LOCAL HOME INSURANCE AGENCY FOR:
NORTH ATTLEBORO - PLAINVILLE - WRENTHAM - FOXBORO
A Home Insurance Homeowners Policy offers protection for your dwelling, as well as your personal possessions and personal liability. This policy is well known as the industry's HO3.
Renters insurance is designed for anyone who rents a home, be it a house or an apartment. You may not own the place where you live, but you still need insurance protection. This policy is referred as the HO4
A condominium combines the convenience of apartment living with the investment advantage of ownership. This form of ownership may create some unique insurance challenges. Condominiums present the most careful consideration when writing the policy. Knowledge of the condominium documents is very important to structure the policy.
Most Homeowners insurance provides protection from the following perils:
- Fire or lightning
- Windstorm or hail
- Explosion
- Aircraft
- Vehicles
- Riot or civil commotion
- Smoke
- Theft
- Vandalism/malicious mischief
- Glass breakage
- Volcanic eruption
Exclusions
A Homeowners policy does not provide coverage for the following perils:
- Loss due to flood, or water that backs up through sewers
- Loss to building by earthquake, aftershocks and mud slides
- Loss by enforcement law or ordinance regulating construction, repair or demolition, or zoning
- Loss due to power interruption when the interruption takes place off the residence property
- Loss due to neglect of the insured to save and preserve property following a loss
- War and nuclear perils
- Intentional loss
Optional coverages:
- Jewelry
- Furs
- Fine Arts
- Boats
Home Insurance Policy Coverage
Home insurance is an essential insurance policy that every homeowner should have. It’s your seat belt while making your way through life. While homeowners’ insurance will not stop unforeseen circumstances, it can keep you afloat when hit by a disaster. Your homeowner’s insurance will protect you as well as your mortgage lender against loss if your home is destroyed or damaged by things such as fires, windstorms, and lightning strikes. It will financially protect some of your most important assets – your house and your personal belongings in most cases. A reliable home insurance policy will help you recover from setbacks like a theft, house fire, or most natural disasters.
Typically, your homeowner’s insurance will cover:
Your dwelling structure – that’s the physical structure of the home
Other structures attached to your property like a garage or a deck
Personal property or belongings like furniture, carpets, and rugs
Liability for damages and injuries caused to someone else or someone else’s property
Homeowners’ insurance provides a safety net in the event of a loss arising from a covered risk. The primary purpose is to protect your home from fire and other perils like theft.
What types of properties are covered by home insurance?
Different properties are covered by homeowner’s insurance and they range from rental homes, multi-family homes, condominiums, apartments, townhouses, and duplexes. If you own a multi-family dwelling, you want to understand the options you have when insuring the property. You need to know what is covered under numerous policies. A multi-family dwelling is any structure that can house more than a single occupant within their unit. You may have each living unit equipped with its bathroom, kitchen, and living spaces. The units have walls that divide the units so they remain private and separate. Good examples of multi-family properties are a house with separate downstairs and upstairs flats, a four-plex or a home comprising four separate apartments, and a duplex meaning a home with two units that are side by side. A multi-family dwelling refers to a stand-alone house with several separate interior units.
You will need homeowners insurance for a multi-family dwelling if you, the owner, reside in one of the dwelling’s units. Since a standard homeowner’s insurance will cover the exterior as well as the framework of the entire structure, it would mean that renting out one or a couple of the units in the multi-family house should not affect your policy. For example, if the dwelling suffers roof damage from a storm, your homeowner’s insurance can cover repairs even when the damage occurs over the rented unit. The idea here is that you ought to be living in the dwelling for a homeowner’s insurance policy to cover the damages. If, on the other hand, you are the owner, and you don’t live in the dwelling, you may want to opt for what is known as Dwelling and Fire Policy, or simply DP policy. A DP policy covers multi-family dwellings that are solely used for renting and don’t serve as your residence.
Similarly, if you own a condo, apartment, or a townhouse that serves as your residence, you can consider a homeowner’s insurance cover.
What perils does homeowner’s insurance typically cover against?
HO-3 is the most common homeowner’s insurance policy and it covers your dwelling structure or house against numerous problems except the ones you find listed as exclusions. Insurers use the term ‘peril’ to refer to the problem that’s covered by home insurance. Your home insurance will cover the following perils:
Theft
Vandalism and malicious mischief
Windstorm or hail
Fire or lightning
Explosion
Smoke
Falling objects
Damage or loss from the weight of snow, sleet, or ice
Accidental overflow or discharge of water and steam
Sudden and accidental cracking, bulging, burning, or tearing apart
Sudden and accidental damage arising from artificially generate electricity current
Freezing
Volcanic eruption
Damage from vehicles
Civil commotion and riot
If burglars break into your home and they steal possessions like furniture, your homeowner insurance may cover that because it’s listed as one of the covered risks or events. Similarly, if people vandalize your home, you can make claims for reimbursement to repairs or replacements you make. Fire is among the commonly covered peril in homeowners’ insurance. Many homeowners lose their property from fire damages. Home insurance comes in to help with home repairs and replacement of damaged items. However, what you need to realize is that if fire damage arises from something like flood or earthquake, the loss or damage is not reimbursed - the reason being that the fire arises from excluded risks. So, not every other incident of a house fire is covered by your home insurance policy.
If a car turning or your parking lot hits your house and causes damage, you may be able to get compensation for the damages to help with repairs. Similarly, if a storm blows branches of nearby trees or it causes a tree to fall over your roof causing damages, you may be able to make claims. That being said, you need to ensure that you take care of your trees by removing those that seem to present the risk of falls or damage to your home. Insurance companies will refuse to offer you reimbursements if they find out that you did not take your responsibility to remove trees or cut branches that are dangerously hanging over your home.
Windstorms may send objects flying through your window glasses causing damage to your home. If that happens, your home insurance can take care of the damages.
What are common exclusions to a standard homeowner’s insurance policy?
Your homeowner’s insurance may not cover problems like:
Internal loss
Neglect
Power failure
Expenses when you are required to demolish, renovate, rebuild, or repair your home to meet local ordinances – an ordinance of law.
Water damage caused by floods, sewer and drain back up, leaks from pools and other structures, water damage from fire, theft, or explosion.
Damage arising from animals you own or you keep within your property
Rodents, insects, vermin, and birds
Shrinking, settling, bulging, and expansion of pavements, footings, pavement, bulkheads, walls, floors, ceiling, roofs, and foundations
Rust, dry rot, smog, or other forms of corrosion
Wear and tear or deterioration and marring
Government action like confiscation, destruction, or seizure of property
A mechanical breakdown that destroys or brings about property damage
If your home has been going through wear and tear and you have damages occurring, for instance, the walls are cracking, the foundation is sinking, or the ceiling is falling, you may not be able to claim these kinds of damages. These are problems you could have acted upon to ensure repairs are done. Similarly, if your home has been experiencing long term leaks and you didn’t repair them, the damages arising thereof won’t be covered in your homeowner’s insurance policy. Homeowners need to take responsibility to make any sort of repairs that occur in their homes over the long term. You may have the water pipes leaking and you never took any measures to repair the leaky pipes. In this situation, you will bear the burden of damages occurring from such leaks.
If you call in a roof repair and he does a bad job that contributes to leaks and damages to your home, again, your home insurance coverage won’t cover those damages.
Typical home insurance will not cover floods and earthquakes. If you reside in an area prone to earthquakes and floods, you may want to consider a separate policy. You should add earthquake and flood coverage to your homeowner’s insurance policy if your home is located in an area that is not considered an earthquake or flood zone. So you want to discuss your coverage option with your insurer to see which coverage to add to your homeowner’s insurance or purchase separate insurance.
Homeowner neglect is another important exclusion you want to be aware of. If, for example, you haven’t replaced your roof in 40 years, and a violent storm destroys it, your claim could be rejected since it’s perceived that the damage of your roof was largely due to neglect than a storm.
The cost for maintenance and repair including infestations by termites and other insects, mold damage, rot, normal wear and tear, and failure of equipment due to mechanical breakdown is not covered in your home insurance. When you experience loss from power outages like food in the freezer or refrigerator, you may not make claims for such a loss.
If you had damage to your home from an event like a fire and the government orders that you make changes to bring the wiring up to the area’s building code or to repair the home to meet building code after it was damaged, the cost for the repairs and rewiring are excluded, even if the cause was from a covered event. A homeowner’s insurance will mostly cover “actual cash value” and not replacement cost for damage. You may want to consider an addition to your policy to increase coverage for replacement costs.
What types of coverage will you find in a home insurance policy?
A home insurance policy offers various coverage options including property insurance, liability insurance, medical payments to others, and loss of use or additional living expenses.
Property Insurance
In property insurance, you will get coverage for your dwelling structure and personal property. Property insurance pays to repair or rebuild the physical structure of the home after it had been damaged by a problem listed among the perils or a problem that’s covered by the policy – for instance, the cost of repairs from fire damage or damage arising from a fallen tree. When talking about a dwelling, it comprises the house itself in addition to other structures like a garage, back porch, or deck provided that these structures are attached to the home you have insured. If you have detached structures like a fence or shed, they will typically be covered under “other structures coverage.”
Dwelling protection helps cover your home’s structure including the walls, roof, and foundation. For other structures that are detached from the home for instance a detached garage, fence, or tool shed, you may want to find out if they are covered in your homeowner’s insurance coverage.
Property insurance also covers your personal property. In this case, the coverage pays to repair or replace your belongings following a peril or problem listed in the insurance policy as covered. Your personal property may include things such as electronics, clothes, pets, furniture, pans, jewelry, rugs, and decorations.
Some items like jewelry, musical instruments, and electronics may have a limit of the amount an insurance company is likely to pay if they are stolen. So you may need to schedule high-value items if you want to get more coverage when they are stolen or damaged.
Liability Insurance
Your homeowner’s insurance also includes liability insurance that pays for injuries as well as property damage occurring to other people you are responsible for. If you’re sued for injury or damage by someone else, homeowner’s liability insurance can offer you legal defense. Liability coverage may payout if your guest hits an object by the toe and slips or if a guest skids and falls on an icy sidewalk within your home and gets hurt. Again, if a guest trips on your carpet or rug and is hurt, the liability insurance will pay for the injuries. If your dog bites another person and causes injury, the insurance could pay for the injury. Similarly, if your dog damages or ruins another person’s rug or property or item, liability insurance can help pay for the damage. Another situation where liability insurance could help is when your kid accidentally hits a handball through the window of a neighbor.
While there are liability limits, you can still purchase higher amounts. For homeowners who have many assets, they may want to consider an umbrella insurance policy.
Umbrella insurance provides a low-cost way of getting extra liability coverage. Although you can rarely lose a lawsuit for an amount greater than what your insurance will pay, when it does happen, you may lose your savings or possessions. Umbrella insurance works to offer you protection whenever you find yourself in such situations. It is a personal liability insurance cover that is designed to cater for claims that are more than the typical homeowners’ policy coverage. This insurance isn’t just for you as the policyholder, but also your family members. Umbrella insurance coverage not only covers injury but also damage to other people's possessions – however, it does not offer protection against the property of the policyholder or the homeowner.
An example of incidents where an umbrella policy can offer coverage is when your homeowner’s insurance isn’t enough. In case your dog viciously attacks a neighbor out of your house. If the neighbor sues you for lost wages, medical bills, and pain or suffering, then umbrella policy can take care of such incidents or perils that make you liable for claims bigger than those your homeowner’s insurance can provide.
Medical payments to others
If a guest is hurt within your property, coverage for medical payments to others can help in paying for the injuries – typically minor injuries. That’s why the coverage is mostly sold in small amounts. You can use this coverage to cover basic medical bills for minor injuries without legal complications. In the event of major injuries that require expensive injury claims, they would fall under homeowners’ liability insurance coverage.
Loss of use or additional living expenses
Sometimes, a covered event like a fire may cause you to evacuate or leave your home to reside in other property to allow repair and renovation work. During this time you are living out of your home, you will incur expenses. Loss of use coverage will reimburse the expenses you incur such as meals, hotel bills, and other costs like pet boarding fees and laundry services. Often, loss of use or additional living expenses coverage is set at some percentage of the dwelling coverage you have taken. If, for example, you have a loss of use limit capped at 25% of your home coverage, and your home insurance coverage is $250,000, you will have up to $62,500 for additional living expenses or loss of use. That being said, you can still increase the coverage limit.
What factors determine your home insurance cost?
When determining the cost of your home insurance, insurers will put into consideration several factors - these include the materials making up your home, for example, brick, stone, wood, and stucco. If you have built your home with fire-resistant materials, you are likely to have a reduced cost of home insurance premiums. Again, if the cost of rebuilding your home is high, you will pay higher premiums for your home insurance. Older homes are likely to attract higher premiums because they present more risks for damages or loss.
Other factors insurers consider to determine your homeowner’s insurance cost are:
Your personal claims history
The fire rating of your area – how close your house is to the fire department and water source
The policy and coverage limits you have selected
Your pets – some dog breeds are prohibited
The claims history within your areas including crime rates and tornadoes
Will homeowners insurance cover mold?
Your home insurance won’t likely cover mold, though there are exceptions in specific cases. If, for example, you experience mold that arises from a water problem covered in your policy, in such a situation, you may have your home insurance coverage cover mold. If you have mold within your basement, and it’s caused by dampness, then you may not have your homeowner’s insurance cover it. For homeowner’s insurance to reimburse for mold damage in your home you need to demonstrate that the mold damage was sudden and accidental by the time you found it. You also need to report the damage promptly to your insurer.
Homeowners coverage limits and deductibles
In the homeowners’ insurance policy, each coverage is subject to what is called a limit. This is the maximum amount that the policy you have taken can pay toward any covered loss. Depending on your coverage needs, you can adjust your coverage limits. For example, if the value of the house is higher, you can increase your coverage limits. Again, if the belongings are pricey, like costly jewelry and expensive boats in your home, you can consider additional coverage to take care of the losses in the event these possessions are destroyed or damaged by a covered peril.
Since in most cases you pay your deductibles before you receive your insurance benefits to cover a loss, you want to make sure that you keenly read your policy.
If your home or its contents suffer damage due to lightning, fire, vandalism, hurricanes, or other covered perils, your insurer can compensate you to have repairs or rebuild your house. However, if you experience destruction from floods and earthquakes, or you neglect your home maintenance duties, you will not be able to claim for reimbursements for the costs you incur. In such situations, you may need to buy separate riders to get protection from these events.
Things like furniture, clothing, appliances, and other contents of the home will be covered in your homeowner’s insurance if an insured or covered disaster destroys them. You may even get what is referred to as “off-premises” coverage to allow you to file insurance claims if you lose jewelry for instance when away from your home.
If you own a home, you want to ensure that you do everything possible to lower your cost of home insurance. If you have old wiring, you want to update it to help reduce your insurance coverage cost. Old wiring may become bare and frayed putting your home at risk of fire from an electrical fault. Installing a firewall between separate units can help contain any fire that may start in one location. This helps reduce fire damage to your house – it increases the safety of the tenants while lowering your insurance cost. If you have a multi-family dwelling, you want to consider living in one of the property’s units. A dwelling that is occupied by the owner is more often readily maintained compared to the one whose owners live offsite. Adding smoke detectors may also help lower your insurance cost.
Home insurance is an essential insurance policy that every homeowner should have. It’s your seat belt while making your way through life. While homeowners’ insurance will not stop unforeseen circumstances, it can keep you afloat when hit by a disaster. Your homeowner’s insurance will protect you as well as your mortgage lender against loss if your home is destroyed or damaged by things such as fires, windstorms, and lightning strikes. It will financially protect some of your most important assets – your house and your personal belongings in most cases. A reliable home insurance policy will help you recover from setbacks like a theft, house fire, or most natural disasters.
Typically, your homeowner’s insurance will cover:
Your dwelling structure – that’s the physical structure of the home
Other structures attached to your property like a garage or a deck
Personal property or belongings like furniture, carpets, and rugs
Liability for damages and injuries caused to someone else or someone else’s property
Homeowners’ insurance provides a safety net in the event of a loss arising from a covered risk. The primary purpose is to protect your home from fire and other perils like theft.
What types of properties are covered by home insurance?
Different properties are covered by homeowner’s insurance and they range from rental homes, multi-family homes, condominiums, apartments, townhouses, and duplexes. If you own a multi-family dwelling, you want to understand the options you have when insuring the property. You need to know what is covered under numerous policies. A multi-family dwelling is any structure that can house more than a single occupant within their unit. You may have each living unit equipped with its bathroom, kitchen, and living spaces. The units have walls that divide the units so they remain private and separate. Good examples of multi-family properties are a house with separate downstairs and upstairs flats, a four-plex or a home comprising four separate apartments, and a duplex meaning a home with two units that are side by side. A multi-family dwelling refers to a stand-alone house with several separate interior units.
You will need homeowners insurance for a multi-family dwelling if you, the owner, reside in one of the dwelling’s units. Since a standard homeowner’s insurance will cover the exterior as well as the framework of the entire structure, it would mean that renting out one or a couple of the units in the multi-family house should not affect your policy. For example, if the dwelling suffers roof damage from a storm, your homeowner’s insurance can cover repairs even when the damage occurs over the rented unit. The idea here is that you ought to be living in the dwelling for a homeowner’s insurance policy to cover the damages. If, on the other hand, you are the owner, and you don’t live in the dwelling, you may want to opt for what is known as Dwelling and Fire Policy, or simply DP policy. A DP policy covers multi-family dwellings that are solely used for renting and don’t serve as your residence.
Similarly, if you own a condo, apartment, or a townhouse that serves as your residence, you can consider a homeowner’s insurance cover.
What perils does homeowner’s insurance typically cover against?
HO-3 is the most common homeowner’s insurance policy and it covers your dwelling structure or house against numerous problems except the ones you find listed as exclusions. Insurers use the term ‘peril’ to refer to the problem that’s covered by home insurance. Your home insurance will cover the following perils:
Theft
Vandalism and malicious mischief
Windstorm or hail
Fire or lightning
Explosion
Smoke
Falling objects
Damage or loss from the weight of snow, sleet, or ice
Accidental overflow or discharge of water and steam
Sudden and accidental cracking, bulging, burning, or tearing apart
Sudden and accidental damage arising from artificially generate electricity current
Freezing
Volcanic eruption
Damage from vehicles
Civil commotion and riot
If burglars break into your home and they steal possessions like furniture, your homeowner insurance may cover that because it’s listed as one of the covered risks or events. Similarly, if people vandalize your home, you can make claims for reimbursement to repairs or replacements you make. Fire is among the commonly covered peril in homeowners’ insurance. Many homeowners lose their property from fire damages. Home insurance comes in to help with home repairs and replacement of damaged items. However, what you need to realize is that if fire damage arises from something like flood or earthquake, the loss or damage is not reimbursed - the reason being that the fire arises from excluded risks. So, not every other incident of a house fire is covered by your home insurance policy.
If a car turning or your parking lot hits your house and causes damage, you may be able to get compensation for the damages to help with repairs. Similarly, if a storm blows branches of nearby trees or it causes a tree to fall over your roof causing damages, you may be able to make claims. That being said, you need to ensure that you take care of your trees by removing those that seem to present the risk of falls or damage to your home. Insurance companies will refuse to offer you reimbursements if they find out that you did not take your responsibility to remove trees or cut branches that are dangerously hanging over your home.
Windstorms may send objects flying through your window glasses causing damage to your home. If that happens, your home insurance can take care of the damages.
What are common exclusions to a standard homeowner’s insurance policy?
Your homeowner’s insurance may not cover problems like:
Internal loss
Neglect
Power failure
Expenses when you are required to demolish, renovate, rebuild, or repair your home to meet local ordinances – an ordinance of law.
Water damage caused by floods, sewer and drain back up, leaks from pools and other structures, water damage from fire, theft, or explosion.
Damage arising from animals you own or you keep within your property
Rodents, insects, vermin, and birds
Shrinking, settling, bulging, and expansion of pavements, footings, pavement, bulkheads, walls, floors, ceiling, roofs, and foundations
Rust, dry rot, smog, or other forms of corrosion
Wear and tear or deterioration and marring
Government action like confiscation, destruction, or seizure of property
A mechanical breakdown that destroys or brings about property damage
If your home has been going through wear and tear and you have damages occurring, for instance, the walls are cracking, the foundation is sinking, or the ceiling is falling, you may not be able to claim these kinds of damages. These are problems you could have acted upon to ensure repairs are done. Similarly, if your home has been experiencing long term leaks and you didn’t repair them, the damages arising thereof won’t be covered in your homeowner’s insurance policy. Homeowners need to take responsibility to make any sort of repairs that occur in their homes over the long term. You may have the water pipes leaking and you never took any measures to repair the leaky pipes. In this situation, you will bear the burden of damages occurring from such leaks.
If you call in a roof repair and he does a bad job that contributes to leaks and damages to your home, again, your home insurance coverage won’t cover those damages.
Typical home insurance will not cover floods and earthquakes. If you reside in an area prone to earthquakes and floods, you may want to consider a separate policy. You should add earthquake and flood coverage to your homeowner’s insurance policy if your home is located in an area that is not considered an earthquake or flood zone. So you want to discuss your coverage option with your insurer to see which coverage to add to your homeowner’s insurance or purchase separate insurance.
Homeowner neglect is another important exclusion you want to be aware of. If, for example, you haven’t replaced your roof in 40 years, and a violent storm destroys it, your claim could be rejected since it’s perceived that the damage of your roof was largely due to neglect than a storm.
The cost for maintenance and repair including infestations by termites and other insects, mold damage, rot, normal wear and tear, and failure of equipment due to mechanical breakdown is not covered in your home insurance. When you experience loss from power outages like food in the freezer or refrigerator, you may not make claims for such a loss.
If you had damage to your home from an event like a fire and the government orders that you make changes to bring the wiring up to the area’s building code or to repair the home to meet building code after it was damaged, the cost for the repairs and rewiring are excluded, even if the cause was from a covered event. A homeowner’s insurance will mostly cover “actual cash value” and not replacement cost for damage. You may want to consider an addition to your policy to increase coverage for replacement costs.
What types of coverage will you find in a home insurance policy?
A home insurance policy offers various coverage options including property insurance, liability insurance, medical payments to others, and loss of use or additional living expenses.
Property Insurance
In property insurance, you will get coverage for your dwelling structure and personal property. Property insurance pays to repair or rebuild the physical structure of the home after it had been damaged by a problem listed among the perils or a problem that’s covered by the policy – for instance, the cost of repairs from fire damage or damage arising from a fallen tree. When talking about a dwelling, it comprises the house itself in addition to other structures like a garage, back porch, or deck provided that these structures are attached to the home you have insured. If you have detached structures like a fence or shed, they will typically be covered under “other structures coverage.”
Dwelling protection helps cover your home’s structure including the walls, roof, and foundation. For other structures that are detached from the home for instance a detached garage, fence, or tool shed, you may want to find out if they are covered in your homeowner’s insurance coverage.
Property insurance also covers your personal property. In this case, the coverage pays to repair or replace your belongings following a peril or problem listed in the insurance policy as covered. Your personal property may include things such as electronics, clothes, pets, furniture, pans, jewelry, rugs, and decorations.
Some items like jewelry, musical instruments, and electronics may have a limit of the amount an insurance company is likely to pay if they are stolen. So you may need to schedule high-value items if you want to get more coverage when they are stolen or damaged.
Liability Insurance
Your homeowner’s insurance also includes liability insurance that pays for injuries as well as property damage occurring to other people you are responsible for. If you’re sued for injury or damage by someone else, homeowner’s liability insurance can offer you legal defense. Liability coverage may payout if your guest hits an object by the toe and slips or if a guest skids and falls on an icy sidewalk within your home and gets hurt. Again, if a guest trips on your carpet or rug and is hurt, the liability insurance will pay for the injuries. If your dog bites another person and causes injury, the insurance could pay for the injury. Similarly, if your dog damages or ruins another person’s rug or property or item, liability insurance can help pay for the damage. Another situation where liability insurance could help is when your kid accidentally hits a handball through the window of a neighbor.
While there are liability limits, you can still purchase higher amounts. For homeowners who have many assets, they may want to consider an umbrella insurance policy.
Umbrella insurance provides a low-cost way of getting extra liability coverage. Although you can rarely lose a lawsuit for an amount greater than what your insurance will pay, when it does happen, you may lose your savings or possessions. Umbrella insurance works to offer you protection whenever you find yourself in such situations. It is a personal liability insurance cover that is designed to cater for claims that are more than the typical homeowners’ policy coverage. This insurance isn’t just for you as the policyholder, but also your family members. Umbrella insurance coverage not only covers injury but also damage to other people's possessions – however, it does not offer protection against the property of the policyholder or the homeowner.
An example of incidents where an umbrella policy can offer coverage is when your homeowner’s insurance isn’t enough. In case your dog viciously attacks a neighbor out of your house. If the neighbor sues you for lost wages, medical bills, and pain or suffering, then umbrella policy can take care of such incidents or perils that make you liable for claims bigger than those your homeowner’s insurance can provide.
Medical payments to others
If a guest is hurt within your property, coverage for medical payments to others can help in paying for the injuries – typically minor injuries. That’s why the coverage is mostly sold in small amounts. You can use this coverage to cover basic medical bills for minor injuries without legal complications. In the event of major injuries that require expensive injury claims, they would fall under homeowners’ liability insurance coverage.
Loss of use or additional living expenses
Sometimes, a covered event like a fire may cause you to evacuate or leave your home to reside in other property to allow repair and renovation work. During this time you are living out of your home, you will incur expenses. Loss of use coverage will reimburse the expenses you incur such as meals, hotel bills, and other costs like pet boarding fees and laundry services. Often, loss of use or additional living expenses coverage is set at some percentage of the dwelling coverage you have taken. If, for example, you have a loss of use limit capped at 25% of your home coverage, and your home insurance coverage is $250,000, you will have up to $62,500 for additional living expenses or loss of use. That being said, you can still increase the coverage limit.
What factors determine your home insurance cost?
When determining the cost of your home insurance, insurers will put into consideration several factors - these include the materials making up your home, for example, brick, stone, wood, and stucco. If you have built your home with fire-resistant materials, you are likely to have a reduced cost of home insurance premiums. Again, if the cost of rebuilding your home is high, you will pay higher premiums for your home insurance. Older homes are likely to attract higher premiums because they present more risks for damages or loss.
Other factors insurers consider to determine your homeowner’s insurance cost are:
Your personal claims history
The fire rating of your area – how close your house is to the fire department and water source
The policy and coverage limits you have selected
Your pets – some dog breeds are prohibited
The claims history within your areas including crime rates and tornadoes
Will homeowners insurance cover mold?
Your home insurance won’t likely cover mold, though there are exceptions in specific cases. If, for example, you experience mold that arises from a water problem covered in your policy, in such a situation, you may have your home insurance coverage cover mold. If you have mold within your basement, and it’s caused by dampness, then you may not have your homeowner’s insurance cover it. For homeowner’s insurance to reimburse for mold damage in your home you need to demonstrate that the mold damage was sudden and accidental by the time you found it. You also need to report the damage promptly to your insurer.
Homeowners coverage limits and deductibles
In the homeowners’ insurance policy, each coverage is subject to what is called a limit. This is the maximum amount that the policy you have taken can pay toward any covered loss. Depending on your coverage needs, you can adjust your coverage limits. For example, if the value of the house is higher, you can increase your coverage limits. Again, if the belongings are pricey, like costly jewelry and expensive boats in your home, you can consider additional coverage to take care of the losses in the event these possessions are destroyed or damaged by a covered peril.
Since in most cases you pay your deductibles before you receive your insurance benefits to cover a loss, you want to make sure that you keenly read your policy.
If your home or its contents suffer damage due to lightning, fire, vandalism, hurricanes, or other covered perils, your insurer can compensate you to have repairs or rebuild your house. However, if you experience destruction from floods and earthquakes, or you neglect your home maintenance duties, you will not be able to claim for reimbursements for the costs you incur. In such situations, you may need to buy separate riders to get protection from these events.
Things like furniture, clothing, appliances, and other contents of the home will be covered in your homeowner’s insurance if an insured or covered disaster destroys them. You may even get what is referred to as “off-premises” coverage to allow you to file insurance claims if you lose jewelry for instance when away from your home.
If you own a home, you want to ensure that you do everything possible to lower your cost of home insurance. If you have old wiring, you want to update it to help reduce your insurance coverage cost. Old wiring may become bare and frayed putting your home at risk of fire from an electrical fault. Installing a firewall between separate units can help contain any fire that may start in one location. This helps reduce fire damage to your house – it increases the safety of the tenants while lowering your insurance cost. If you have a multi-family dwelling, you want to consider living in one of the property’s units. A dwelling that is occupied by the owner is more often readily maintained compared to the one whose owners live offsite. Adding smoke detectors may also help lower your insurance cost.
