Now’s the Time to Review Your Coverage
It’s spring cleaning time again, and it’s a good time to schedule your annual insurance review too. Much can change during the course of a year, so take a look around you, and evaluate what you’ve picked up recently that’s likely to need increased insurance coverage. Consider special endorsements and floaters because a standard homeowners policy is likely to leave you with some significant coverage gaps.
Alarm systems
If you had a burglary or fire alarm system installed in your home, risk to both you and your insurer decrease. It decreases even more if you had a sprinkler system installed in your home too. As a result of having these systems now, savings to you increase. Don’t keep the alarm system a secret to your insurer. Notify your agent, and you’re likely to receive significant savings.
What else did you buy?
If you bought any particularly pricey items in the form of artwork, jewelry, furs, musical instruments, electronics or home computers, you might want special coverage for more risks than a standard homeowners policy. Coverage for increased risks might not be sufficient though. You’ll probably want to raise your coverage limits on those items too. That’s what special endorsements are for. They expand coverage limits. If that’s still insufficient, there’s replacement cost coverage.
Replacement cost coverage
You’ll probably want higher coverage limits for some items along with replacement cost coverage so you can buy an item of like quality and purpose if an expensive piece of personal property is lost or destroyed by a covered risk. The advantage of replacement cost coverage is that it doesn’t contemplate depreciation. Floaters are even available should your replacement cost coverage not be sufficient. Many floaters even cover accidental loss that a standard homeowners policy won’t cover. If you work from your home, special coverage is also available for your business equipment. As long as we’re on the subject of replacement cost coverage, consider it for the structure of your home too. You don’t want to live in a $300,000 home with $200,000 of coverage.
You can even get special endorsements for risks like sewer and drain backup, sinkholes and identity theft. Adding onto your coverage isn’t going to result in clutter that you’re going to dispose of during some other spring cleaning in the future. You’re protecting some items of personal property that are likely to survive for generations.