When a commercial claim gets hard, owners reach for help, and three very different professionals answer the phone: public adjusters, policyholder attorneys, and consultants. They are not interchangeable. Each has a legal lane, a cost structure, and a right moment. Hiring the wrong one first is one of the most expensive sequencing mistakes an owner can make.
What each one actually does
- Public adjuster. A state licensed professional who represents you, the policyholder, in adjusting the claim. They can measure and value the loss, prepare the estimate, and negotiate the settlement with your carrier on your behalf. They typically charge a percentage of the recovery, often in the range of 5 to 15 percent depending on the state, claim size, and timing.
- Policyholder attorney. A lawyer who represents you against the carrier when the dispute is about coverage, policy interpretation, bad faith conduct, or when litigation or appraisal is on the table. Fee structures vary: hourly, contingency, or hybrid. When the fight is over what the policy language means, or the carrier's conduct itself, this is the only professional with the full toolkit.
- Consultant or owner's representative. Someone like me. I organize the loss: documentation, photos, timelines, inspections, contractor scopes, and the project side of putting the building back together. What a consultant legally cannot do in most states is negotiate your insurance settlement or interpret coverage for a fee. That is licensed activity, and anyone unlicensed offering to do it is breaking the law and putting your claim at risk. I stay firmly in the documentation, oversight, and advocacy lane, and I connect owners to vetted licensed pros when the claim needs them.
How to think about sequencing
- Start with organization, always. Whoever you eventually hire will do their job faster and better on top of a clean file. Documentation discipline costs almost nothing and benefits every path.
- Claim moving but undervalued? A public adjuster earns their percentage when the gap between the carrier's number and the real scope is bigger than their fee. On large losses with real scope disputes, they often pay for themselves several times over.
- Coverage denied, exclusion invoked, or carrier conduct smells wrong? That is attorney territory. A public adjuster cannot argue policy interpretation in court, and a denial letter is a legal document that deserves legal eyes.
- Claim paid but project chaotic? That is where an owner's rep matters most, because winning the claim and then losing the money to a bad contractor is a very real ending.
Questions to ask before hiring any of them
- Are you licensed in my state, and can I verify it? (Public adjusters and attorneys both.)
- What percentage or rate, and what does it apply to, the whole recovery or only the increase you obtain?
- Who exactly will work my file, and how many claims are they carrying?
- Have you handled my building type and my loss type before? Ask for specifics.
- What is your exit if I am not satisfied?
One warning: after major storms, unlicensed operators blur these lines on purpose. Contractors promising to handle your claim, consultants promising settlements. The lines exist to protect you. Anyone eager to cross them will cut corners elsewhere too. If you want help thinking through which professional your situation actually calls for, and introductions to vetted ones, start a conversation.
And whoever you hire, stay in the driver's seat. Signing with a professional does not mean going silent on your own claim. Read what goes out under your name, keep your own copy of the file, and expect regular reporting on a schedule you set. The owners who get the best outcomes treat hired advocates as instruments of their strategy, not replacements for their attention.
Organize first, hire the adjuster for valuation fights, hire the attorney for coverage fights, and keep an owner's rep on the project either way.