LACOMBE, La. — Beverly Barnett moved from Mississippi to Louisiana with the hopes of finding her dream home. Now two years after living in Lacombe, she's putting her house up for sale as she is just six months away from losing it due to the expense.
Owning the home has become a bigger liability than she bargained for.
"This has become not my dream home anymore, it's become my nightmare house because if I don't sell it, I'm going to lose it," Barnett told WWL Louisiana.
Barnett said she used to pay $1,800 a year for home insurance. Since September, her rates have doubled, raising her insurance to $4,000 with an increased mortgage of $1,700.
"I noticed a larger draft than usual on my checking account," she said.
From there Barnett called her insurance company, Louisiana Citizens, who failed to notify her of the insurance increase.
"The response I got was 'Oh yeah the insurance went up,'" she claimed. "I had to raise my deductible to almost 10k in order to afford to stay here till I could get the house sold."
Barnett said she also applied for the fortified roof program to lower her home insurance rates.
When she asked how much the program would lower her rates, she was told by a representative that there currently isn't anything in place to lower the cost and "it would be in January before they could even speculate on what a lower insurance rate would be on the wind and hail."
Already on a fixed income, the 67-year-old has three other side jobs, working 110 hours a week to make ends meet.
“Unless you have dual incomes, you can’t afford to pay the bills that you were paying," Barnett explained. "I’ve canceled my life insurance, I’ve canceled my health insurance, I’ve canceled my burial insurance, things that I no longer think I need just to have a place to live."
Now she's forced with a decision to either sell her brand-new truck or have a place to sleep.
“It’s come down to a choice of either have a way to go or have a place to sleep and right now a place to sleep is a little bit more important than a way to go," she said.
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