Homeowner’s insurance (and other types)?

[fairfax]

Hi all! I mostly lurk, but was hoping to get advice/experiences from the group 😊

On of my goals for Q1 this year is to reevaluate our insurance needs for our home, cars and personal property. I want to make sure we have the coverage we need - for example, we’ve put a lot of money into home improvements that may have increased the value of our house. Would we have enough coverage to rebuild our house including the improvements? That kind of thing.

I also want to get quotes to make sure we’re not overpaying. We’ve been with the same company for years so it’s time to shop around.

Additionally I know we need to document the projects and the contents of our home. What’s the best way to do this? iPhone video and then saved on some sort of cloud storage? How do you update for large purchase? I have googled but wanted to see if anyone has a system they’ve found useful.

Thanks!!

[ohgillian]

It's a great goal!

Before we had a hurricane a few years ago, I walked thru the house and took a video. I opened cabinets and drawers, described what I saw in different rooms, etc. I had a house fire earlier in my life and being able to tell insurance what contents were missing or destroyed was really hard - photos helped a lot. It wasn't so much about having proof for my insurance co, as it was about jogging my memory. I saved it in my dropbox, but you could just email it to yourself.

[dr.girlfriend]

Jan 14, 2020 13:15:30 GMT -5 fairfax said:

Hi all! I mostly lurk, but was hoping to get advice/experiences from the group 😊

On of my goals for Q1 this year is to reevaluate our insurance needs for our home, cars and personal property. I want to make sure we have the coverage we need - for example, we’ve put a lot of money into home improvements that may have increased the value of our house. Would we have enough coverage to rebuild our house including the improvements? That kind of thing.

I also want to get quotes to make sure we’re not overpaying. We’ve been with the same company for years so it’s time to shop around.

Additionally I know we need to document the projects and the contents of our home. What’s the best way to do this? iPhone video and then saved on some sort of cloud storage? How do you update for large purchase? I have googled but wanted to see if anyone has a system they’ve found useful.

Thanks!!

We just spent $200k on an addition to our house, so I got back to our insurance rep to increase our coverage.  IDK that we'll be able to cover the property for what we put into it because their formula just goes on number of bedrooms, square footage, etc., but at least it's something.  We provided the plans, and I have plenty of photos from my participation in the decorating boards here.  :-)  As a note, here are several "riders" I didn't know existed but we are strongly considering:

Home System Protection: Provides protection for the breakdown of permanently installed equipment, such as furnaces, water heaters, air conditioning units and permanently installed appliances. Includes a $50,000 limit and a $500 deductible.

Service Line Protection: Covers the cost of repairing damaged underground service lines on the property. Includes a $10,000 limit and a $500 deductible.

Back-Up of Sewers or Drains adds coverage to a homeowners policy for losses caused by water that backs up from a sewer or drain, including sump pumps, sump pump wells, and any system that removes subsurface water.

We have State Farm.

[sadlebred]

Are you a member of USAA or Amica? If so, look no further. I can't help besides that. USAA is amazing...not "cheap," but their service is legendary

[fairfax]

Jan 14, 2020 13:31:18 GMT -5 ohgillian said:

It's a great goal!

Before we had a hurricane a few years ago, I walked thru the house and took a video. I opened cabinets and drawers, described what I saw in different rooms, etc. I had a house fire earlier in my life and being able to tell insurance what contents were missing or destroyed was really hard - photos helped a lot. It wasn't so much about having proof for my insurance co, as it was about jogging my memory. I saved it in my dropbox, but you could just email it to yourself.

Duh, email to myself! I can’t believe I didn’t think of that - I was just so focused on some kind of cloud storage... thanks!

[fairfax]

Jan 14, 2020 13:46:13 GMT -5 dr.girlfriend said:

Jan 14, 2020 13:15:30 GMT -5 fairfax said:

Hi all! I mostly lurk, but was hoping to get advice/experiences from the group 😊

On of my goals for Q1 this year is to reevaluate our insurance needs for our home, cars and personal property. I want to make sure we have the coverage we need - for example, we’ve put a lot of money into home improvements that may have increased the value of our house. Would we have enough coverage to rebuild our house including the improvements? That kind of thing.

I also want to get quotes to make sure we’re not overpaying. We’ve been with the same company for years so it’s time to shop around.

Additionally I know we need to document the projects and the contents of our home. What’s the best way to do this? iPhone video and then saved on some sort of cloud storage? How do you update for large purchase? I have googled but wanted to see if anyone has a system they’ve found useful.

Thanks!!

We just spent $200k on an addition to our house, so I got back to our insurance rep to increase our coverage.  IDK that we'll be able to cover the property for what we put into it because their formula just goes on number of bedrooms, square footage, etc., but at least it's something.  We provided the plans, and I have plenty of photos from my participation in the decorating boards here.  :-)  As a note, here are several "riders" I didn't know existed but we are strongly considering:

Home System Protection: Provides protection for the breakdown of permanently installed equipment, such as furnaces, water heaters, air conditioning units and permanently installed appliances. Includes a $50,000 limit and a $500 deductible.

Service Line Protection: Covers the cost of repairing damaged underground service lines on the property. Includes a $10,000 limit and a $500 deductible.

Back-Up of Sewers or Drains adds coverage to a homeowners policy for losses caused by water that backs up from a sewer or drain, including sump pumps, sump pump wells, and any system that removes subsurface water.

We have State Farm.

Thank you! That rider for home systems sounds valuable - we just replaced our HVAC and we are also with State Farm!

[fairfax]

Jan 14, 2020 13:52:45 GMT -5 sadlebred said:

Are you a member of USAA or Amica? If so, look no further. I can't help besides that. USAA is amazing...not "cheap," but their service is legendary

No, we’re with State Farm now. I have heard good things about USAA as well and my dad is a vet...

[laterz]

Jan 14, 2020 13:31:18 GMT -5 ohgillian said:

It's a great goal!

Before we had a hurricane a few years ago, I walked thru the house and took a video. I opened cabinets and drawers, described what I saw in different rooms, etc. I had a house fire earlier in my life and being able to tell insurance what contents were missing or destroyed was really hard - photos helped a lot. It wasn't so much about having proof for my insurance co, as it was about jogging my memory. I saved it in my dropbox, but you could just email it to yourself.

I try to do this once a year with my camera - open every door, cabinet, drawer, as well as multiple pictures of each room (diff angles) and outside/garage/basement.   Speaking of things I need to put on my list of To Dos...

[ohgillian]

Jan 14, 2020 14:09:52 GMT -5 fairfax said:

Jan 14, 2020 13:52:45 GMT -5 sadlebred said:

Are you a member of USAA or Amica? If so, look no further. I can't help besides that. USAA is amazing...not "cheap," but their service is legendary

No, we’re with State Farm now. I have heard good things about USAA as well and my dad is a vet...

It’s totally worth bugging him to sign up, and once he’s a member you can join. He doesn’t have to use them for anything, he just needs a membership for you to be eligible.

[Deleted]

Jan 14, 2020 14:35:26 GMT -5 ohgillian said:

Jan 14, 2020 14:09:52 GMT -5 fairfax said:

No, we’re with State Farm now. I have heard good things about USAA as well and my dad is a vet...

It’s totally worth bugging him to sign up, and once he’s a member you can join. He doesn’t have to use them for anything, he just needs a membership for you to be eligible.

Do you know how difficult the process is? My FIL is a Vet but he's not really computer savvy. 

[Susie]

If you have Amazon Prime, unlimited photo (but not video) storage is included.  So I take still photos every time we make changes to the house or make a major purchase, including the serial no. panel, and just add them to my Amazon photo account.  There would be a lot to go through if I ever needed it, but it would all be there.

[ohgillian]

Jan 14, 2020 14:48:28 GMT -5 @sameoldstory said:

Jan 14, 2020 14:35:26 GMT -5 ohgillian said:

It’s totally worth bugging him to sign up, and once he’s a member you can join. He doesn’t have to use them for anything, he just needs a membership for you to be eligible.

Do you know how difficult the process is? My FIL is a Vet but he's not really computer savvy. 

He can join by phone! USAA website says:

“Call 800-531-8722 and say ‘join USAA.””

[sadlebred]

I'll second everything ohgillian said about USAA! If you can become a member, I highly recommend it. You don't have to purchase anything from them. They offer more than insurance as well.

[Alps79]

I'll just say that we have State Farm- we had a leak and they took SUCH good care of us, really went above and beyond. It was a $50K leak. Many MANY of our friends have USAA (PDQ) we live 3 miles from their headquarters and honestly, they do not rave. We had a huge hail storm come through. Everyone got new roofs.... everyone except those with USAA. I'm not knocking them, but I wouldn't just drop State Farm for USAA; make sure you compare apples to apples.

Also, we have the same goal as you; we reevaluated our auto insurance last quarter and need to do our home next. I have a good post with a lot of info on ML and I'll try and link it. It was very informative to me and I feel much better with the changes we made.

Here it is. Still haven't done homeowners, whoops. Sorry, you have to get through the cr@p about me being rear-ended :/
pandce.proboards.com/thread/612717/insurance-insured

[pierogigirl]

Consider an umbrella policy to cover someone getting hurt on your property, etc. We have and like Amica.

[icedcoffee]

Definitely shop around before just committing to USAA. For us they were not the cheapest. They were reasonable-ish for homeowners, but car insurance was DOUBLE my Geico rate. Eventually increases on our homeowners were so high we moved that to Geico too. USAA was great when we had a claim, but the prices were just crazy. We'll re-quote with them in a few years, but for now we'll pass.

[dr.girlfriend]

Jan 15, 2020 9:18:49 GMT -5 icedcoffee said:

Definitely shop around before just committing to USAA. For us they were not the cheapest. They were reasonable-ish for homeowners, but car insurance was DOUBLE my Geico rate. Eventually increases on our homeowners were so high we moved that to Geico too. USAA was great when we had a claim, but the prices were just crazy. We'll re-quote with them in a few years, but for now we'll pass.

I agree that you can never take rates for granted. State Farm was drastically lower for house and about even for car, so we switched away from GEICO to take advantage of their multi-policy discount. When I was shopping for life insurance, though, State Farm was double the cost of Prudential, because of Prudential's more "generous" height/weight chart. So, it really all seems to depend. Glad to hear that people have had good experiences with State Farm claims, though...we've never made a claim.

[fairfax]

Jan 15, 2020 9:18:49 GMT -5 icedcoffee said:

Definitely shop around before just committing to USAA. For us they were not the cheapest. They were reasonable-ish for homeowners, but car insurance was DOUBLE my Geico rate. Eventually increases on our homeowners were so high we moved that to Geico too. USAA was great when we had a claim, but the prices were just crazy. We'll re-quote with them in a few years, but for now we'll pass.

We definitely will! I may go through a broker and save myself some legwork...

[fairfax]

Jan 14, 2020 15:42:49 GMT -5 Alps79 said:

I'll just say that we have State Farm- we had a leak and they took SUCH good care of us, really went above and beyond. It was a $50K leak. Many MANY of our friends have USAA (PDQ) we live 3 miles from their headquarters and honestly, they do not rave. We had a huge hail storm come through. Everyone got new roofs.... everyone except those with USAA. I'm not knocking them, but I wouldn't just drop State Farm for USAA; make sure you compare apples to apples.

Also, we have the same goal as you; we reevaluated our auto insurance last quarter and need to do our home next. I have a good post with a lot of info on ML and I'll try and link it. It was very informative to me and I feel much better with the changes we made.

Here it is. Still haven't done homeowners, whoops. Sorry, you have to get through the cr@p about me being rear-ended :/
pandce.proboards.com/thread/612717/insurance-insured

Thanks so much! Sorry about the rear/ending!!

[fairfax]

Jan 14, 2020 14:51:10 GMT -5 Susie said:

If you have Amazon Prime, unlimited photo (but not video) storage is included.  So I take still photos every time we make changes to the house or make a major purchase, including the serial no. panel, and just add them to my Amazon photo account.  There would be a lot to go through if I ever needed it, but it would all be there.

I do have Prime - great suggestion!!

[fairfax]

Jan 14, 2020 14:35:26 GMT -5 ohgillian said:

Jan 14, 2020 14:09:52 GMT -5 fairfax said:

No, we’re with State Farm now. I have heard good things about USAA as well and my dad is a vet...

It’s totally worth bugging him to sign up, and once he’s a member you can join. He doesn’t have to use them for anything, he just needs a membership for you to be eligible.

I didn’t know this - I thought he had to actually be insured through them! Thank you!!!

[minzy]

Not much to add except that I recently contacted a State Farm rep to compare quotes for our bundled coverage. She was very impressed with the rates we have from Farmers Insurance and couldn’t come close to matching (for us, that day, in our location, etc. etc.). Farmers gives us a lawyer/judge rate, multiple car, good payer, and ePolicy discounts, for example - a couple of which even the State Farm rep hadn’t heard of before. I’m glad we checked though; it was pretty painless.

[freshsqueezed]

Jan 16, 2020 6:11:48 GMT -5 fairfax said:

Jan 14, 2020 14:35:26 GMT -5 ohgillian said:

It’s totally worth bugging him to sign up, and once he’s a member you can join. He doesn’t have to use them for anything, he just needs a membership for you to be eligible.

I didn’t know this - I thought he had to actually be insured through them! Thank you!!!

I think this is no longer accurate. They have to be a level 2 member for Membership to extend to children. Level 2 means holding an insurance policy of some kind.

[mrsjuleshs]

I have a friend who is a broker and he did all the shopping around for me. He ended up saving me almost $2500/year on my homeowners. Cars are a bit higher but not by much.

[dutchgirl678]

We use an insurance broker and they always do a good job finding us the best insurance policy. It helps to have them shop around for us and give us the differences between different policies.

[mich1]

Jan 14, 2020 13:52:45 GMT -5 sadlebred said:

Are you a member of USAA or Amica? If so, look no further. I can't help besides that. USAA is amazing...not "cheap," but their service is legendary

So is Amica.  I have USAA, DH has Amica and we are still straddling both these companies because we can't make a decision.