Author’s Note: Azmina and Sasha Kanji’s home on Saddle Peak was one of 33 Topanga homes lost in the Palisades Fire. They shared their shock and devastation with TNT at the time and have agreed to share some details of their experience since. Not everyone’s experience will be the same but there will be similarities and lessons for us all to learn.
If your home burns down and you are insured, the first thing you do after the initial shock and finding temporary shelter is call your insurance company.
Azmina and Sasha’s home had been insured with California Fair Plan since 1987. They offered Azmina $400 per sq ft to re-build her home. Lesson number one: don’t accept the first offer because, says Sasha, it’s more like (up to) $750 a sq ft to re-build. “Especially if you need a new foundation.”
While they can’t give the exact figure they ended up getting, as some of the payout was sent directly to the mortgage company, six months later they have received their final payment from California Fair Plan.
Their plan is to keep the mortgage going after the re-build rather than pay it off from the insurance payout and they have applied for forbearance (three months at a time) on the repayments, to be added on at the end of their mortgage.
“Right now, we’re feeling pretty good,” said Azmina.
Sasha is more circumspect. “We’ll have to make some compromises here and there but it looks as if we have enough money to rebuild.”
The first company they hired to design and assess how much the re-build would cost said they needed a new foundation, a significant extra cost. The Kanjis are going to ask for a refund of their $40,000 fee because a second opinion said they didn’t need a new foundation. Lesson number two: get a second opinion.
Sasha said, “A great development for us is that through my mom’s Buddhist group we met structural engineer, Kit Miyamoto, CEO of Miyamoto International and President of the California Seismic Safety Commission, who lives in Topanga and offered to double check the other company’s findings. The planning department agrees with Kit that the foundation is safe to build on.”
The county gave approval to use the old foundation a nail-biting 24-hours before the Army Corps of Engineers was coming to clear the debris from the fire and dig out the foundation.
Kit Miyamoto introduced the Kanjis to an architect and builder in Woodland Hills who they are happy with and they are at the end of the planning stage where the schematic plans have been completed.
“Our goal is to start building in September and be completed by June, 2026. We need to hold out hope that LA County is as fast at approving permits as they claim they’ll be,” said Sasha. “We’re hoping we’ve got our application in before the big rush.”
Sasha spent so long on hold with the insurance company trying to get an adjustor to agree to pay out that the Kanjis hired a private adjustor to budget the re-build and handle the negotiations with California Fair Plan.
“Ultimately, I feel we made all the right moves in the end. We have our insurance money, we have a plan,” said Sasha.
Hiring your own adjustor costs 7-15% of the insurance pay out. The Kanjis think it was a good call because the insurance payout he achieved was higher than the initial offer and more than covered his fee.
Azmina and Sasha say they were slightly under-insured on their dwelling but massively under-insured on their possessions which were insured for $100,000 and didn’t come close to covering the cost to replace items that are irreplaceable. A Tiffany lamp valued at $125,000 wasn’t insured, along with other precious items collected during a lifetime of international travel.
“Everything is gone or badly damaged,” said Azmina. “Photographs, jewels, my coin collection, art. All irreplaceable.”
For Sasha, the most painful loss is stickers he had drawn with a friend that were stuck around his room. Worthless to anyone else, but priceless to him.
Lesson number three: Fireproof safes are not built to withstand endless flames and are not heatproof. Sasha said, “Our safe turned into a giant oven and items were basically dry-baked. Jewels inside and some cash were burned or blackened beyond repair.”
The house burned and smoldered for several days. There was no water to put it out with and no one turned up to try.
“We have a fire hydrant outside our house that was dry,” said Azmina. The same thing happened in 1993. If I hadn’t had a pump for my pool, the house would have burned down then because the fire hydrants were empty and they’ve been empty ever since.”
Surely Azmina kicked up a fuss back in 1993 about there being no water? “Of course we did! We went to all these meetings and they promised they would do a better job and now it’s the same s***.”
Sasha added, “It’s long term systemic failures.” Which is why the Kanjis are part of a class action with Engstrom, Lipscomb & Lack who are suing the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power (LADWP), other government agencies and Southern California Edison (SCE).
The Kanjis don’t blame firefighters for their home being left to burn but they do feel Governor Gavin Newsom and Mayor Karen Bass have performed badly.
“Karen Bass and Gavin Newsom come out for the cameras but don’t seem to accomplish anything. Bass has spent more time deflecting blame rather than trying to solve the problems. I think that when you see these types of failures this is why the Democrats are in disarray. Their defense seems to be ‘at least we’re not as bad as the other side’,” said Sasha, a Democrat.
Did anyone do a great job? “The Army Corps of Engineers were fantastic. They contracted out to Kiewit. We stayed onsite with them and fed them twice a day. They went way beyond,” said Sasha.
Azmina said, “My neighbor Victoria Charles really came through for me
and brought me clothes and toiletries. She went to donation sites and collected things for me and continuously has been awesome. Kathy Smith gave me somewhere to stay for a nominal rent. She’s been so supportive. And Sea n Soul Surf in Malibu were very generous with clothes donations to anyone who lost everything in the fire.”
After a traumatic loss, it’s not unusual to develop emotional and physical illness from the stress of it. Sasha, who was laid off from his job two weeks after the fire, has been diagnosed with and is being treated for PTSD. Azmina has developed an illness since the fire for which she is being treated.
When anyone re-builds it can be plus or minus 10% of the original square footage. “We’re plus 10,” said Sasha. “And this house will be more fireproof.”
Kit Miyamoto has designed a house that can be exposed to flames for two hours before it will become compromised. “We have a shutter system on the windows that is popular in Japan. Heavy duty shutters that roll down manually so we don’t have to worry about the power being out,” said Sasha.
The only parts of their home that survived the fire were painted navy blue: the wall around the pool and the planters. Azmina said, “In Morocco there’s a place called Chefchaouen, in the Rif Valley. Every house and surface is painted different shades of blue because desert heat and fire don’t like blue. Our new home will be painted blue.”
Lesson number four: paint your house blue.
The Palisades Fire is going to impact everyone’s home insurance fees. California Fair Plan, the insurer of last resort when no one else will insure us and no one else will, is funded by other insurance companies. CFP received a bailout from insurance companies to cover the enormous cost of the payouts. Those companies have the right to claim that money back from their customers within two years so everybody’s premiums are going to go up.
Sasha said, “Our philosophy right now is to build a house that’s worth paying higher premiums for.”
