Water pipes will burst and fires will ravage homes. Which is why Brad Hager thought his job as a damage assessor at an insurance company was secure, even in a nasty recession.
But executives at his small company decided to cut back as a precaution, leaving Hager unemployed and worried about making mortgage payments on the Summerville home where he and his wife, Melissa, are raising two young girls and a teen-age foster son.
The Hagers had prepared to wait out the tough economic times. Brad, a painter who saw business slow last summer, took the job at the insurance firm after intentionally seeking out an industry he thought was recession-proof.
“This is all so surreal. I still don’t believe it,” said Melissa while attending a recent foreclosure prevention seminar in North Charleston. “If it’s happening to us, it’s really bad.”
it was only a few years ago that Charleston played host to the TV show “Flip this House” on A&E;, which featured local realtor Richard Davis running around buying dilapidated homes, fixing them up and flipping them at a handsome profit. Boy have times changed….