Any time you have property damage to your residence, you have to go through your Insurance Company to recover money for your losses and to rebuild what was lost. If you are like a large sum of property owners, you walked away with a check from your insrance company with barely enough funds to cover half of the work that has to be done to get your home back in shape.
This happens because of a couple of reasons. The first reason this happens is because of the nature of the Insurance Industry. They are in business to make money. They also hire their own Insurance Adjusters to estimate the amount of property damage you have to your home and how much it will cost to fix it. Since the Insurance Adjuster in this case works for the insurance company, you have nobody that is evaluating the damage with your thoughts in mind.
The second reason that Insurance Companies underpay their property owners is simply because the average property owner doesn't know any better. They see the insurance company and their Adjuster doing work, and when they come up with a payment number, it is automatically accepted that this is how much they should be paid for the damage.
A little known fact, is that all property owners can choose their own contractors and get multiple bids on conductng repairs to their home. You do not have to take the lowest estimate of the bunch. The lowst estimate could mean the work will also be the lowest quality. You, as a property owner, have the option of selecting the contractor with the highest estimate if you choose, and that is what the insurance company has to go by.
The problem with this option is that the average property owner doesn't know how to go about this process. It can be very tedious, overwhelming, and plain confusing. The good news is that you can get an Insurance Adjuster that works striclty for the policy holder and has only your interests at heart. This type of Adjuster is referred to as Public Adjuster. A Public Aduster's responsiblity is to work with and for the policy holder and to get every penny they deserve out of the insurance company. Property damage claims that are handled by a Public Adjuster include fire, wind, water, flood, hurricane, theft and many others.
In many states, a property damage claim can be reopened up to five years after it was claimed. If you feel that you were underpaid by your insurance company on a past insurance claim, a Certified Public Adjuster can help you recover those extra funds.
Wednesday, July 18, 2012
Tuesday, July 17, 2012
Keep Your Home Insurance From Being a Waste of Time With a Current Home Inventory
You'll hear hundreds of people tell you that buying a home insurance policy for your home, wherever that home happens to be, is never a waste of time. Guess what? They're wrong. If you don't bother to keep a current home inventory you're wasting both your time and your insurance agent's and leaving the doors to your home wide open to whatever misfortune fate decides to throw your way.
All right, so maybe that's a little melodramatic. Chances are pretty good that you're not going to have a burglar come in and completely gut your home while you're on vacation. There's a relatively slim percentage of the population that ever has to sit and watch while their home goes up in flames. Keeping a current home inventory for your homeowners insurance provider helps protect you from this type of loss, so the odds are in your favor that taking the time to catalog everything you own is going to be a complete waste of time.
But are you willing to take that chance? Are you willing to leave yourself wide open to the possible repercussions of being a statistic, a victim, just because you didn't want to take the time to complete a current home inventory for your insurance provider?
How much money would you say you had invested in your home? No, not your mortgage payment. That should have been your starting number when you figured out how much home insurance you were going to need, not your final one. Statistics show that the average American has $5,000 to $10,000 dollars worth of "stuff" just lying around their house between their furniture, their electronics, their jewelry, their book, their clothing and their collectibles.
Unless you're not going to miss $5,000 to $10,000 dollars it pays to make sure you've got enough insurance to cover your losses. By cataloging what you own, how much it cost to buy it, where you bought it and when you bought it you know that every item in your house is accounted for and able to be replaced if something should happen. Many people find that the easiest way to create their home inventory for their homeowners insurance companies is to create a photo or video log of everything they own, carefully marked and stored in a safe place.
Pro Tip: Don't store your photo or video log in your house. If the structure goes up in flames you're going to lose that along with everything else.
Remember, it pays to update regularly and add big ticket items to your home insurance policy as you buy them. It's not going to do you any good to file a claim for a $7,000 television if your insurance company didn't know you owned it in the first place. By maintaining a current inventory you're protecting your possessions from loss if the worst really does happen and helping keep yourself free and clear of any accusations of insurance fraud when the time comes to file a home insurance claim.
All right, so maybe that's a little melodramatic. Chances are pretty good that you're not going to have a burglar come in and completely gut your home while you're on vacation. There's a relatively slim percentage of the population that ever has to sit and watch while their home goes up in flames. Keeping a current home inventory for your homeowners insurance provider helps protect you from this type of loss, so the odds are in your favor that taking the time to catalog everything you own is going to be a complete waste of time.
But are you willing to take that chance? Are you willing to leave yourself wide open to the possible repercussions of being a statistic, a victim, just because you didn't want to take the time to complete a current home inventory for your insurance provider?
How much money would you say you had invested in your home? No, not your mortgage payment. That should have been your starting number when you figured out how much home insurance you were going to need, not your final one. Statistics show that the average American has $5,000 to $10,000 dollars worth of "stuff" just lying around their house between their furniture, their electronics, their jewelry, their book, their clothing and their collectibles.
Unless you're not going to miss $5,000 to $10,000 dollars it pays to make sure you've got enough insurance to cover your losses. By cataloging what you own, how much it cost to buy it, where you bought it and when you bought it you know that every item in your house is accounted for and able to be replaced if something should happen. Many people find that the easiest way to create their home inventory for their homeowners insurance companies is to create a photo or video log of everything they own, carefully marked and stored in a safe place.
Pro Tip: Don't store your photo or video log in your house. If the structure goes up in flames you're going to lose that along with everything else.
Remember, it pays to update regularly and add big ticket items to your home insurance policy as you buy them. It's not going to do you any good to file a claim for a $7,000 television if your insurance company didn't know you owned it in the first place. By maintaining a current inventory you're protecting your possessions from loss if the worst really does happen and helping keep yourself free and clear of any accusations of insurance fraud when the time comes to file a home insurance claim.
Friday, July 13, 2012
NAPIA Welcomes Quality Claims’ Ron Reitz as President
Quality Claims Management attended the Annual Meeting of the National Association of Public Insurance Adjusters (NAPIA) this past June to participate in discussions and educational sessions about Public Adjusting, and to witness the commencement of their own President, Ron Reitz, as NAPIA President for 2012-2013. The NAPIA Annual Meeting, held at The Grand Del Mar in San Diego, had Public Adjusters and other NAPIA members from all over the country in attendance.
Ron Reitz, President of Quality Claims, carries a wealth of experience as he has been in the Public Adjusting field since 1994. The NAPIA community is excited to have him lead the organization for this coming year. In addition to Ron’s presidential term commencement, Kim Cary, also of Quality Claims Management, was nominated to the Board of Directors for NAPIA.
The NAPIA Annual Meeting gives members the opportunity to network with fellow public adjusters from across the country and to advance their insurance knowledge.
Sunday, July 8, 2012
Need Builder's Risk Insurance to Plug the Gaps in Your Home Insurance Coverage
What would you say is the best part of being a homeowner as opposed to renting? For most people, it's knowing that they can do just about anything they want with their house and no one's going to argue with them about it! There's a certain amount of freedom that goes along with being a homeowner that you're just not going to find when you're renting (like the freedom to start ripping down walls if you want to!). Before you launch all of those renovation projects you've got broiling around in your head, however, make sure you let your home insurance company know what's going on.
There are a couple of reasons home insurance companies heed to be kept in the loop when you're talking about renovating your house. First and foremost, let's talk about relative home value. Your home's value will usually increase, sometimes dramatically, when you renovate. Since the value's going up, you want to make sure your insurance coverage goes up too. Some home try to avoid this step in an attempt to keep their home insurance rates as low as possible, which is a good short term gain with catastrophic long term consequences.
It's no fun to get quotes to rebuild your home only to find out that because you never raised your level of coverage you're underinsured. That's like having to pay for those renovations all over again.
The other thing you want to keep in mind is that renovations can save you some big bucks on your home insurance rates. Yes, we just said that renovations raised the cost of your home insurance. Keep reading. If your renovations are making your home safer as well as more valuable you're going to be in an excellent position to save money on your insurance. Home insurance companies love low risk homes. By lowering your risk factor you're going to lower your insurance risks at the same time.
That's not the main reason you want to make sure your home insurance company knows about your renovation process, however. When you signed your insurance policy did you make sure to go through and read the fine print? If you did you probably already know that your insurer isn't going to cover your home (at all) during the time you're renovating.
That's a nasty little surprise that way too many home don't find out about until after the fact, when it's way too late to do anything about it. Since the risk of fire and water damage go flying during renovations (especially if you're doing the renovations yourself) your home insurance doesn't want to open themselves up to that much risk. The good news is, most providers give you the option of purchasing builder's risk insurance.
Builder's risk insurance takes the place of your regular home insurance coverage during the renovation period, and if its purchased before you begin renovations may even extend to cover your construction materials if they're lost courtesy of one disaster or another. Even if it doesn't cover your building materials, however, builder's risk insurance will make sure you're never left homeless with nowhere to turn because of an accident that took place during the renovation process.
Make sure you talk to your home insurance provider before you pick up that hammer. It might turn out to be the best decision you ever make.
There are a couple of reasons home insurance companies heed to be kept in the loop when you're talking about renovating your house. First and foremost, let's talk about relative home value. Your home's value will usually increase, sometimes dramatically, when you renovate. Since the value's going up, you want to make sure your insurance coverage goes up too. Some home try to avoid this step in an attempt to keep their home insurance rates as low as possible, which is a good short term gain with catastrophic long term consequences.
It's no fun to get quotes to rebuild your home only to find out that because you never raised your level of coverage you're underinsured. That's like having to pay for those renovations all over again.
The other thing you want to keep in mind is that renovations can save you some big bucks on your home insurance rates. Yes, we just said that renovations raised the cost of your home insurance. Keep reading. If your renovations are making your home safer as well as more valuable you're going to be in an excellent position to save money on your insurance. Home insurance companies love low risk homes. By lowering your risk factor you're going to lower your insurance risks at the same time.
That's not the main reason you want to make sure your home insurance company knows about your renovation process, however. When you signed your insurance policy did you make sure to go through and read the fine print? If you did you probably already know that your insurer isn't going to cover your home (at all) during the time you're renovating.
That's a nasty little surprise that way too many home don't find out about until after the fact, when it's way too late to do anything about it. Since the risk of fire and water damage go flying during renovations (especially if you're doing the renovations yourself) your home insurance doesn't want to open themselves up to that much risk. The good news is, most providers give you the option of purchasing builder's risk insurance.
Builder's risk insurance takes the place of your regular home insurance coverage during the renovation period, and if its purchased before you begin renovations may even extend to cover your construction materials if they're lost courtesy of one disaster or another. Even if it doesn't cover your building materials, however, builder's risk insurance will make sure you're never left homeless with nowhere to turn because of an accident that took place during the renovation process.
Make sure you talk to your home insurance provider before you pick up that hammer. It might turn out to be the best decision you ever make.
Saturday, July 7, 2012
Home Insurance And Selling Your Home
If you are selling your home, hopefully you have considered hiring a real estate agent to help you with all the fine details. If not – get to work!
The process of choosing the right real estate agent can be just as difficult as it is important. Below are guidelines to follow when you start your search for the right real estate agent for you.
Look at insurance companies that specialize in real estate. Usually these companies will be able to provide you with a list of their own real estate agents who are trained to the company’s specifications. Perhaps your current homeowner’s insurance company provides tools you need to sell your home; they may even have their own real estate agents from which you can choose. If not, they may be able to point you in the direction of a reputable insurance company or real estate agency that does.
Make sure the real estate agent you choose is trained or accredited. Most real estate agencies, or insurance companies that supply real estate agents, have specially trained their real estate agents, or have hired real estate agents who are in some way accredited. Look for special training or accreditation when choosing your real estate agent.
“Interview” the real estate agent. During the selling process, the real estate agent you eventually choose is going to handle a lot of things for you – many of which are better left handled by the real estate agent. However, there are certain factors you may want to know about, such as how the real estate agent plans to list your home and how the real estate agent plans to “show” your home. Make sure the real estate agent provides you with all the information you want to know.
In the end, choose a real estate agent you with whom you feel comfortable, whether the real estate agent is from an insurance company or real estate agency.
The process of choosing the right real estate agent can be just as difficult as it is important. Below are guidelines to follow when you start your search for the right real estate agent for you.
Look at insurance companies that specialize in real estate. Usually these companies will be able to provide you with a list of their own real estate agents who are trained to the company’s specifications. Perhaps your current homeowner’s insurance company provides tools you need to sell your home; they may even have their own real estate agents from which you can choose. If not, they may be able to point you in the direction of a reputable insurance company or real estate agency that does.
Make sure the real estate agent you choose is trained or accredited. Most real estate agencies, or insurance companies that supply real estate agents, have specially trained their real estate agents, or have hired real estate agents who are in some way accredited. Look for special training or accreditation when choosing your real estate agent.
“Interview” the real estate agent. During the selling process, the real estate agent you eventually choose is going to handle a lot of things for you – many of which are better left handled by the real estate agent. However, there are certain factors you may want to know about, such as how the real estate agent plans to list your home and how the real estate agent plans to “show” your home. Make sure the real estate agent provides you with all the information you want to know.
In the end, choose a real estate agent you with whom you feel comfortable, whether the real estate agent is from an insurance company or real estate agency.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)