Home Insurance
Your home is one of your biggest assets, and it’s important to do all that you can to protect it. We’ll help you plan for the unexpected with insurance coverage that’s just right for you and your family.
Home insurance covers anywhere you might call “home”. It includes houses, condos, apartments, mobile homes, trailers, or any home (house, apartment etc.) that you rent. If you live in it or own it, we can create a customized policy to cover the building and/or the stuff inside.
Your home is both a valuable asset and the center of your life, so it’s extra-important to cover every risk with homeowners insurance. Get the right policy and you’ll take care of the small and large risks related to owning a house at the same time.
For example, a devastating fire could result in not just the total loss of your home, but financial ruin. Without adequate home insurance you could be left with no way of raising the funds to pay off the balance of the mortgage. Of course, homeowners insurance may also protect you from more common house-related incidents like pipe leaks, burglary of personal possessions and much more.
We write comprehensive policies with some of the best coverage in the business including replacement cost for your personal possessions, and even guaranteed replacement is available for your home itself.
Coverage you can expect to see on a standard homeowner policy:
Dwelling Coverage
Personal Property/Contents
Other Structures
Loss of Use/Additional Living Expenses
Personal Liability
Medical Payments
Miscellaneous Coverage
Off-Premises Theft
Dwelling Coverage
Dwelling Coverage
- Risk Factor: Imagine you had a fire in your home. Besides the emotional impact, the physical damage to your home can be significant. If you lost your home to fire, do you have adequate insurance to replace your home and its contents? Remember, inflation rates on building materials and construction costs rarely track with real estate values. As a result, rebuilding a home can often cost significantly more than expected.
- Solution: Make sure your homeowners policy contains guaranteed replacement cost coverage or at the very least, an additional percentage of increased construction costs coverage. This protects you if the cost to reconstruct your home is higher than your current limit of coverage. Also be sure that your insurance includes rebuilding your home to code.(called Ordinance or Law coverage) Often, local ordinances and building codes change over time, which may require additional funds.
- Covers Perils such as: Fire & Smoke, Lightning Strikes, Windstorms & Hail, Explosion, Vandalism & Malicious Mischief, Damage from an Aircraft, or Vehicle, Theft, Falling Objects, Weight of ice, snow or sleet
Personal Property/Contents
Personal Property/Contents
- Risk Factor: When your home suffers damage due to an unexpected event, ou personal property is also at risk. Furniture, appliances, clothing, electronics, and other personal items can also be damaged or destroyed.
- Solution: Your homeowners insurance policy typically covers personal property, including the contents of your home and other personal items owned by you or family members who live with you. Make sure your homeowners policy includes replacement cost coverage for personal property so tat you always receive the full cost to replace whatever item is damaged.
Other Structures
Other Structures
Includes, but is not limited to items such as detatched garages, sheds, barns, pergolas, swimming pools, fences,
Loss of Use/Additional Living Expenses
Additional Living Expense/Loss of Use
- Risk Factor: When there is substantial damage to your home due to unexpected events such as lightning, fire, or a storm, you may not be able to live in your home until it can be repaired or rebuilt – potentially incurring additional living expenses for lodging, food, and other daily needs.
- Solution: Ensure that your homeowners insurance policy provides additional living expense or loss of use coverage to compensate you for the additional costs you incur for reasonable housing and living expenses if a covered event makes your house temporarily uninhabitable while it’s being repaired or rebuilt.
Personal Liability
Personal Liability
- Risk Factor: In the unfortunate event that someone slips and falls while on your property, you and your family may be held liable for any injuries that result.
- Solution: Your homeowners policy includes personal liability coverage to respond to incidents where injuries or damages occur to a third party where you may be deemed negligent. However, you should consider purchasing a personal umbrella or excess liability policy to provide additional coverage limits to prtect your assets in case a lawsuit is brought against you.
Medical Payments
Medical Expenses
- Risk Factor: If a guest is injured while on your property, even when it’s due to a friendly game of baseball, you may be required to pay any medical expenses associated with their injury. This coverage is also important as a lawsuit deterrent, as covering an injured guest’s out of pocket medical expenses makes them less likely to sue.
- Solution: Your homeowners policy should include medical expenses coverage to take care of injuries and treatment – generally not of a serious nature. In the event a person is injured on your property and requires medical attention, you would be able to submit the injury-related medical expenses to your insurance carrier. Medical expenses are usually paid without a liability claim being filed against you.
Miscellaneous Coverage
Miscellaneous Coverage
- Risk Factor: The fun that comes with having a trampoline in your backyard can also be accompanied by serious risks, which may not be covered under your standard homeowners insurance policy since coverage varies from state to state and between insurance companies.
- Solution: You should make sure your homeowners insurance policy covers your trampoline, as many insurance providers refuse to take on trampoline liability and exclude them from coverage. Best practices include regular inspection/maintenance, a secure perimeter net, and only allowing one child on the trampoline at a time.
- Most homeowners policies will cover water damage from burst pipes or water heaters when the cause is sudden and accidental (but not the damage to the pipe or water heater if they burst because of defect or wear and tear). So, if your water heater bursts and soaks your drywall, you’re likely protected from the water damage. Water damage from a flood requires a separate flood insurance policy. Water damage from water backup from sewers or drains or overflow of water from a sump pump typically requires additional optional coverage.
Off-Premises Theft
Off-Premises Theft
- Risk Factor: Surprisingly, standard auto insurance does not cover personal property or contents stolen from your car.
- Solution: Most home policies offer an option to include off-premises theft coverage as an endorsement, which covers you for theft of your personal property away from your residence.
Additional Coverage Options to Consider:
Policies vary greatly from company to company. What is standard with one, might be optional for another. The list below encompasses many types of coverage that may or may not be included with your current policy. If one or more of these options is important to you, please let your agent know and we ensure it is added to your policy.
Umbrella/Excess Liability Coverage
Secondary Home
Flood
Backup of Sewers and Drains
Personal Injury
Collectibles, Furs, Jewelry, Guns, Tools, Musical Instruments, Artwork, etc.
Collector Cars
Other Coverage Options
Umbrella/Excess Liability Coverage
- Risk Factor: You invite guests over for a pool party and one of your guests dives into the shallow end of the pool and is permanently injured. They hire a lawyer to represent them and after a long legal battle, you and your family are left financially responsible for their injuries. Do you have enough money in savings to cover your legal responsibilities as well as the legal defense costs?
- Solution: An umbrella or excess liability policy increases your personal liability limits by adding protection over and above your current auto, boat, or homeowners policies – providing real financial value, as well as priceless peace of mind. Excess liability insurance is available either by an endorsement to your homeowners policy or available as separate coverage.
Secondary Home
- Risk Factor: Owning a secondary home has the potential of increasing your liability exposures
- Solution: Be certain that you extend the liability coverage under your homeowners policy to include your secondary home. You should also consider including the secondary home under an excess liability or umbrella policy to provide additional liability limits.
Flood
- Risk Factor: You do not have to live near a body of water to suffer loss due to flooding. With the changing weather patterns and more damaging storms occurring around the globe, flood losses are becoming more common in places that are not normally prone to flood damage. Your homeowners policy does not covers damage from flood. Could your home be at risk?
- Solution: Purchase a flood insurance policy to protect your home and covered contents from certain types of flood losses as designated by the National Flood Insurance Program. A flood policy is purchased as a separate policy through the federal program (NFIP) or through a servicing carrier known as a “write your own” carrier.
Backup of Sewers and Drains
- Risk Factor: Most homeowners policies exclude coverage for water back-up damages as a result of a clogged drain, sewer, or sump pump.
- Solution: Water backup coverage can be added to most insurance policies. Consider adding it so that you have the coverage you need in the event of damages caused by a clogged drain, sewer, sump pump, and related risks.
- *Note: this is different than flood coverage, which applies to water flowing in from outside the house.
Personal Injury
- Risk Factor: Young people are usually very active online. However, using social media and other sites can increase the possibility of them directly or indirectly damaging someone’s reputation and exposing you, the parent, to a lawsuit.
- Solution: Your homeowners insurance policy includes liability coverage for property damage caused by any member int he family but it may not cover rumors or statements that damage a reputation. You need to add an endorsement to your policy to expand coverage to include liability protection that covers personal injury.
Collectibles, Furs, Jewelry, Guns, Tools, Musical Instruments, Artwork, etc.
- Risk Factor: If your diamond ring disappears or valuable artwork is stolen, our standard home policy may not compensate you for the loss. Homeowners policies include coverage for your belongings and personal property, but some special items like jewelry, furs, silverware, antiques, collectibles, and other valuables have limited or no coverage and need to be insured separately.
- Solution: Valuable possessions insurance covers personal property that may have unique value, cannot be replaced like regular personal property, or is subject to special types of losses such as breakage or mysterious disappearance. For most valuable possession categories, there is no deductible applied at the time of loss. Valuable items insurance can be added to your home policy or may be written as a separate policy.
Collector Cars
- Risk Factor: Collector vehicles often have significant value and require specialized insurance coverage and claims handling.
- Solution: Schedule your collectible vehicle on a separate collector car policy. By doing so, you are protecting the vehicle for either the appraised value or market value.
Other Coverage Options
- Forgery and Alteration
- Computer Coverage
- Computer Fraud
- Business Property at Home
- Electronic Transfer Fraud
- Fungi, Mold and Bacteria
- Fences and Outdoor Structures
- Damage to Leased Property
- Equipment Breakdown
- Property of Others
- Wine Collection
- Money and Securities
Note: Actual policies vary and must be consulted for specific terms and conditions.
The Takeaway
Finding the right homeowners insurance policy for your unique needs can seem overwhelming. Rest assured, we can help make things a bit simpler by creating a homeowners insurance policy that gets you the proper coverage for your house at the right price.
Your standard homeowner policy should include the following:
- Dwelling Coverage for the Structure of the Home
- Personal Property/Contents
- Property Damage
- Additional Living Expense / Loss of Use
- Jewelry, Fine Arts & Collectibles
- Medical Expenses
- Personal Liability
- Miscellaneous Coverage
Consider the following optional endorsements:
- Umbrella/Excess Liability
- Flood Coverage
- Secondary Home
- Collectible/Classic/Antique Cars
- Personal Injury
- Sewer/Drain Backup
- Collectibles
- Equipment Breakdown and/or Service Line Repair