A recent federal decision out of Iowa should make every roofing contractor, restoration contractor, and public adjuster take note if they enter into contracts before a loss occurs. The case, PHG Inc. d/b/a Pinnacle Roofing Consultants and P&L Apartments LLC v. Nationwide Mutual Insurance Company, 1 centers on a motion for summary judgment by Nationwide and a pre-loss assignment of insurance benefits to a roofer. The court’s ruling is nuanced, but the message to those using pre-loss assignments is crystal clear: you are skating on very thin legal ice.
P&L Apartments LLC owned apartment buildings in Iowa, insured under a commercial policy issued by Nationwide. Pinnacle Roofing Consultants, formally PHG Inc. d/b/a Pinnacle Roofing Consultants, had an ongoing relationship with the property owner and monitored storms that might affect the owner’s buildings. On April 1, 2023, before any storm loss occurred, P&L signed an assignment of benefits in favor of Pinnacle Roofing. That document purported to transfer “any and all claims, demands and causes or future causes of action” that P&L had or might have against Nationwide under the policy.
On July 28, 2023, a hail and wind event allegedly damaged the P&L property. P&L, working with a public adjusting firm, Semper Fi Public Adjusters LLC, submitted a claim and, eventually, a sworn proof of loss to Nationwide. The proof of loss listed Semper Fi in places where the form asked about other interests in the property and named insureds, even though Semper Fi had no ownership interest and was not a named insured. The proof of loss claimed over $16.4 million in damage, supported by Semper Fi’s estimate. Nationwide had already paid about $350,000 on the claim in December 2023, before the proof of loss was submitted. The assignment of benefits to Pinnacle Roofing was not produced to Nationwide until around September 4, 2024, after litigation had begun.
Nationwide moved for summary judgment on all claims. First, it argued that Iowa law enforces anti-assignment provisions in insurance policies against pre-loss assignments. The policy contained a standard clause that the insured’s “rights and duties under this policy may not be transferred” without Nationwide’s written consent, except in the case of death of an individual named insured. Nationwide never gave written consent.
Under Iowa Supreme Court precedent, pre-loss assignments without consent are invalid, and an assignee like Pinnacle Roofing has no standing to sue the insurer. Nationwide asked the court to throw out Pinnacle’s contract and bad faith claims entirely on that basis.
Nationwide did not stop there. It also argued that by entering into the pre-loss assignment, P&L itself violated the policy’s anti-assignment clause and thus failed to comply with a condition precedent to suit. The policy also contained a “legal action against us” clause requiring “full compliance with all terms” before the insured can sue.
From Nationwide’s perspective, the mere act of signing that pre-loss assignment was a disqualifying breach by P&L, barring P&L from bringing any lawsuit under the policy.
Nationwide further contended that P&L’s failure to disclose the assignment on the sworn proof of loss and its late production amounted to intentional misrepresentation, concealment, and breach of the cooperation clause, voiding the entire coverage under the policy’s fraud and misrepresentation provisions.
Finally, Nationwide argued that the bad faith claims should fall both because there was no viable contract claim and because plaintiffs had not come forward with any evidence that Nationwide lacked a reasonable basis for its coverage position. 2
P&L and Pinnacle were apparently represented by the same attorneys and responded with several joint arguments. They contended that Nationwide had effectively waived any right to rely on the anti-assignment clause by continuing to investigate and adjust the claim after the assignment existed. They pointed to other claims involving entities affiliated with P&L’s owner, in which benefits had been assigned to Pinnacle Roofing and Nationwide had nevertheless adjusted and resolved the claims. They argued that an insurer who treats a policy as valid and continues adjusting with knowledge of a forfeiture condition can be deemed to have waived it.
More importantly, the plaintiffs argued that the correct legal consequence of a pre-loss assignment in Iowa is not a forfeiture of the insured’s rights, but the invalidation of the assignment itself. They cited Iowa cases and Eighth Circuit authority, noting that pre-loss assignments in the face of an anti-assignment clause are “invalid and unenforceable” as a matter of contract law. Their point was simple but powerful: if the assignment is void or voidable by operation of law, then P&L never truly transferred its rights, and the policy is not void as to P&L. Any attempt by Nationwide to treat the same assignment as invalid for Pinnacle yet fatally valid for P&L was, in their view, an attempt to “have it both ways.”
On the misrepresentation issue, plaintiffs stressed that the proof of loss form asked about named insureds and ownership interests in the property, not about assignments of claim benefits. Pinnacle Roofing did not own the property and was not a named insured, so its omission was not a misrepresentation. Listing Semper Fi as having an interest was at most an error, they argued, and there was no evidence of intent to deceive or of any material impact on coverage. On bad faith, plaintiffs essentially said it was too early to decide; discovery was ongoing and might reveal evidence of unreasonable claim handling. 3
The federal court issued a detailed opinion that cut through the confusion and sorted the claims actor by actor. First, the court had little trouble concluding that Pinnacle Roofing, as the pre-loss assignee, could not sue Nationwide. The anti-assignment clause was valid and enforceable under Iowa law. The assignment was signed in April 2023, months before the July 28, 2023, loss date. Nationwide never consented to any transfer of rights.
The court noted that the plaintiffs offered no actual evidence that Nationwide knew of this particular assignment during claim handling, and knowledge from other cases involving other properties did not automatically carry over. Without actual knowledge of this assignment, Nationwide could not have waived the anti-assignment clause. As a result, Pinnacle Roofing had no rights under the policy, and its breach of contract and bad faith claims were dismissed.
Nationwide wanted the court to rule that by signing the pre-loss assignment, P&L itself violated a condition precedent and thereby forfeited its right to sue. The court rejected that position. Looking to Iowa precedent, the judge read the cases as treating pre-loss assignments in violation of anti-assignment clauses as “invalidated,” not as nullifying the insured’s policy rights entirely. If the attempted assignment was legally ineffective as to Nationwide, then P&L never successfully assigned its rights, and thus could not be said to have breached the policy in a way that barred suit. The court explicitly noted the unfairness of allowing Nationwide to argue that the assignment is void to defeat Pinnacle’s claims, but somehow effective enough to create a disqualifying breach by P&L.
The proof of loss issue is one that all public adjusters should pay attention to. The court refused to grant summary judgment based on alleged misrepresentation or concealment. The fraud provision in the policy required an intentional concealment or misrepresentation of a material fact. The proof of loss did not clearly call for disclosure of assignment of claim benefits. P&L’s omission of Pinnacle from the “other named insureds” and “ownership interest” boxes was not obviously false, because Pinnacle was neither. Listing Semper Fi as an entity with an interest in the property was simply wrong, but the record did not compel a finding that this was an intentional scheme to mislead. And materiality was at least debatable, given that the court had already ruled the assignment itself legally ineffective. All of this meant that a jury could reasonably find no intentional, material misrepresentation by P&L. Summary judgment for Nationwide on that ground was denied, and P&L’s breach of contract claim survived.
On the bad faith claim, however, P&L ran into trouble. Under Iowa law, a bad faith plaintiff must show the insurer had no reasonable basis for denying benefits and knew or should have known that its position lacked such a basis. Nationwide argued that plaintiffs had no evidence at all on those elements. P&L did not respond with substantive evidence or specific facts, and its request for more time to take discovery failed to comply with the procedural requirements and local discovery rules. The court stressed that summary judgment is the “put up or shut up” moment; simply hoping that discovery might later reveal bad faith is not enough. With no evidentiary showing, the court granted summary judgment on P&L’s bad faith claim.
So, where does this leave everyone? Pinnacle Roofing is out of the case entirely. Semper Fi remains in the background as the public adjuster that prepared the large loss estimate and helped prosecute the claim, but it is not a party. P&L Apartments continues forward on a breach of contract theory, arguing that Nationwide underpaid a multimillion-dollar hail and wind loss, while Nationwide insists that its payment and coverage decisions were consistent with the policy and the facts. The bad faith claim is gone.
The case is not over, and there will no doubt be more lessons as discovery, expert work, and trial unfold. I will follow up with additional commentary as significant rulings or developments arise.
For roofers, mitigation contractors, and restoration contractors in the habit of using pre-loss assignments of insurance benefits, this case should be treated as a red flare on the horizon. The court’s ruling is entirely consistent with the majority rule around the country that anti-assignment clauses are enforceable as to pre-loss assignments.
That means if you are a roofing contractor like Pinnacle Roofing Consultants, and you rely on a pre-loss assignment of “any and all claims” without the insurer’s written consent, you are almost certainly an assignee without rights. You may spend time, money, and effort chasing a claim only to discover you have no standing to enforce it. Worse, your paperwork may provoke arguments that the policyholder breached the contract, forcing them into a needless fight over conditions and misrepresentation rather than focusing on the actual storm damage.
The lesson is not that roofers and policyholders cannot work together or that contractors cannot be compensated from insurance proceeds. The lesson is that pre-loss assignments of policy rights in the face of an anti-assignment clause are a legal problem. Where allowed and properly entered into, post-loss assignments, narrow work authorizations, direction-to-pay agreements, and carefully drafted contracts that respect policy language and state law are far safer roadways than broad pre-loss assignments that purport to transfer “any and all” rights under the policy. Those sweeping AOB forms might look powerful in a sales packet, but as this case shows, a judge can turn them into mere scraps of paper.
Thought For The Day
“The strength of a nation derives from the integrity of the home.”
—Confucius
1 PHG Inc. v. Nationwide Mut. Ins. Co., No. 24CV-1028, 2025 WL 2383420 (N.D. Iowa Aug. 15, 2025).
2 See, Nationwide’s Motion for Summary Judgment.
3 See, PHG’s Response to Motion for Summary Judgment.