Free tool · Decision aid
Should I hire a public adjuster?
Six questions, one recommendation: PA-first, attorney-first, or both stacked. The same logic our editorial team applies on intake reviews.
Three paths, three different costs
The decision between hiring a public adjuster, an attorney, or both is rarely a close call once the right facts are on the table. The trouble is that most policyholders don't know which facts matter. They search for "should I hire a public adjuster" and land on a law firm blog written to convert them into litigation, or they search for "do I need an insurance lawyer" and land on a PA firm blog written to convert them away from one.
The honest answer depends on three things: the posture of your claim (active negotiation vs. coverage interpretation vs. bad-faith conduct), the size of the claim (because contingency math works very differently at $50K vs. $500K), and the clock (statute-of-limitations exposure constrains the legal options).
This tool walks through those three things in six short questions.
PA decision tool
Should I hire a public adjuster, an attorney, or both?
Six questions. ~90 seconds. Educational, not legal advice.
What's the status of your claim right now?
How we weight the answers
PA-first is the default outcome and the most common recommendation, because most claims are valuation disputes — scope, depreciation, sublimit application — that a public adjuster is purpose-built for. Contingency at 10–20% on a 60–180 day timeline beats litigation contingency at 33–40% on an 18–36 month timeline whenever the dispute can be resolved without a lawsuit.
Attorney-first kicks in on three signals: a denial that turns on policy interpretation (where the question is whether the loss is covered, not how much the loss is worth), a stale claim with statute-of-limitations exposure (where the legal clock is the binding constraint), or a clear bad-faith conduct pattern with significant dollar exposure (where bad-faith remedies and Brandt fees are reachable through litigation but not through PA negotiation).
Both, stacked is the right answer on large complex claims where bad-faith conduct is present and the claim size justifies the layered fee structure. The dominant model on stacked engagements is PA-led documentation followed by attorney-led litigation if negotiation fails. The fee math, when Brandt applies, is often better than the headline contingency percentages would suggest.
The tool is not a substitute for a written claim review on your specific facts. It is a sanity check on the recommendation you'll get when you have that conversation.