Natural Disaster Case

Luca and Laura Russo

Tie to Chapter 15 - Homeowners and Micro insurance portion of the chapter

Luca, 28, along with his wife Laura, 27, and their two kids Matteo, 3, and Stella, 7, recently lost their home in a tornado. They inherited the house from Luca's parents when they passed away after paying off the mortgage. Although the house was old and in need of repairs, not having a house payment allowed them to be financially stable. The family is currently homeless. They were staying with a friend until recently, when Luca got into a conflict with the owner. For the past week, they have been staying in a motel, but will soon be out of their small savings and are concerned about continuing to use their credit card for necessities. Laura's parents live out of state and are financially and logistically unable to help the family. They hope to live at the motel and possibly back with their friends until they can figure out something more permanent.

Luca works as a waiter full time, making around $24,000 a year. Laura is a stay at home mom but sometimes babysits for the neighbors and does hair part-time to make a little extra cash. The family would like to collect on their homeowners insurance policy, but are unsure whether the policy covered them. They want to rebuild debt-free, and stay move close to the children's school and Luca's job.

Unique financial aspects papers are not specifically based on textbook chapters. Instead, students should mainly use non-textbook references (e.g., journal articles, CFPB) for the paper. (See description in syllabus)

Unique Financial Aspects content:Natural disasters and finances

Questions to guide your inquiry for the "Unique Financial Aspects" narrative:

1. What are the unique financial challenges for people who have been through a natural disaster?
2. What help do emergency services provide for people to help them with their finances?
3. What options do people have after disasters to regain their financial stability and security?