Leland Coontz III

I started my career working for a restoration contractor in South Orange County, California — handling slab leak claims, fire losses, and construction consulting while learning Xactimate, the estimating software that dominates the property insurance industry. From there I moved into catastrophe adjusting as an independent insurance adjuster, deployed to major disasters across the country and internationally — Hurricanes Katrina, Rita, Ike, Sandy, Harvey, and Irma, numerous California wildfires,Hurricane Odile in Mexico, and the Christchurch earthquake in New Zealand. I wrote estimates, inspected losses, and negotiated settlements on behalf of the carriers. That experience — from the contractor side and the carrier side — gave me a thorough understanding of how insurance companies evaluate, document, price, and close claims from the inside.

I transitioned to the policyholder side because I saw firsthand how the system is designed to under-compensate people who don't know their rights. And frankly, it's a lot more fun to help underpaid or even victimized policyholders than to work for bureaucratic insurance companies. As a California Licensed Public Adjuster, I now use everything I learned on the carrier side to advocate for homeowners and business owners — reading the same policies, using the same estimating tools (Xactimate, Symbility), and speaking the same language the carrier's adjusters speak.

Over the course of my career, I've handled many millions of dollars in insurance claims across the United States and internationally, including Mexico and New Zealand. My work spans every major type of first-party property loss — residential and commercial, from single-room water losses to multi-million-dollar wildfire total losses.

Most property insurance policies contain an appraisal clause — a binding dispute resolution process where each side selects an appraiser, and the two appraisers select an umpire. When the appraisers cannot agree, the umpire reviews both positions. Agreement between the umpire and either appraiser sets the binding award.

I have served as both appraiser and court-appointed umpire on hundreds of insurance disputes. Attorneys, policyholders, and courts retain me when they need someone who understands policy language, construction estimating, and the practical realities of how claims are valued and paid.

If your claim is stuck in a valuation dispute, or if you need an experienced appraiser or umpire, contact me to discuss your situation.

When you file an insurance claim, your insurer sends their own adjuster — someone whose job is to evaluate (and minimize) what they pay out. A Public Adjuster is a licensed professional who works exclusively for you, the policyholder.

A PA reads your policy, documents your loss, prepares the claim, and negotiates with the insurance company on your behalf. A 2010 Florida government study (OPPAGA Report 10-01) found that PA-represented claims received higher gross payments than unrepresented claims — though the study did not control for claim complexity, PAs tend to take on larger and more disputed losses, and after deducting PA fees, the net policyholder recovery was roughly comparable for smaller claims. What the data consistently shows is that policyholders with professional representation are better positioned to receive the full value of their claim, particularly on larger and more complex losses.

In California, Public Adjusters are licensed and regulated by the California Department of Insurance. We work on a contingency fee basis — a percentage of your settlement. If we don't improve your outcome, you owe nothing.

You can verify any Public Adjuster's license on the California Department of Insurance license lookup.

InsuranceClaimsInfo.com is a free educational resource with over 500 articles on property insurance claims — from basic concepts like how deductibles work to advanced topics like efficient proximate cause, anti-concurrent causation clauses, and the appraisal process.

Every article is written from the policyholder's perspective, with California law cited where applicable. The site also includes interactive tools — a contents inventory tool, a claims knowledge quiz, and guided reading paths for different claim situations.

Nothing on this site is legal advice. But understanding how claims work, what your policy says, and what the regulations require puts you in a far stronger position — whether you handle the claim yourself, hire a Public Adjuster, or retain an attorney.