Terms and Conditions

• In an emergency, call 911. BuildSOS can't send help.
• Our guides are general information, not legal, insurance, building or medical advice.
• Accounts are free. Keep your password private and your details accurate.
• The Verified Seal means a contractor passed our checks. It isn't a guarantee of their work.
• Offers from The Home Depot and other partners are set by them, not us.
• Don't misuse the site or copy our content to sell.
• There are limits on what we're responsible for.

The full terms are below. The short version doesn't replace them.

If you or someone else is in danger, call 911 or your local emergency number. In many areas you can also text 911. Follow the instructions of local officials and emergency services.

BuildSOS gives general information. We aren't an emergency service. We don't watch the site for calls for help, and we can't send anyone to you. We don't send alerts or warnings. Our pages don't show live weather, evacuation orders or official warnings, and during a fast-moving event the information on our site may be out of date. Follow your local emergency management office and the National Weather Service, and sign up for your county's emergency alerts.

During a storm or disaster, power, phone and internet services can fail, and our site may be slow or offline too. Don't count on reaching it when you need it most. Print or save the information you need before a disaster.

If you're struggling emotionally after a disaster, call or text 988, or chat at 988lifeline.org, to reach the 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline.

These terms apply whenever you use the site. They work together with our Privacy Policy, which explains how we handle your information.

When you create an account, you agree to these terms and to our Privacy Policy by checking the box on the sign-up form on our member portal (portal.buildsos.com). If you don't agree, please don't create an account or use the site.

The site is for people in the United States, mainly homeowners and contractors who want to prepare for, respond to and recover from disasters. Much of our content is written for particular places, especially areas exposed to hurricanes and storms such as Florida and the Gulf Coast. Laws, programs and building rules differ from state to state, so check what applies where you live.

You must be at least 18 years old to create an account. Anyone can read our public pages.

BuildSOS accounts are free. If we ever add paid features, we'll show you the price and terms before you're charged anything.

When you create an account, you agree to:

• Give accurate information and keep it up to date.
• Use your own email address, and confirm it when we send you a link.
• Keep your password private. Don't use it on any other site.
• Keep the account to yourself. Each account is for one person, so contractors shouldn't share one login across a crew or company.
• Tell us right away at info@buildsos.com if you think someone else has used your account.

You're responsible for what happens under your account, unless it happened because of something we did wrong.

Our member portal sends the emails you need to use your account, such as sign-up confirmations and password resets. Signing up for our weekly tips or the Resilience Playbook is separate, and you can unsubscribe from those emails at any time. Our Privacy Policy explains this in more detail.

The BuildSOS team (our staff and editors) signs in to a separate staff area to manage site content. Staff accounts are only for people we have authorized, and only for BuildSOS work. We may require team members to use extra security, such as two-step sign-in with an authenticator app. Team members must not share sign-in details or codes, and must only upload images and other material we have the right to use. We can remove staff access at any time.

Our articles, guides, checklists, videos, podcast episodes and the Resilience Playbook are for education. They're general information, not advice for your situation. They are not:

• legal advice
• insurance advice, or advice about a specific claim or policy
• engineering, architectural or building-code advice
• financial, tax, lending or grant advice
• medical or mental-health advice

About insurance. We aren't an insurance company, agent, broker or public adjuster. We don't act for you on any claim, and we don't negotiate with insurers. Read your policy, and talk to your insurer, your agent, or a licensed public adjuster or attorney about your claim.

Talk to a licensed professional before making decisions about your home, your insurance, your money or your health. That could be an attorney, a licensed public adjuster, your insurer, a licensed engineer or contractor, a financial adviser, or a doctor.

We work to keep our content accurate and current. Still, disaster programs, insurance rules, deadlines, laws and building codes change, sometimes quickly after a disaster. Always check details with the official source, such as FEMA, your insurer, your state, or your local building department. Some figures on the site are examples or estimates. Check them before you rely on them.

Some contractor features are new or still being built. They include the Contractor Finder (our Find a Contractor page), the Verified Seal and its tiers, and the Marketplace. They may not be available yet, and they may change.

How the Seal works. The Verified Seal has three tiers:

• Silver. The contractor's business passed a verification check run by BuildZoom, an independent company. The check looks at the business's license, insurance and track record. A contractor with an active Silver Seal can appear in the Contractor Finder.
• Gold. Silver, plus completing the BuildSOS contractor curriculum and passing our Certification Review.
• Platinum. Gold, plus a further identity, background and quality check by Profile Gorilla, another independent company.

A contractor's verification can show as pending while checks are underway. We can suspend or remove a Seal at any time, for example if a license or insurance policy lapses.

Fees. Silver, Gold and Platinum Seals for qualifying contractors are free with BuildSOS membership. We'll tell you in advance if this ever changes. Payment never affects whether a contractor passes a check.

What the Seal means. The Seal means a contractor passed the checks for their tier, using the information available when each check was done. We re-check contractors every 3 months for license, insurance and permit activity.

What the Seal does not mean. The Seal isn't a guarantee, warranty or endorsement of any contractor's work. In particular:

• we don't employ, supervise or control contractors, and they aren't our agents
• we don't guarantee the quality, price, safety, timing or legality of any work
• a license or insurance policy that was valid when checked can later lapse, change or be canceled
• we aren't part of any agreement between a homeowner and a contractor, and we don't handle payments between them

If you're hiring. Do your own checks before you sign anything. Confirm the contractor's license with your state licensing board, and ask for proof of current insurance. Get a written contract and more than one quote, and be wary of anyone who asks for a large payment up front.

If you're a contractor. You agree to:

• give accurate information to us, to BuildZoom and, for Platinum, to Profile Gorilla
• tell us right away if your license or insurance changes
• not use the Seal, a tier name, or anything that suggests you hold them, unless your account shows that Seal or tier as active
• stop using the Seal right away if we suspend or remove it

Courses and certifications. Some of our programs, such as FortiGuide and the contractor assessment in the Resilience Game, lead to a BuildSOS accreditation or certification. These show that you completed our program. They aren't a government license, and they don't replace any license, permit or certification your state or another body requires.

We may point you to offers from suppliers and partners. These include member pricing in our Marketplace and The Home Depot's Pro Xtra program. The supplier or partner sets the terms of these offers, not us, including prices, eligibility, availability, returns and warranties. When you use an offer, your agreement is with them. Offers can change or end at any time.

If you give us your Pro Xtra phone number on our member portal, we use it only to link your BuildSOS member discount to your Pro Xtra account once your account is set up. The Home Depot decides who qualifies for Pro Xtra and what the discount is.

Our Marketplace page is a preview while we set it up. Nothing on it is an offer to sell until the Marketplace opens.

Our site links to mobile apps, including Disaster AIDvisor, Policy AIDvisor, Claims AIDvisor, the Resilience Game and Disaster Diaries. They're separate from this website, and you download them from the Apple App Store or Google Play. Each app's own terms and privacy notice apply when you use it, along with the app store's rules. These website terms don't cover what you do inside an app, such as uploading an insurance policy. The general-information limits above apply to anything those apps tell you, too.

Please use the site fairly and lawfully. You must not:

• break the law, or help anyone else break it
• give false information, pretend to be someone else, or create accounts for other people without their permission
• submit forms in bulk, with fake details, or using someone else's email address
• use bots, scrapers, crawlers or other automated tools to copy content or collect data (normal search engine indexing is fine)
• try to get into accounts, the staff area or any part of our systems you aren't allowed to use
• probe, scan or test our security without our written permission
• interfere with the site, overload it, or spread malware
• copy, resell or republish our content, except as allowed below
• use the site to harass anyone, send spam, or mislead homeowners

If you find a security problem, please email us at info@buildsos.com before you do anything else, and give us a fair chance to fix it.

We own the content on the site, or we have permission from the people who do. That includes text, guides, the Resilience Playbook, videos, graphics, the design and the software. It's protected by copyright and other laws.

You may view, download and print our content for your own personal, household or business use. That includes sharing a link with a client or neighbor, or printing a checklist. You may not sell our content, remove our copyright notices, or present it as your own.

Right now members can't post content on the site. If we add features that let you, we'll update these terms.

BuildSOS, the BuildSOS logo, the Verified Seal, the Resilience Game and the Resilience Playbook belong to BuildSOS Inc. as its trademarks. Don't use them in a way that suggests we endorse you or your business. Contractors with an active Seal may display it as we allow.

Other names and logos on the site belong to their owners. These include The Home Depot, Pro Xtra, BuildZoom, Profile Gorilla, FEMA, FORTIFIED, YouTube, Apple and Google. Mentioning them doesn't mean they sponsor or endorse BuildSOS.

We welcome ideas and suggestions. If you send us feedback, we may use it to improve BuildSOS without paying you or owing you anything. We won't publicly name you as the source without your permission.

Our site links to other websites and services. These include government agencies, partners, app stores, and YouTube and podcast platforms. When you leave our site, the other site's own terms and privacy policy apply. We don't control those sites and aren't responsible for their content, products or practices.

Videos on our pages are hosted on YouTube. A video only loads from YouTube when you choose to play it.

We work hard to make BuildSOS useful and reliable, but we provide the site and its content "as is" and "as available". This means that, as far as the law allows, we make no promises, either written here or implied by law, that:

• the site will always be available, uninterrupted, secure or free of errors
• the content is complete, accurate or current for your situation
• following our content will prevent loss or damage, or produce any particular result with an insurer, lender, agency or contractor

Some states don't allow certain disclaimers. In those states, these apply only as far as the law allows.

As far as the law allows, BuildSOS and its owners, officers and employees won't be liable for:

• indirect, incidental, special, consequential or punitive damages (losses that don't flow directly from what we did)
• lost profits or lost data
• loss or damage, including damage to property, that results from relying on our general information, or from a contractor's or supplier's work or products

These limits don't apply where the law doesn't allow them. For example, they don't apply to harm caused by our gross negligence, fraud or willful misconduct, or to consumer rights that can't be waived. Nothing in these terms limits our liability for death or personal injury caused by our negligence where the law doesn't allow that.

If you live in New Jersey, the disclaimers and limits in this section and in "What we don't promise" don't apply to the extent New Jersey law prohibits them, including liability for negligence that causes personal injury or property damage.

To the extent the law allows, if someone else makes a claim against us that is caused by your breach of these terms or your violation of the law, you agree to cover our reasonable costs of that claim, including reasonable legal fees. This doesn't apply to anything caused by our own fault.

You can stop using the site at any time. To close your account, email info@buildsos.com from the email address on the account. Our Privacy Policy explains how to ask us to delete your information.

We may suspend or close an account, or block access to the site, if someone breaks these terms, puts other people or the site at risk, or if the law requires it. Where it's reasonable and safe to do so, we'll tell you why. We may also change, pause or stop any part of the site.

The sections on content ownership, what we don't promise, limits on what we're responsible for, misuse claims, and which laws apply continue to apply after your account closes.

The laws of the State of Delaware apply to these terms, even if another state's laws would normally apply. Any dispute about these terms or the site will be heard in the state or federal courts in East Baton Rouge Parish, Louisiana, unless the law where you live lets you bring it closer to home. Nothing here takes away the consumer protections your own state gives you.

If you have a problem, please contact us first. Most issues can be resolved quickly by email.

We may update these terms as BuildSOS grows, for example when new contractor features launch. When we do, we'll post the new version here and change the effective date at the top. If a change is significant, we'll tell account holders by email at least 30 days before it takes effect. If you keep using the site after a change takes effect, that means you accept the new terms.

• If a court finds part of these terms unenforceable, the rest still applies.
• If we don't enforce a term right away, we can still enforce it later.
• These terms, together with our Privacy Policy, are the whole agreement between you and us about the website.
• You may not transfer your account or these terms to anyone else. We may transfer them to a company that takes over BuildSOS.

• Company: BuildSOS Inc.
• Mail: 21212 Smith Road, Covington, LA 70435
• Email: info@buildsos.com
• Account closing and privacy requests: info@buildsos.com