Guide

What Insurance Needs After a Fire

If your home has had a fire, you do not need a perfect list today. You need a clear list, made in order, with what you can still show. This page walks through what an adjuster will usually ask for, how to record what is left, and what to do next — calmly, one step at a time.

This page is general information, not advice about your claim. Your policy and your insurer decide your claim. If anything here differs from your policy or from what your adjuster tells you, follow your policy and your adjuster.

First, safety and the first calls

1. Do not go back inside until fire officials say the building is safe to enter. Soot, weak floors, and hidden hot spots are real risks after the flames are out.
2. Call your insurer or your agent as soon as you can and open the claim. Write down the claim number, the adjuster's name, and every phone number they give you, on paper you keep with you.
3. Take reasonable steps to stop further damage — for example, covering a broken window — and keep the receipts for what you spend. Keep receipts for lodging and food too, and ask your adjuster what your policy covers for those costs.
4. Do not throw anything away yet, even badly damaged things, until your adjuster says you may. Damaged items are part of the record.

What the adjuster will ask for

For each lost or damaged thing, insurers work from the same basic facts. This is the field set used across the industry, in line with guidance from the Insurance Information Institute and the National Association of Insurance Commissioners, checked October 2026:

For each item	What to write down
What it is	Brand, make, and model — for example, the maker and model name on the label
Where it was	The room it was kept in
Numbers on it	Serial number and model number, if it has them
When and for how much	Purchase date and purchase price, as close as you can get them
What it costs today	Replacement cost today — what a like item costs now
Age and condition	How old it was and what shape it was in
Proof you owned it	A receipt, a warranty paper, a bank or card statement line, or a photo of it in your home
Photos	Photos of the item in place before the loss, if you have them, and photos of what remains now

You will not have every line for every item. Fill in what you can, say plainly what you are estimating and how, and do not guess at a serial number. An honest partial record is worth far more than a padded one.

The proof of loss

Many policies ask for a signed statement called a proof of loss. It is a formal list of what was lost or damaged, when the loss happened, and what you say the loss is worth, in the form your insurer asks for. Your insurer may send you its own form or worksheet — there is no single form every company uses — and it may set a deadline for it in your policy. Ask your adjuster, in writing if you can, which form they want and by when, and keep a copy of everything you send.

Our free home inventory template includes a blank proof-of-loss worksheet with those same fields laid out, so you can gather the facts in one place before you copy them onto your insurer's own form.

Photographing what remains

1. Work room by room, in a set order, so nothing is skipped. Start at the door of each room.
2. Take wide photos of the whole room first, then closer photos of each damaged item where it lies.
3. Photograph labels and serial plates up close, even on damaged goods. A readable model number can settle a long argument in seconds.
4. Photograph empty spaces too — shelves, walls, and floors where things stood. The space itself helps show what was there.
5. Keep the photos in date order and back them up outside the house — in email to yourself, in cloud storage, or on a drive kept elsewhere — the same day you take them.

Making the salvage and damaged-goods list

As you and the adjuster sort through things, keep two lists: what was destroyed, and what was damaged but may be cleaned or repaired — often called salvage. For each entry, note the item, the room, a short line on its condition now, and where it is being kept. Do not clean or repair things before they have been seen and recorded, unless your adjuster tells you to. If you must move things for safety, photograph them first, where they were.

Where an inventory made before would have plugged in

If you had a room-by-room list made before the fire, this is the moment it would do its work: brand, model, serial number, purchase date, price, and a photo in place, already written down, ready to hand over. If you do not have one, that is the common case, and it is not a reason to blame yourself now — claims guides commonly put it at 30 to 50 percent for how much people underestimate or forget their own belongings when they work from memory alone. Rebuild what you can from bank and card statements, email receipts, photos on your phone, warranty registrations, and the memories of everyone who lived in the house, room by room. Then, when you are settled again, make the list once, properly, while everything is in front of you. The InventoryByHand app is built for exactly that job.

The Insurance Information Institute puts the reason plainly: an up-to-date inventory helps you "get your insurance claim settled faster, verify losses for your income tax return and help purchase the correct amount of insurance."

Next steps, in order

1. Keep every paper together: claim number, adjuster notes, receipts, and copies of everything you send.
2. Finish your room-by-room list of destroyed and damaged items, with photos of what remains.
3. Ask your adjuster which proof-of-loss form they want, and by when, and complete that form from your list.
4. Send copies, never your only originals, and note the date and way you sent each thing.
5. Keep updating the list as you remember items — tell your adjuster when you add something, and keep the note of when you told them.

You do not have to do all of this in one day. Do it in order, write down what you do, and keep copies somewhere outside the house. A steady, honest record is the strongest thing you can hand an adjuster.