance hitting here that I know is going
Speaker 5: to charge me money.
Speaker 16: What do we do?
Speaker 5: Where do we go?
Speaker 6: Sometimes there's multiple people involved, there's three or four vehicles.
Speaker 6: Sometimes it's scary, and people don't know what the right
Speaker 6: thing to do is. And so the other side of
Speaker 6: the coin is that, in my heart of hearts, I
Speaker 6: truly believe that if I get involved in a case
Speaker 6: early on in the process, that when we're all said
Speaker 6: and done, I genuinely feel like I can put twenty
Speaker 6: five to thirty percent more money in your pocket, just
Speaker 6: because we set everything up right from the beginning, gotcha.
Speaker 6: And so when we were talking earlier about health insurance
Speaker 6: and Medicaid and Medicare and medpay and all this stuff.
Speaker 6: It really matters how you structure that stuff and what
Speaker 6: goes first. You know, sometimes people have these crazy high
Speaker 6: deductibles in today's world, and it's nothing to have, you know,
Speaker 6: five or six thousand dollars that you have to come
Speaker 6: out of your pocket first. You know, even though you
Speaker 6: weren't at fault and you've got everything else going on
Speaker 6: and you're out of work and all that, they still
Speaker 6: want you to pay that first six grand.
Speaker 16: You know.
Speaker 6: That's where medpay comes in. But it's only good if
Speaker 6: the hospital didn't build a medpay and take every penny of.
Speaker 5: It upfront and stuff.
Speaker 6: So you've got to really know how these things are
Speaker 6: supposed to work to get them to work best for you,
Speaker 6: got it, And if you do, then at the end
Speaker 6: of the day, there's going to be a better outcome,
Speaker 6: you know, And that doesn't that's before we even get
Speaker 6: to look at what kind of insurance the other guy
Speaker 6: has or how much or any of that stuff. That's
Speaker 6: just a matter of structuring your insurance to work best
Speaker 6: for you.
Speaker 4: Well, I know, we needed someone to think straight for
Speaker 4: us because we were so jarred and rattled from the accident.
Speaker 4: We couldn't think on neither of us. And I was
Speaker 4: more hurt than Mark was, but it was you know,
Speaker 4: it's nice having someone hold your hand through the process,
Speaker 4: and we'll thank you, give you the steps, you know,
Speaker 4: so John Fuller three oh three five nine seven forty
Speaker 4: five hundred, give him a call.
Speaker 6: Appreciate that, and we're going to go to a caller. Now, Drew,
Speaker 6: what is going on with you, sir?
Speaker 22: Yes, sir, I am being harassed and T Bank is
Speaker 22: stealing my money.
Speaker 5: Oh tell me more, Okay.
Speaker 22: I was staying in a hotel. The last time I
Speaker 22: was there, there was no heed. I immediately walked out
Speaker 22: and I asked TD bank to put a stop payment
Speaker 22: on the final night in the hotel. They wrote me
Speaker 22: back that they would only put a stop payment. This
Speaker 22: is in writing. I had to find somebody else who
Speaker 22: is also so swindled by the hotel. I had to
Speaker 22: find some other merchant. That's ridiculous. I was supposed to
Speaker 22: go throughout it with New Providence, New Jersey. I'm supposed
Speaker 22: to go throughout New Providence looking for another merchant who
Speaker 22: didn't have heat in the hotel, So that's wrong. So
Speaker 22: the director of the TD Bank said it should be
Speaker 22: put back in my bank account. TD Bank has not
Speaker 22: done that, okay.
Speaker 5: So let me ask you a couple of questions. Did
Speaker 5: this happen in Providence.
Speaker 22: New Providence, New Jersey?
Speaker 5: Okay? And when when was this?
Speaker 22: Who is back a year and a half ago. I
Speaker 22: didn't do anything because I thought they had put the
Speaker 22: money back in my bank account. Now I find out
Speaker 22: they didn't.
Speaker 4: Why didn't you just ask the hotel for a refund, Drew?
Speaker 4: Why did you go through Why didn't you just ask
Speaker 4: the hotel for a refund for no heat? Why did
Speaker 4: you have to go through your bank first?
Speaker 22: The hotel was going to give me a refund, but
Speaker 22: when the bank said they were going to do it,
Speaker 22: I didn't want to take two refunds, so I let
Speaker 22: the bank supposedly do it, but they didn't do it.
Speaker 22: They also harassed me. If I got to the bank
Speaker 22: at four forty five, the bank closes at five, I
Speaker 22: was in line and then I was thrown out of
Speaker 22: the bank at five o'clock. They refused to wait on me.
Speaker 22: They're simply harassing me because I reported this and another
Speaker 22: thing somebody used my bank card and charged one hundred
Speaker 22: and seventy dollars. I tried pulling it into customer service.
Speaker 22: I gave them my name, birthday address, social security number,
Speaker 22: phone number, and even the recent transaction, and they said
Speaker 22: that was not enough to identify myself. So ridiculu true.
Speaker 6: Is there any connection between the erroneous debit card and
Speaker 6: the hotel?
Speaker 5: Do you think?
Speaker 22: I don't know whether there's a connection between the bank
Speaker 22: and a hotel. I feel that the bank that a
Speaker 22: couple people there are harassing me when I went into
Speaker 22: report and asked or stop payment.
Speaker 6: Really, we've got different things. Hold on, We've got three
Speaker 6: different things going on here. You're not happy with the hotel,
Speaker 6: You're not happy with the bank handled your stop payment request,
Speaker 6: and on top of all that, somebody used your debit card,
Speaker 6: and then really the cloud hanging over all of that.
Speaker 5: Is just really crappy customer service at the TD bank.
Speaker 5: Have I got that figured out?
Speaker 22: They're the most convenient bank as far as I'm concerned,
Speaker 22: They're the most inconvenient bank.
Speaker 5: And so you gave them all ID when we ran
Speaker 5: into trouble with the bank.
Speaker 6: Why didn't you go back to the hotel and say,
Speaker 6: you know, it was too much trouble with the bank,
Speaker 6: just go ahead and give me my money back.
Speaker 22: I might have to do that, but I don't know
Speaker 22: if the hotel is going to remember from.
Speaker 6: Well, you've got the documentation from your bank that proves
Speaker 6: that you were there and that they build you right right.
Speaker 6: That I think is pretty pretty much proof that you
Speaker 6: were there and they can look it up. But I mean,
Speaker 6: have you know, listen, you got to vote with your
Speaker 6: feet in these situations. And if a company is not
Speaker 6: willing to provide you the level of customer service that
Speaker 6: you feel like you're owed, then you know there's plenty
Speaker 6: of other banks out there that are really trying to
Speaker 6: take your money. So we're going to come back and
Speaker 6: revisit the rest of those issues in just a moment.
Speaker 9: Hang on, Drew, go with a sure thing Denver's Best
Speaker 9: roofer Excel roofing dot com. You don't pay a cent
Speaker 9: until you're content. Time for an insurance check up free,
Speaker 9: no obligation. In comparison, call Compass insurance paying too much
Speaker 9: your coverage at dozens of insurance companies find out now
Speaker 9: three all three seven to seven to one help You'll
Speaker 9: think you're his only customer when you choose Frank durand
Speaker 9: the real estate man dot Com to list your home
Speaker 9: with Remax Alliance three All three nine two zero sixteen
Speaker 9: twenty two.
Speaker 5: Hey, welcome back to the Tom Martino Show. We are here.
Speaker 5: My name is John Fuller.
Speaker 6: I'm in a personal injury attorney here in Denver, Colorado,
Speaker 6: filling in for Tom and Mark today with the wonderful
Speaker 6: Suzanne right next to me helping out. And we had
Speaker 6: been on the phone with Drew for a while. I'm
Speaker 6: going to recap that issue. After Drew, We're going to
Speaker 6: talk to Mike with an issue with Phil Long. But
Speaker 6: in a nutshell, Drew was staying in a hotel in Providence,
Speaker 6: New Jersey, I believe, and found the heat to not
Speaker 6: be working correctly, so bad so that he decided to
Speaker 6: leave the hotel and take it up with his bank
Speaker 6: the next day and attempted to stop payment on that
Speaker 6: night's worth of the rent, and not quite sure exactly
Speaker 6: how the bank was supposed to figure out which or
Speaker 6: what portion of the charge they were trying to reverse,
Speaker 6: but nonetheless those efforts have failed. A year and a
Speaker 6: half has gone by, Drew still with the same bank,
Speaker 6: has never gotten his money back and now is upset
Speaker 6: with They tried to apparently throw him out of the
Speaker 6: local branch because he showed up at fifteen minutes before
Speaker 6: the end of the workday. And then, to add insult
Speaker 6: to injury, somebody used his debit card and ran off
Speaker 6: one hundred and forty dollars charge that nobody.
Speaker 5: Seems to have straightened out for you? Is that fair, Drew?
Speaker 5: Did I did I accurately recount the issues that you have?
Speaker 22: You did a very good job, except there was a
Speaker 22: seventy oh.
Speaker 6: One hundred and seventy bye, Sorry about that. So where
Speaker 6: was one hundred and seventy spent?
Speaker 22: Do you know?
Speaker 9: Uh?
Speaker 22: Supposedly it was spent at best Buy. It wasn't done
Speaker 22: by me because I don't use that card and I
Speaker 22: haven't been in best Buy in a year.
Speaker 5: So did you file a complaint with TD bank about
Speaker 5: that charge?
Speaker 22: I tried to. What happened was I gave them all
Speaker 22: my information, like I told you, even the transaction that
Speaker 22: I did at the bank that day I address social
Speaker 22: Security birthday, yeah right, and they said it's not enough information.
Speaker 5: Did you walk in the branch o, were you trying
Speaker 5: to do that over the phone.
Speaker 14: Phone.
Speaker 6: Yeah, you know, that's one of the lessons that I
Speaker 6: think it's just hard for people to accept. But if
Speaker 6: you're a person that carries a debit card, you have
Speaker 6: to understand that there's almost no protection for you as
Speaker 6: a consumer for charges that get made on that debit card.
Speaker 6: It is not a credit card.
Speaker 4: I only used mine for an ATM john. I've never
Speaker 4: used it to purchase I.
Speaker 6: Don't even do that. I learned that lesson the hard way.
Speaker 6: One day I used my card and I, you know,
Speaker 6: I just used the debit because I didn't want to
Speaker 6: run up debt.
Speaker 5: I just thought that was crazy.
Speaker 6: And no sooner than I had gone through a particular
Speaker 6: drive through, I think I had gotten back to my office,
Speaker 6: which was all of like seven minutes away, and somebody
Speaker 6: was at Walmart running up five or six hundred dollars
Speaker 6: in no time. And here's the crazy thing about it,
Speaker 6: Like I can't individually go and file a complaint with
Speaker 6: the police because they consider the bank to be the
Speaker 6: victim of it. So my only recourse is to go
Speaker 6: back and deal with the bank, and then they can
Speaker 6: do whatever they want to do with the fraud.
Speaker 5: It was really eye opening.
Speaker 6: But the long and the short of it is, and
Speaker 6: we've had callers on the show before, if you choose
Speaker 6: to use a debit card, you do it at your
Speaker 6: own risk, and there's a really good chance that if
Speaker 6: something happens or you get defrauded, there's not going to
Speaker 6: be any recourse from the bank.
Speaker 5: Is that kind of what they're telling you, Drew?
Speaker 22: Well, what they told me was all the stuff I
Speaker 22: gave him was not enough. They wanted to give me
Speaker 22: a code through the phone. But then they told me
Speaker 22: that a phone company could charge me a big phone
Speaker 22: bill if I looked them give me a code through
Speaker 22: the phone.
Speaker 6: Well, I don't know anything about that. I think, Drew,
Speaker 6: you're probably going to need to try to walk back
Speaker 6: in there during normal business hours and see if you
Speaker 6: can't follow a complaint and allege the fraud. Normally, if
Speaker 6: they decide that fraud actually happened, they're going to put
Speaker 6: that money back in your account and at least you'll
Speaker 6: get a little bit of relief out of it.
Speaker 5: Thanks for the culture.
Speaker 10: We forgot it.
Speaker 4: Another hour ago, John on the show.
Speaker 9: All right to look at court, go with a sure thing.
Speaker 9: Denver's best roofer Well Roofing dot com. You don't pay
Speaker 9: a cent until you're content. Time for an insurance check
Speaker 9: up free, no obligation. In comparison, call Compass Insurance. Pay
Speaker 9: too much your coverage at dozens of insurance companies find
Speaker 9: out now three oh three seven seven to one help.
Speaker 9: You'll think you're his only customer when you choose Frank
Speaker 9: durand the real estate Man dot com to list your
Speaker 9: home with Remax Alliance three oh three nine two zero
Speaker 9: sixteen twenty two.
Speaker 10: Yeah, ripped.
Speaker 1: News need so you don't have.
Speaker 16: Run insistas as we can.
Speaker 2: Shooter's gonna help Come Man.
Speaker 3: Six is the Troubleshooter Show Now, Tom Martine, Welcome.
Speaker 5: Back to the Tom Martino Show. My name is John Fuller.
Speaker 6: I am filling in for Tom and Mark today on
Speaker 6: the Only sho It's kind where we solve problems, answer
Speaker 6: questions and take complaints. We are here to help you
Speaker 6: out today. The phone number is Area GO three three
Speaker 6: seven one three eight two five five. Give us a call.
Speaker 6: We'd love to help you out with your problem. Sitting
Speaker 6: here with me in the studio today is as always
Speaker 6: Doc and the lovely Suzanne here by my side to
Speaker 6: help me out. Hey, Sean, Hey, yeah, you've got a
Speaker 6: couple questions over there, I do.
Speaker 4: I wanted to know something since you're a personal injury attorney,
Speaker 4: if I get a ticket when when an accident happens,
Speaker 4: when I'm in an accident. Let's say I'm speeding, which
Speaker 4: I would never do so, but if I were speeding
Speaker 4: and got a ticket for that or you know, asked
Speaker 4: during the accident, does that make.
Speaker 10: Me at fault?
Speaker 14: No?
Speaker 5: So, you know, here's the thing.
Speaker 6: Normally, there's not multiple tickets given to multiple parties when
Speaker 6: you have an accident. There's one guy that's going to
Speaker 6: be charged with careless or DUI or something, or reckless
Speaker 6: driving or something like that. And that's pretty despositive of
Speaker 6: the issue of who's at fault.
Speaker 5: But not always.
Speaker 6: So I've had cases where you know, a person is
Speaker 6: not at fault for the accident, but they just happened
Speaker 6: to be drunk at the same time, so they got
Speaker 6: a DUI. But being drunk didn't cause the accident, Like
Speaker 6: you can be drunk at a red light and get
Speaker 6: rear ended. Being drunk didn't cause it wasn't about.
Speaker 4: To give the other party a good case though, Like, hey,
Speaker 4: you're saying I'm at fault, but this guy was drunk
Speaker 4: when this happened.
Speaker 6: Yeah, and so I've even responded that, yeah, and you're
Speaker 6: lucky they were because they were nice and relaxed and
Speaker 6: they got less hurt as a result of you running
Speaker 6: into them.
Speaker 5: But really the two aren't connected.
Speaker 6: I mean, the fact that the person was drunk, if
Speaker 6: they did nothing wrong, they did not do anything negligently
Speaker 6: to cause the accident.
Speaker 5: It's a non issue. So so good question.
Speaker 4: Do you ever deal with like road rage accidents where
Speaker 4: there's personal injury as well? And I mean that must
Speaker 4: get a little bit hairy as well, because you have
Speaker 4: two people accusing each other of you know, pointing fingers
Speaker 4: of who started what.
Speaker 5: Yeah, yeah, unfortunately we do. So so here's kind of
Speaker 5: the thing.
Speaker 6: You know, road rage is one of those things that
Speaker 6: tiptoes over the line into intentional conduct. Okay, whenever you
Speaker 6: you know, pull off the road and try to get
Speaker 6: in a fight, or god forbid, pull a gun or
Speaker 6: do something crazy like that, that's an intentional act. And
Speaker 6: intentional acts aren't negligence. They're not going to be covered
Speaker 6: by your insurance. And so if if that happens and
Speaker 6: and you know, God forbid, somebody gets injured or shot
Speaker 6: or you know, beat up or something, chances are pretty
Speaker 6: good that their insurance company's going to deny that coverage completely.
Speaker 4: Oh, because it's a criminal case.
Speaker 6: At that point, it's not so much criminal, but it's intentional.
Speaker 6: So insurance can only cover you for things that were
Speaker 6: that were accidental, that were negligence, right, something that you
Speaker 6: didn't intend to happen. If you steered over on the
Speaker 6: sidewalk and ran over somebody because they had a Raiders
Speaker 6: shirt on, there'd be no in insurance coverage for that.
Speaker 5: That would be an intentional act.
Speaker 4: So if you're irritated at me and we're both driving
Speaker 4: and you do something intentionally to cause us to collide
Speaker 4: or whatever, your insurance can deny covering my damages.
Speaker 11: Yep.
Speaker 6: Absolutely, they're going to deny that completely because what I
Speaker 6: did was an intentional act.
Speaker 4: Is that where you get a personal injury attorney involved
Speaker 4: in to help with that?
Speaker 6: Maybe the case that the PI attorney can't do anything
Speaker 6: to help you because we can only go I mean literally,
Speaker 6: we can go after the person, but that comes down to,
Speaker 6: you know, are we trying to go after the person
Speaker 6: or after the insurance policy. That's that's where the money is.
Speaker 6: So you know, you could go after that person and
Speaker 6: that's kind of like we were talking with Tom earlier.
Speaker 6: You know, what's that judgment worth and what do they
Speaker 6: do and.
Speaker 4: Are they going to have to figure out their assets
Speaker 4: and all?
Speaker 6: Yeah, exactly. So really, in my practice, we want people
Speaker 6: to be insured. We want there to be a pot
Speaker 6: of money at the end of the rainbow that if
Speaker 6: we satisfy our burden of proof that we know we're
Speaker 6: going to get paid and the check going to clear
Speaker 6: and spend.
Speaker 8: One hundred and fifty bucks on a cam, a dash cam.
Speaker 8: The best advice you ever gave me, John.
Speaker 6: I can't stress that too much. I've had so many
Speaker 6: cases now where it's a he said, she said case,
Speaker 6: and believe it or not. We hate he said, she
Speaker 6: said cases because many times, unless there's a camera on
Speaker 6: the intersection or an independent witness, we're just never going
Speaker 6: to resolve that. And so the insurance companies on both
Speaker 6: sides say, well, we believe are insured and we're going
Speaker 6: to deny the claim. And so the only way that
Speaker 6: you can resolve that claim is to go fully through
Speaker 6: the litigation process. And it may not be a case
Speaker 6: that really justifies the expense and the time and all
Speaker 6: the you know, the trouble of going through litigation. One
Speaker 6: sure way to eliminate that issue completely.
Speaker 5: Is a dash cam.
Speaker 6: Wow, and it's amazing when you have that full color.
Speaker 6: You're like, we're talking to the insurance adjuster and they're
Speaker 6: giving you all this bs about denying the claim and
Speaker 6: you're like, oh, did I mention that I had the
Speaker 6: entire accident on tape? They're like, no, let me send
Speaker 6: that over to you, and about thirty seconds later they're like,
Speaker 6: we'll accept my ability.
Speaker 5: Done deal.
Speaker 4: So, folks, give John Fuller a call three oh three,
Speaker 4: five nine seven forty five hundred, give them a call
Speaker 4: and get a dash cam for crying out loud.
Speaker 6: Get that dash camp one hundred and fifty bucks at
Speaker 6: Toy Cars. Yeah, I think it's it's money. Well, Spark Toys.
Speaker 6: Excuse me, Mike, you have an issue with Phil Long
Speaker 6: in the Springs. Tell me what's going on, sir.
Speaker 14: Yeah. Hi, So I bought two vehicles from so Long
Speaker 14: eight months ago, and a twenty sixteen Ford Edge and
Speaker 14: a twenty eighteen Ford Edge sixteen for myself. The eighteen
Speaker 14: for my wife traded into vehicles both look Christine's seven
Speaker 14: year warranties. Know the kids who sold me the cars
Speaker 14: as father's the general manager and partner so long, so
Speaker 14: I trusted in them.
Speaker 11: About a month and a.
Speaker 14: Half after we purchased both of these vehicles, my twenty
Speaker 14: six started having some issues on my brakes, and I
Speaker 14: reached out to the guy who's the kid who sold
Speaker 14: me the car, and pretty much got ghosted. And then
Speaker 14: I finally reached out to the dealership and I got
Speaker 14: a hold of the service manager and I told them, look,
Speaker 14: you know something's wrong with my brakes. I need you
Speaker 14: guys to give me a loaner and you know, moving forward.
Speaker 14: So I take my car down there to give me
Speaker 14: a vehicle and they tell me three days later, come
Speaker 14: pick up your car. So I go down to pick
Speaker 14: it up and they say there's.
Speaker 11: Nothing wrong with the brakes.
Speaker 14: I take it to an independent mechanic who's as he certified,
Speaker 14: guy I have been using since I moved out here
Speaker 14: almost six years ago, and he tells me, as they're
Speaker 14: about shot and you're definitely grinding and you're going to
Speaker 14: be metal to metal sooner than later.
Speaker 11: So I let this go.
Speaker 14: For a minute, I got sidetracked. I'm opening up my
Speaker 14: own business out of my home, so I kind of
Speaker 14: just my car's been sitting in the driveway and we've
Speaker 14: been using my wife's twenty eighteen. So in the beginning
Speaker 14: of August, my wife and I decided to take a
Speaker 14: short vacation out to Vegas, and we drove out. We
Speaker 14: wanted to drive from Utahon and whatever. So on the
Speaker 14: way back from Vegas, I start feeling my wife's car
Speaker 14: same thing. So I reach out to so Long and
Speaker 14: I get myself a meeting with Chris to Tone, the
Speaker 14: general manager and partner so Long Forward, and I expressed
Speaker 14: my concerns to him. And while I'm sitting with him,
Speaker 14: I said, Chris, you know I don't understand you know,
Speaker 14: two cars. You know, I'm having the same issues on
Speaker 14: both of these vehicles. And now all of a sudden,
Speaker 14: it's my wife's vehicle and my vehicle can't be driven,
Speaker 14: and I need something done. I said, I want to
Speaker 14: return both of these, take one brand new car. We'll
Speaker 14: figure out the payment and move forward. And you know,
Speaker 14: he sits there and he starts expressing me, well, you
Speaker 14: know that's going to destroy your credit and I said, look, Chris,
Speaker 14: I'm a fifty six year old man. This is my
Speaker 14: first rodeo. I'm not asking. I'm telling you these cars
Speaker 14: aren't safe. And your ase certified mechanic told me there's
Speaker 14: no from wrong with the brakes. And he says to me,
Speaker 14: and I didn't say anything back to him. He says,
Speaker 14: who told you their ASEE certified man? And I thought, huh,
Speaker 14: you're so long forward. So you're hiring Goat mechanics.
Speaker 10: The fact of the.
Speaker 14: Matter is, man, that I've had my wife, my daughter,
Speaker 14: my four grandchildren in both of these vehicles that are
Speaker 14: not safe. I've done. I'm just going to move it
Speaker 14: forward really fast. Because I met with Chris about three
Speaker 14: and a half almost yeah, well it's a month now.
Speaker 14: I met with them on a Wednesday at ten am.
Speaker 14: At eleven fifteen, I left the meeting. He said, Mike,
Speaker 14: give me two hours. I'll get back to you. Thursday
Speaker 14: goes by, Wednesday goes by nothing, Thursday goes.
Speaker 10: By no call.
Speaker 14: So Friday morning, at eleven o'clock, after it was forty
Speaker 14: eight hours, not too I reached back out and I said, look,
Speaker 14: you know, nothing's going on here. And I have two
Speaker 14: unsaved vehicles, and what are we doing here? I said,
Speaker 14: I don't want to have to call an attorney. And
Speaker 14: I was told instantly, well, now that you said you're
Speaker 14: going to call on it to you need to have
Speaker 14: your attorney contact our corporate attorney. And I thought, okay,
Speaker 14: well here we go. I mean, so what I did
Speaker 14: moving forward was I called the bank up in Denver,
Speaker 14: which was Canvas Credit Union, and I did a voluntary
Speaker 14: repo on my wife's card because I stopped payments on that,
Speaker 14: and I stopped paying on the one that's still sitting
Speaker 14: in my driveway. Oh wow, that's due to be repossessed
Speaker 14: on October to twenty fifth. And I have a relationship
Speaker 14: with the bank and the gentleman I dealt with in
Speaker 14: the hold on I'm so sorry. Let me find a
Speaker 14: note here. But the department, he's like the lost mitigation,
Speaker 14: I believe, let's see.
Speaker 5: So why do that? That seems like kind of the
Speaker 5: nuclear really, but why do that? Is it the damage
Speaker 5: done from that greater than the cost of just fixing
Speaker 5: the brakes?
Speaker 14: Well, so the problem is they're telling me they'll have
Speaker 14: somebody look at these two vehicles that I've been paying
Speaker 14: on forts that are not safe, that don't have an
Speaker 14: ASC certified mechanic. And I've been to an attorney who
Speaker 14: said I absolutely have a case. The gentleman who came
Speaker 14: to pick up the car when I called for a
Speaker 14: voluntary repo told me that this is a very common
Speaker 14: issue with still Long and that they don't fix their warranties,
Speaker 14: and that he's picked up more cars from the bank
Speaker 14: people's homes and phill Long themselves that have the same
Speaker 14: issue that I've had. And I have a neighbor who's
Speaker 14: been fighting with so Long here so took her car up.
Speaker 6: Mike, what what warranties did you have on these cars?
Speaker 6: They both are they were they both still in warranty, right, Yeah, but.
Speaker 4: Those warranties wouldn't cover where in tearly breaks.
Speaker 5: What warranty did you think would have covered that.
Speaker 14: Bought these right? Well, we were told when we bought
Speaker 14: these vehicles, guys, that new breaks all around, new tires,
Speaker 14: new windshields, which I can see them.
Speaker 4: I'm gonna pull it, Tom. Do you have that in
Speaker 4: writing that you had that there was going to be
Speaker 4: new breaks. There was there was new this knew that
Speaker 4: If you have that in writing, Mike, you should send
Speaker 4: that over to us. We have an angel over there,
Speaker 4: but you better have it in writing.
Speaker 14: Okay, can you send me give me some information where
Speaker 14: I can send this information?
Speaker 22: So you guys going so Mike attorney?
Speaker 16: Who?
Speaker 5: Okay? So why didn't you hire the attorney and go
Speaker 5: that route?
Speaker 14: Well, I'm looking for a consumer advocate attorney that doesn't
Speaker 14: want six thousand dollars retainer.
Speaker 11: All I'm asking.
Speaker 14: For is I was just asking for one new vehicle
Speaker 14: that I wasn't even happy dealing with still Long because
Speaker 14: of all the people have told me. Bro, if you
Speaker 14: have to go to court for this, we will testify
Speaker 14: the guy who reposed for canvas hold me. I will
Speaker 14: go to court with you and tell them in open
Speaker 14: court how many people phill Long does this too?
Speaker 11: And this isn't just me, This is just a community of.
Speaker 14: Them allowing people to be unsafe on the road. All right,
Speaker 14: Not about myself, but my wife, my child.
Speaker 5: Mike, got it, I got it, Mike, Hang on a sec.
Speaker 5: We'll be right back after this.
Speaker 9: Go with a short thing Denver's Best roofer excel roofing
Speaker 9: dot com.
Speaker 15: You don't pay a cent until you're content.
Speaker 9: Time for an insurance checkup free, no obligation comparison call
Speaker 9: Compass Insurance paying too much your coverage at dozens of
Speaker 9: insurance companies find out now three all three seven to
Speaker 9: seven to one help. You'll think you're his only customer
Speaker 9: when you choose Frank durand the real estate Man dot
Speaker 9: com to list your home with Remax Alliance three three
Speaker 9: nine two zero sixteen twenty two.
Speaker 5: Good afternoon.
Speaker 6: This is John Fuller on the Troubleshooter Network here rounding
Speaker 6: out our four hour block today of fun filled excitement.
Speaker 6: We were just on the phone with Mike a few
Speaker 6: minutes ago. Mike bought a couple of cars from Phil
Speaker 6: long Ford in the in the Springs and ultimately had
Speaker 6: bad breaks on both of those, and Mike's trying to
Speaker 6: return his car and he's having some difficulty. Here's the
Speaker 6: bottom line. Mike has dropped off. He's going to get
Speaker 6: his paperwork and get back with us, hopefully tomorrow, and
Speaker 6: we'll try to get to the bottom of that. We
Speaker 6: do have an angel it feel long and we want
Speaker 6: to have the opportunity to reach out to them and
Speaker 6: see if we can't get to the bottom of it.
Speaker 6: But unfortunately these kind of issues really come down to paperwork.
Speaker 6: So if you're in the dealership and anything is getting
Speaker 6: promised to you, it's got to be on that paperwork.
Speaker 6: Do not leave with a handshake and a smile and
Speaker 6: a promise to get anything done.
Speaker 5: It will not stand up for you.
Speaker 4: And all he was left with is sound and fired
Speaker 4: up John he was I and I.
Speaker 6: Really feel sorry for the guy because he made some
Speaker 6: really poor decisions in my opinion, like doing a voluntary recall.
Speaker 6: If you can't get something resolved with the dealership, just
Speaker 6: call the bank and turn them in. That doesn't sound
Speaker 6: like the right course of action, particularly if he's trying
Speaker 6: to unravel those two and get a new car. No
Speaker 6: bank is going to loan y money if he's had two,
Speaker 6: not one, but two repossessions in the same instant over
Speaker 6: a break job.
Speaker 5: Doesn't make sense.
Speaker 4: It makes you wonder why he didn't just pay for
Speaker 4: a couple of break jobs. They can't be that, I know.
Speaker 6: I really hope that we've got an opportunity to maybe
Speaker 6: get some of this figured out before it's just too
Speaker 6: late for this guy.
Speaker 4: We'll reach out to it Angel.
Speaker 6: He'll get a hold of this tomorrow hopefully, and we'll
Speaker 6: figure it out. So got a couple more calls. Let's
Speaker 6: go to Stephen with the question about duuis. Go ahead,
Speaker 6: Steven Hi.
Speaker 20: So the case wasn't the vault about me, It's about
Speaker 20: my girlfriend. This was that happened in March of last year,
Speaker 20: twenty three, and she was driving to Uber Eats delivery
Speaker 20: and there was a car stalled on the highways on
Speaker 20: I twenty five southbound near the Tech Center, and she didn't.
Speaker 17: See it because the car in front of her all
Speaker 17: of a.
Speaker 20: Sudden swerved to get out of the way, and then
Speaker 20: when she saw the stalled car, it was too late.
Speaker 11: But because she was the one.
Speaker 20: Intoxicated slightly just over the limit, they gave her the citations.
Speaker 20: And I heard you guys talking earlier about this type
Speaker 20: of scenario. So my question just to wrap this up, Ken,
Speaker 20: can we can she still kind of fight this in
Speaker 20: court because she's having to go to these courts all
Speaker 20: of this d y and prove that she's not drinking, right,
Speaker 20: that's one issue, But I just wonder if they can
Speaker 20: get her out or some kind of I don't know fault.
Speaker 6: For Let me make sure I understand this. Your girlfriend
Speaker 6: was driving for Uber while intoxicated.
Speaker 11: Well, uber eats, that's what I am.
Speaker 6: So she was delivering food, but she was under the
Speaker 6: influence and got a DUI. Yeah, okay, so you've got
Speaker 6: a couple of things going on here. I was just
Speaker 6: talking to Doc earlier about this. When you hit somebody
Speaker 6: in Colorado, if you hit somebody from the back, there
Speaker 6: is a presumption that you're at fault. Now it's a
Speaker 6: rebuttable presumption, but the law starts out with an assumption
Speaker 6: that you were the person that was at fault. Because
Speaker 6: we all have a duty to avoid obstacles in our way,
Speaker 6: broken down cars. It's entirely foreseeable that somebody could have
Speaker 6: a you know, a breakdown and end up disabled on
Speaker 6: the side of the road. So you start with the
Speaker 6: presumption that she was at fault, saying that guy shouldn't
Speaker 6: have been there, you know, absence some really screwy circumstances,
Speaker 6: that probably is not going to be enough to overcome
Speaker 6: that presumption. When you add to that the idea that
Speaker 6: she was under the influence, then not only is she
Speaker 6: going to still be at fault for the accident, but
Speaker 6: depending on the circumstances and whether or not it was
Speaker 6: her first defense and a bunch of other factors. You
Speaker 6: really opened the door to even punitive damages for the
Speaker 6: idea of being out there drunk on the roads delivering food.
Speaker 6: I mean it's it's how does one wind up under
Speaker 6: the influence while they're working as an uber driver?
Speaker 4: Is that is that common?
Speaker 20: I there's a difference between the uber driver and well.
Speaker 6: I understand uber eats, but she's still going and she's
Speaker 6: on the job, right, I mean, come.
Speaker 20: On, I'm not defending her, but let me just say
Speaker 20: the same thing happened to me. And I wasn't drunk
Speaker 20: because I don't drink right, And there was a stall
Speaker 20: car and I was coming up on this was I
Speaker 20: seventy eastbound. You know where it goes over like Havana.
Speaker 20: There's like a little hump in the highway for sure,
Speaker 20: and it was right over the hump.
Speaker 16: But I didn't see it.
Speaker 20: I looked down in my app for like it seemed
Speaker 20: like one second.
Speaker 11: I look back up.
Speaker 20: There's a stalled vehicle. I got the citation for following
Speaker 20: too close.
Speaker 11: Okay, I'm paying my.
Speaker 20: Dues, but I'm just wondering.
Speaker 11: I mean, there's got to be some.
Speaker 20: Responsibility and obligation on the stalled vehicles.
Speaker 11: Why are they there?
Speaker 21: Did she take like a roadside test or a breathalyze
Speaker 21: or anything? Or are they just assuming she's drunk because
Speaker 21: she hit this vehicle.
Speaker 20: Oh I wasn't there, but I got a call from
Speaker 20: the sheriff and they said, come pick up your girlfriend.
Speaker 20: We're not going to put her in jail because she's
Speaker 20: very cooperative.
Speaker 9: Did she take an go with a sure thing Denver's
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Speaker 15: You don't pay a cent until you're content.
Speaker 9: Time for an insurance checkup free, no obligation comparison call
Speaker 9: Compass Insurance Paying too much your coverage at dozens of
Speaker 9: insurance companies find out now three all three seven seven
Speaker 9: to one help. You'll think you're his only customer when
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Speaker 9: to list your home with Remax Alliance three all three
Speaker 9: nine two zero sixteen twenty two.
Speaker 6: Good afternoon, John Fuller here on the Troubleshooter Network. We
Speaker 6: are having too much fun today. We are going to
Speaker 6: go right to the phones again. Here of Karen, You've
Speaker 6: got to call about a car moped accident.
Speaker 5: What's going on?
Speaker 22: Yes, I have.
Speaker 23: My daughter in law was involved in I guess the
Speaker 23: head on She was on her milk head and then
Speaker 23: got hit head on and she ended up in a
Speaker 23: hospital with injuries. And so they're wondering what are the
Speaker 23: first steps or first few steps about getting like an
Speaker 23: insurance in tale or what's the first couple of things
Speaker 23: they should do. This happened like a week ago.
Speaker 5: Okay, is she doing Okay? Today she's doing Okay.
Speaker 23: She's got a couple of broken bones and and things
Speaker 23: like that, but she's on the men.
Speaker 5: Where where did this happen, Karen? What city?
Speaker 23: It's actually in a different states?
Speaker 5: What state in Hawaii? Okay?
Speaker 6: So, and was your daughter ticketed or was she not
Speaker 6: at fault? Was it the other car's fault for the accident?
Speaker 4: Do you know?
Speaker 23: I don't know. That's my suggestion to them first is
Speaker 23: to get the police report. She was taken by ambulance, Okay,
Speaker 23: so I don't think she's in ticketed or anything.
Speaker 5: So everything, Karen really comes down to trying to figure out,
Speaker 5: first you know, who's at fault in the accident. Okay.
Speaker 6: I don't practice law in Hawaii. I don't know the
Speaker 6: exact system they have over there, but I can tell
Speaker 6: you that, you know, that would be step one for
Speaker 6: us if.
Speaker 5: It were here in Colorado. So and the reason why.
Speaker 6: That's really step one is we have to be concerned
Speaker 6: about who's ultimately going to be responsible for the medical
Speaker 6: bills that come out of that accident. And depending on
Speaker 6: the legal you know, framework they've got over there in Hawaii,
Speaker 6: it could be it probably will be the person who's
Speaker 6: that fault for the accident. The issue is whether she
Speaker 6: has to kind of front load that and pay for
Speaker 6: the medical care out of her own resources, or whether
Speaker 6: there's some mechanism to have either the auto insurance that
Speaker 6: she has over her mopad or even the other driver.
Speaker 6: So do you know, you know, does your daughter have
Speaker 6: health insurance as well on top of any any car insurance?
Speaker 23: I know she just applied for medicaid.
Speaker 5: Did she apply for medicaid because she was in the
Speaker 5: hospital and they were applying for her?
Speaker 23: She applied for it because she can't go to work.
Speaker 23: I don't know if they applied for it for her
Speaker 23: or I don't know those.
Speaker 6: But did she apply after the accident happened or before after? Okay,
Speaker 6: so it sounds like she didn't have her own health
Speaker 6: insurance before this accident, and they're they're trying to retroactively
Speaker 6: get her qualified for Medicaid, and there's nothing wrong with that.
Speaker 6: What that's going to basically do for you is to
Speaker 6: pay the initial bills of the you know, the hospital
Speaker 6: and the emergency room and and the different personnel that
Speaker 6: she saw there. That's going to probably cover her up
Speaker 6: until when she gets discharged, and then she's going to have,
Speaker 6: you know, the same challenges that I talked about earlier
Speaker 6: of getting follow up care. It's difficult to establish a
Speaker 6: primary care type relationship under under those circumstances. But again,
Speaker 6: you're going to want to talk to a personal injury
Speaker 6: attorney in Hawaii that can help advise you on exactly
Speaker 6: what the.
Speaker 5: Law is there. But in general terms, you're you're on track,
Speaker 5: You're you're you're spot on to want to get the
Speaker 5: police report and find out who really was, you know,
Speaker 5: was assessed fault in that if it's her. Did she
Speaker 5: have insurance on her moped?
Speaker 23: I don't know on the moped. I know, I believe
Speaker 23: she's got car insurance when she's driving a car, but
Speaker 23: I don't know if the moped was or not. So
Speaker 23: probably not.
Speaker 5: You never know.
Speaker 6: I mean, you would typically put the moped on your
Speaker 6: auto policy as well. And in that case, you'll want
Speaker 6: to just give them a call if she was the
Speaker 6: one that was at fault for the accident, because they
Speaker 6: have a duty to defend her and kind of fend
Speaker 6: off the other driver if there were any injuries for
Speaker 6: that driver, And so you want to give them a
Speaker 6: call right away and open up the claim. If she
Speaker 6: was not at fault and she was just a victim
Speaker 6: of somebody else's negligence, then you know, whichever PI attorney
Speaker 6: you get a hold of in Hawaii is going to
Speaker 6: be able to get that claim opened up and get
Speaker 6: things off to the races so that you can find
Speaker 6: out really what you know, sources of recovery you're going
Speaker 6: to have, and to kind of help her make some
Speaker 6: good decisions about how to use those ben if it's best.
Speaker 6: I mean, that really is the challenge that we run into.
Speaker 6: Are you in Hawaii as well?
Speaker 5: Or are you here in Denver?
Speaker 14: No?
Speaker 23: No, no, I'm in Colorado.
Speaker 5: Okay, So.
Speaker 23: Going with a personal they should you think they should
Speaker 23: contact a personal injury attorney for sure?
Speaker 6: Well, you know, listen, this is what I do for
Speaker 6: a living, and what you're telling me is that you
Speaker 6: know your daughter's in another state, You're not sure of
Speaker 6: exactly what the circumstances were, You're not sure of exactly
Speaker 6: what the coverage is. Sounds like she really doesn't have
Speaker 6: health insurance, or if she does, it's only because they
Speaker 6: just got her qualified for Medicaid, and you're really not
Speaker 6: sure of who is at fault.
Speaker 5: It sounds like to me.
Speaker 6: I would pick up the phone and call a PI
Speaker 6: attorney right away. I mean, there's really no downside. They're
Speaker 6: not going to charge you by the hour to talk
Speaker 6: to you and help try to figure out what the
Speaker 6: circumstance is. And if it turns out that she's not
Speaker 6: at fault and you've got a case there, that person
Speaker 6: is going to be able to help you get the
Speaker 6: best recovery of anybody, particularly when you're, you know, two
Speaker 6: thousand miles away in Denver, trying to help your.
Speaker 23: Daughter, right, right, Okay? Will that appen?
Speaker 14: Right?
Speaker 4: I hope your daughter is okay there.
Speaker 5: Karen for the call, Karen, good luck.
Speaker 23: She's out of hospital and she's you know, she's on
Speaker 23: the men.
Speaker 6: Good luck there, Karen, Thanks for the call. So you know,
Speaker 6: it's just another example of you know, you just don't
Speaker 6: know what you don't know when you get in these
Speaker 6: accidents and everything comes at you so fast. You're in
Speaker 6: the hospital, you've got an ambulance that's sending out a
Speaker 6: bill about two seconds after they drop you off, and
Speaker 6: you just, you know, it's hard to get everything organized
Speaker 6: and on track so that you can focus on just
Speaker 6: getting better. That's really all you want to focus your
Speaker 6: efforts on, is just recovering. Let somebody else do everything
Speaker 6: else if you have that opportunity.
Speaker 4: It did bring up a question in my mind, just
Speaker 4: because she brought up moped. I don't know what the
Speaker 4: law is, John, but recently there's been a new law
Speaker 4: or a change of law where motorcycles now can come
Speaker 4: up between vikers can come up between cars when you're
Speaker 4: coming up to a stop I'm pardon me, Ken, if
Speaker 4: you end up like if you don't see them and
Speaker 4: you hit them, who's at fault when they're coming up
Speaker 4: between you like that? John, I mean, that's just scary
Speaker 4: to me when I see them. They're not always slow either,
Speaker 4: so you know you're changing lanes, you know, when you're
Speaker 4: coming up to a stoplight, and you don't see this
Speaker 4: motor What happens there? How do they determine who's at
Speaker 4: fault on that?
Speaker 5: Yeah, you try to go all Kamala on Ken, right there.
Speaker 7: Goodness, I just meant to say that cars have to
Speaker 7: be stopped. Well, that's not what always happens.
Speaker 4: That's not what always happens Ken, when I'm in my experience.
Speaker 6: Yeah, so I believe that the law dictates that they
Speaker 6: can only do that, like at a traffic signal, where
Speaker 6: at least in theory, all the other cars are stopped
Speaker 6: and they can go up to the front. I think
Speaker 6: those I think it's crazy to do that most of
Speaker 6: the time. I think you're just asking for troubles, you know,
Speaker 6: and and and so it's going to come down to
Speaker 6: just the same analysis we use on everything else. Negligence
Speaker 6: is the you know, the failure and exercise do care
Speaker 6: under the circumstances. So, you know, did you do something
Speaker 6: that in the exercise of normal caution you shouldn't have done?
Speaker 6: You know, that's kind of your definition of negligence. Just
Speaker 6: the act of going up between the cars, I don't
Speaker 6: think in itself is going to make you necessarily liable
Speaker 6: for causing an accident because the law allows you to
Speaker 6: do that, right. But you know, if if we're all
Speaker 6: piled up at the front and the light turns green
Speaker 6: and we have a many you know drag race off
Speaker 6: the line and something happens, I could definitely see circumstances
Speaker 6: where where that would have you know, bad effects, that
Speaker 6: would have a.
Speaker 4: Bad just never looks like a good idea when they
Speaker 4: do it, that's all I mean. I love those guys
Speaker 4: out there and women, but then I mean, it never
Speaker 4: looks like a good.
Speaker 6: Idea with it scares me a lot of times because
Speaker 6: you know, what really is the scariest thing to me
Speaker 6: is that you don't always see them, and all of
Speaker 6: a sudden, it's just zoom right up beside you and
Speaker 6: you you know, That's.
Speaker 4: What I see most of the time, not like what
Speaker 4: Ken is saying, like where you're stopped and they're coming
Speaker 4: up fifteen miles per hour or less. That's not generally
Speaker 4: what I see.
Speaker 8: I don't think I've ever seen a motorcycle do less
Speaker 8: than twenty miles over the speed limit.
Speaker 7: They are unbelievable.
Speaker 5: Have you gone less than twenty miles over the speeder?
Speaker 11: Yeah?
Speaker 8: I mean every motorcycle. I see going on when I'm
Speaker 8: on I seventy or twenty five, they're just zooming past.
Speaker 5: Yeah, I you know, that's just one of those things.
Speaker 5: I don't know. Maybe you're doing twenty under the speed
Speaker 5: limit again. You know, Hey, we got to go to
Speaker 5: a break right now. Thanks, we'll be right back.
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Speaker 6: Welcome back to the last hour of the Tom Martine
Speaker 6: Troubleshooter Show. This is John Fuller filling in for Mike
Speaker 6: and Tom. We have a couple minutes left today. We're
Speaker 6: going to go right to the.
Speaker 5: Calls Bob, what's going on? Oh, Bob's gone, so we
Speaker 5: won't go to b I.
Speaker 4: Wonder what he was saying. That was Bob with elliam
Speaker 4: Landscaping is a referral list member of ours. No, maybe
Speaker 4: you want to say something about the motorcycle law or something.
Speaker 4: So John, I did have a question for you, being
Speaker 4: a personal injury attorney, how do you pay for deductibles
Speaker 4: when you're getting treatment after an accident, when you've been hurt?
Speaker 4: How does that work?
Speaker 6: Yeah, the very best way, if we're talking about health
Speaker 6: insurance deductibles, the very best way is to use our
Speaker 6: medical payments coverage to make make sure that it applies
Speaker 6: to your out of pocket maximums and your deductibles. And
Speaker 6: the very best way to do that is to get
Speaker 6: us involved early on where we can actually kind of
Speaker 6: jump in between the hospital and the ambulance and all
Speaker 6: the people that are trying to go after that met
Speaker 6: pay money. And there's a lot of reasons why they
Speaker 6: try to do that, But the quicker that we can
Speaker 6: get involved and help protect that money, the better we
Speaker 6: can dictate that it gets used in a way that
Speaker 6: covers those cops and deductibles. That's what it was intended
Speaker 6: to do. But there's ways in which some of these
Speaker 6: bad players sometimes can get in there and take advantage
Speaker 6: of that money where you don't really get the credit.
Speaker 4: For Okay, okay, gotcha. And then can you still claim
Speaker 4: damages even if you are at fault.
Speaker 5: Yeah, that's a tough one generally injuring. Noah, generally speaking.
Speaker 6: No, if you're at fault, you're not going to be
Speaker 6: able to recover against anybody. The only time that we
Speaker 6: run into weird situations like that is if you're a
Speaker 6: non negligent passenger in a car with a negligent driver,
Speaker 6: So you're you're in the front seat, the driver is
Speaker 6: the cause of the accident. Not only does the person
Speaker 6: in the other car have a claim against that driver,
Speaker 6: but you may have one.
Speaker 4: Oh, your passenger would have a claim, this would have
Speaker 4: a claim against you.
Speaker 5: Might very well.
Speaker 6: Yeah, if you're a non negligent passenger, you can file
Speaker 6: a claim. As long as it's not your spouse, you
Speaker 6: can file a claim against that negligent driver. Yep, that
Speaker 6: comes up all the time.
Speaker 4: Do you ever get like cyclists calling you for personal
Speaker 4: injury claims?
Speaker 10: For sure?
Speaker 5: And I mean absolutely.
Speaker 6: The downside of cycling is that the damages tend to
Speaker 6: be a lot worse when you get into an accident
Speaker 6: and we do handle a number of those cases. We're
Speaker 6: always happy to talk to motorcyclists.
Speaker 4: That have been I'm meant more bicyclist.
Speaker 5: Oh yeah, absolutely, yeah, you scare me.
Speaker 4: I love them, but they scare me being out there. John.
Speaker 6: You know, bicyclists have to adhere to the same rules
Speaker 6: of the road that cars do, and unfortunately the car
Speaker 6: drivers just don't see them that well, and so, you know,
Speaker 6: bad things happen, and the bikers a lot of times
Speaker 6: are just completely innocent victims and it's a complicated area
Speaker 6: of the law. If you get into that situation, absolutely
Speaker 6: give us a call. We we love handling those cases
Speaker 6: and helping those people recover.
Speaker 4: Yeah, and that's John Fuller at three three five nine
Speaker 4: seven forty five hundred or Personal injuryco dot com.
Speaker 5: Yeah. So hey, it's been a load of fun this afternoon.
Speaker 7: Yeah, and we got to give John props. I mean,
Speaker 7: he did an outstanding job.
Speaker 5: Thank you, so thank you. We're really impressed as we're
Speaker 5: nearing the ind here.
Speaker 8: And also for.
Speaker 7: Doctor to him to praise a lawyer, you know, he
Speaker 7: has to be good.
Speaker 5: That's really a big move for you. Doctor. I want
Speaker 5: to say I'm really proud of you today. We come
Speaker 5: a long way in just this short little two.
Speaker 7: Hours here, as long as you don't mention that evil
Speaker 7: five letter word.
Speaker 4: Did you ever practice any other kind of law, John,
Speaker 4: or has it always been personal injury for you?
Speaker 6: From the day I've been practicing. I began working in
Speaker 6: a a plaintiffs medical malpractice firm, but they did a
Speaker 6: little bit of everything, and then I kind of be
Speaker 6: doing what I do right now, and I've specialized in
Speaker 6: strictly personal injury cases for you know, the last twenty years.
Speaker 4: So do you practice in Florida at all? And I asked,
Speaker 4: because you have a house down there, and I know
Speaker 4: you spend a lot of time there.
Speaker 6: I've got family in Florida. We've always had kind of
Speaker 6: a little bit of a touch in Florida. But I've
Speaker 6: never practiced in Florida. I don't plan to practice in Florida.
Speaker 6: Florida has these nifty rules that say there's zero reciprocity.
Speaker 6: So there's no way I could ever practice in Florida
Speaker 6: unless I completely retook the.
Speaker 5: Bar and started over. And this old dog is not
Speaker 5: learning that new trick, so that'll never happen.
Speaker 4: Now, Can you represent your wife if she's injured in
Speaker 4: an accident, or does she have to get somebody else
Speaker 4: to do that.
Speaker 5: I could do that. Yeah, I could absolutely do that.
Speaker 8: Interesting, John, Are there multiple states that accept the Colorado
Speaker 8: bar and will admit you to their bar?
Speaker 6: Yes, all the states are different, and most states have
Speaker 6: deals where if they'll acknowledge us, will acknowledge them, and
Speaker 6: so there's kind of a reverse or you know, reciprocal acknowledgement.
Speaker 5: And you know, Flora is just not one of them.
Speaker 4: So that's John Fuller, Personal injuryco dot Com three oh three,
Speaker 4: five nine seven forty five hundred. Join us tomorrow on
Speaker 4: the Troubleshooter Show for Car Day, we have Kevin Culkin
Speaker 4: in studio.