Free printable · after a fire, flood, or storm
Free After-the-Disaster First Steps Checklist
Almost everything that decides an insurance claim happens in the first week, and most of it happens before anyone has thought about a claim at all. This free checklist is that week, in order: what to photograph before anything moves, who to call and what to write down, how to stop the damage getting worse without losing the evidence, and the figures to find on your own declarations page. Print it and work down it, or open the spreadsheet and set a status on each line.
Take it with you — free, no signup
Direct download. No email, no account — just the files.
What it does
- Puts the eight first-72-hour actions in the order they actually have to happen — and flags the ones that cannot be done later, the photographs above all.
- Names the thing people lose most: additional living expenses generally begin the first night a covered loss makes your home unfit to live in — often the night of the event itself — and the receipts are what that coverage gets paid against. Start the log on night one.
- Sends you after the paperwork early — the full policy and the declarations page, in writing, because a summary is not the policy — and after a federal disaster declaration, which opens FEMA and the SBA on their own separate clocks.
- Lists the figures on the declarations page that decide what you get paid, with room to write yours in: the dwelling, contents and additional-living-expense limits, the deductible, and the one most people have never checked — whether contents are covered at replacement cost or actual cash value.
- Warns about the contract signed in the driveway on day three, and about starting permanent repairs before the adjuster has seen the damage.
- Comes as a printable PDF and a spreadsheet. The PDF has a drawn checkbox on every line to tick by hand; the spreadsheet opens pre-filled with a fictional household's progress, with a Status you pick from a list and a count of how far along you are.
- Stores no policy logins, passwords, or full account numbers — it records what you have done and what you still need, never the keys, so there is nothing in it a helper should not see.
- Prefer to read the whole method first? The Ardent Workshop tutorial “How to document a home insurance claim after a disaster” walks it end to end — what to photograph, how to value what you lost, and which deadlines to write down.
Related reading
Own it, don't rent it
Want the tool that works out what you are actually owed?
This checklist is the first week, and it stops there on purpose. It values nothing and tracks nothing. The full Disaster-Recovery Claims & Rebuild Binder does the two calculations that decide most of what a household gets paid: a loss inventory that takes each item's category and age and works out its actual cash value AND the depreciation being held back — the second payment that is easiest to forget, because nothing prompts you to claim it — and a living-expenses log that computes the claimable increase over what you normally spent, run against your policy's limit. Then a deadline clock for proof of loss, the contents inventory, the FEMA application and appeal, and the depreciation window; a ledger following every claim from claimed to approved to paid to outstanding; contractor bids against the insurer's own estimate; a receipt log; and a live dashboard. Thirteen connected tabs (Excel, Google Sheets, or LibreOffice) plus four guides.
A one-time purchase you keep and own — the owned binder between a shoebox of adjuster letters and a rented claim app, for a rebuild that outlasts most apps.
A checklist — not insurance, legal, tax, or public-adjusting advice. Ardent Workshop is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or connected to FEMA, the Small Business Administration, any insurance company, or any government agency. It does not file anything, does not value your loss, does not adjust your claim, and guarantees no result. What is covered and when anything is due are set by your policy, your state, and the letters your insurer, FEMA, or the SBA send you — always work from the deadline printed on the letter in your hand. The example household is fictional. Free to use; please don't resell or redistribute.