My wife and I have moved recently (to a rural part of Washington state) and I’ve been tasked with obtaining renters insurance. Which, of course, I know very little about.
Questions:
(1) What options are typical (and typically available)?
(2) Are there any well-known “gotchas” to watch out for?
(3) Does anyone know of a reputable internet site from which to get quotes and/or check company reputations? Or is my best bet to simply start calling places and/or go by word of mouth?
I’m not sure this is actually a GQ, but I thought there was enough factual content to warrant placing it here. Any info is greatly appreciated…
See whether your auto insurer offers renter’s first. They often give discounts on both if you have both. For Allstate, the discount was on the auto side for having multiple policies was enough that it almost paid for the renter’s.
When you ask for a quote ask them what options are available. There is an industry standard form for coverage that is the basic plain vanilla policy and there are usually a few optional upgrades. Make sure you opt for the replacement value coverage. In the event something happens, you can actually afford to replace what was lost since your not being paid it’s depreciated value.
Most property insurance is sold by local agents since they usually need to see the property.
If you have expensive jewelry (engagement rings and the like), you will need to get a rider on your insurance- otherwise, it only covers jewelry up to a fairly low amount. I don’t know this for a fact, but I suspect the same is true if you have an expensive stereo system or stamp collection or anything else that is much more valuable than the standard stuff most people have.
With my policy I need a jewelry rider. And I was recently informed I should have my jewelry appraised every couple of years so that the rider keeps up with replacement cost.
With my policy there is a lot of fine print about computers. They will repay very little for a computer and you get nothing for lost information, so if you use the computer primarily for work you have to have a rider for that.
The insurance company charges you depending on the size and type of building you’re in (they like brick), how secure the building is (locked outside doors, alarms) and how many (and what type) smoke detectors you have.
I can’t help with picking one, mine is through my auto insurer (USAA).
Ordinary home owners insurance will pay for fire damage, theft and the like. Floods are excluded (see numerous threads about Hurricane Katrina).
Ordinary home owners insurance and it’s renters variation will pay for damge and replace the object damaged with a “like object”. So if your unit is damaged by fire and you need to replace your 5 year old sofa, bed and TV, you will be paid the actual cash value (think of depreciation) of your 5 year old sofa, bed and TV. Which is not usually enough money to go out and buy new replacements. For a few dollars more you can get increased coverage which does give you full replacement value.
That’s why when you total your 10 your old car, the $300. payout doesn’t let you buy a new Hummer.
Renter’s insurance is pretty cheap. It’s always a good idea to have some documentation: receipts for high value items, a list of same, videos of your home w/ certain items laid out for viewing, etc. These records should obviously be kept outside your home, a safety deposit box, at your office, at a relatives house, etc. The value of items such as jewelry, art, collectables, needs to be documented and likely noted on your policy as exceptions, the added cost is small.
Many people assume that they’re covered by their landlords insurance and this is almost never true, you’re smart to take care of this.
Being a doctoral candidate in computer science, that’s another incredibly important point for me. My computer equipment is not really “work” (as a matter of commercial entity), but certainly of value (possibly intangible). Thanks for bringing it up; I’ll make sure to inquire.
Fortunately, at least as far this goes, we’re right next to the fire station (and I do mean right next to it), so I’m guessing that we’ll have the cheapest coverage possible as far as fire goes.
Another question I was wondering about. When my wife took care of this back in IN, she was told that she didn’t have to turn in any itemized list of our property. Which confuses me…how could they possibly arrive at a reimbursement figure? Particularly if they’re not basing it on replacement value?
[QUOTE=Another question I was wondering about. When my wife took care of this back in IN, she was told that she didn’t have to turn in any itemized list of our property. Which confuses me…how could they possibly arrive at a reimbursement figure? Particularly if they’re not basing it on replacement value?[/QUOTE]
Sure, they don’t require a list of normal possesions, maybe just high value stuff, but wait until you have to file a claim, then is the time you’ll be glad you took the time to keep some records. I’ve never been through a fire, but I’ve been burgled a couple of times and it’s difficult to recall, from memory, what all you’ve lost, how old it was and what you paid for it.
But it’s better to have insurance without photos or videos of stuff in your home than not to have insurance at all. For quite a while, I thought that receipts for stuff and photos of it were required for insurance, so I didn’t get it- those receipts had been long since thrown out, and my place is always too messy to be taking pictures in it. Then I found out you don’t have to do that stuff, so I got renter’s insurance.
