Considering flip on house with extensive fire damage

[Chris Schuler]

Can I encourage the seller to file a claim against their homeowners insurance for some of the repairs? Are there legal issues with repairs being initiated in the midst of or immediately prior to a sale? It seems the owner is an investor that just wants to be rid of the property. The damage is fairly extensive, and obviously I'm going to have a large rehab budget on this, but there's room for profit: the listing price is about $90,000 below local comps that are sold as-is, and $120,000 below improved properties in the area. Trying to figure out how to post pics from the mobile app.