5 Ways to Personalize Homeowner’s Insurance

By Danielle Owen – Insurance Advisor

Keeping Options Personal.

Additional insurance coverage (most commonly referred to as “endorsements”) aims to expand coverage, terms or provisions of the policy. We’ve compiled five of the most common endorsements to help you start up an easy conversation with your insurance advisor:

1. Sewer Backup

   Backups happen when sewage and dirty water comes up from a sink, toilet or drain. These can cause extensive (and incredibly expensive) damage to your basement or other areas. Often, these are seen with flooding or other natural disasters. Unfortunately, sewer backups often result in a total renovation from the irreparable damage from the water and sewage. Be prepared for the unexpected!

2. Scheduled Personal Property

   This option is a supplemental endorsement geared to ensure full coverage of expensive items in the event of a claim – such as jewelry, antiques or art. Insurance companies typically set a dollar limit on how much they will pay for certain types of valuables, and it should be noted that companies typically do not cover those expensive items for accidental losses.
   
   You may have to provide your insurance provider with a recent receipt or a professional appraisal to determine the scheduled value of items you’d like covered, but this option is worth the effort to cover those rare items.

3. Replacement Cost – Personal Property

   This insures the replacement cost of your personal property in the case of a covered loss. Without this, it’s possible your policy may only pay you for the depreciated value of your personal property.

   For example, if your flat screen TV is destroyed in a covered loss, this endorsement option will pay the full cost to replace it with one of a similar type and quality. Without this option, you would only be paid the actual cash value, or depreciated value, which could be a difference of hundreds (sometimes thousands) of dollars.

4. Home Business

   With many people now working from home and starting home-based businesses, this option is key to consider! To note: Home-based businesses are not covered in a basic homeowner’s That’s why it’s important to consider including additional coverage for business property and liabilities. Check with your insurance advisor to see if this option makes sense for you.

5. Personal Injury Liability

   In these times of social media and online reviews, it’s important to consider how your reputation can also be impacted in the event of someone else hurting themselves on your watch (and property). Although personal injury seems similar to bodily injury (which may be covered under your homeowner’s policy), this endorsement specifically covers damage to your reputation due to libel, slander, defamation or even unintentional harm.

   It's always best to visit with your advisor directly to gather the details of what’s covered under your policy to ensure you’re fully protected (and prepared) on what you deem most important.