TABLE OF CONTENTS: What is Life Insurance? Why Life Insurance Matters in Your 20s-40s Locking in Lower Rates Protecting Your Loved Ones Covering Final Expenses Tax-Free Payouts The Cost of Life Insura...
Are You Getting Enough Coverage with Your Homeowners Insurance?
As your wealth grows, it’s important that your insurance protection reflects this increase in value. If you’ve enjoyed success in your career and finances in the past few years, you may have outgrown your basic homeowners insurance policy.
Maintaining the proper amount of protection will help ensure you don’t have any major gaps in coverage and will minimize the likelihood of overpaying for out-of-pocket expenses if you do have to submit a claim.
If any of the following situations sound familiar, you may benefit from additional insurance coverage for your home and assets:
- Your home is valued at over $500,000
- The cost to completely rebuild your home is over $500,000
- Your home is custom-built or designed
- You have high-end personal items in the home, including high-end electronics and appliances, fine art, and costly amenities such as marble countertops or imported kitchen tile.
- You need to protect sizable financial assets
In this blog post, we’ll discuss some popular additional coverage options for individuals who want to ensure their home, wealth, and property are adequately protected.
Extra Coverage Options to Consider
Knowing how much homeowners insurance coverage you need is relatively straightforward. You’ll want to review your basic policy, adjust amounts to reflect the current value of your assets (if needed), then consider adding additional protection to cover any gaps.
Additional coverage options include:
Extended Dwelling Coverage
Did you know that the covered amount for full reconstruction of homes often falls short of how much it actually costs to replace the residence? For example, in 2021, single-family builders reported their material costs increased an average of 26.1% from a year earlier to build the same home. Soaring lumber prices alone added almost $36,000 to the cost of building an average single-family home.
Extended dwelling coverage can help protect you from having to pay out-of-pocket expenses if construction, labor, material, or permitting costs change and exceed your current policy limits. This coverage may also pay for certain contractor costs, tree or debris removal, construction fees, permitting fees, and other expenses.
Building Ordinance Coverage
If you need to rebuild your home in the event of a covered loss, you’ll need to make sure you adhere to all current building codes (which isn’t always cheap). These codes can change from year to year, so these costs may be higher than anticipated. Building ordinance coverage covers the difference in cost, which could result in significant savings.
Replacement Cost Up-Front Coverage
This loss settlement coverage gives you the option to opt-out of rebuilding at the original location in the event of a covered total loss. With this coverage, you would receive an up-front payout that you could then apply to the purchase or construction of a new home in a new location.
Personal Property Replacement Cost Coverage
If you’ve been enjoying the benefits of financial success, chances are you’ve got some accessories to show for it. Personal property replacement cost coverage helps pay for the costs of replacing personal property in your home following a covered event. This includes personal electronics, fine art, jewelry, and appliances. Since there is no deduction for depreciation on these items, you should get the amount needed to buy an identical or comparable item rather than settling for something of lesser value down the line.
If you think you may have outgrown your current homeowners insurance policy, contact your insurance agent to discuss your situation and make sure you have adequate protection.
Related Categories
InsuranceTyreo Harrison
As Executive Vice President, Lending & Insurance Solutions, Ty Harrison leads teams of lending and insurance professionals that are dedicated to delivering value-added programs, services and technology tailored to address the needs of lenders, loan servicers, portfolio managers, mortgage brokers, insurance agents and insurance brokers.
Let Us Know What You Thought about this Post.
Put your Comment Below.