Home Owners Insurance - A Basic Introduction .(property insurance)

property insurance

Home owners insurance is a must for anyone with their own a home, whether fully paid for or not. Home owners insurance protects you and your family against life's little mishaps and without it, your asset may literally be sunk.

Home owners insurance generally provides two types of coverage namely casualty coverage and liability coverage. (But remember to check with your broker as to your particular policy). Casualty coverage covers your home and its contents from certain natural or man made disasters like flood, fire, tornado etc. while liability coverage covers you in the case where someone is injured on your property. Both are essential is you don't want unexpected financial burdens.

Home owners insurance is generally calculated at the replacement costs of your home and not at the sale price of your asset. You may find that what you can sell your home for far outweighs what it would cost to rebuild it should it suffer some sudden sad fate. But make sure that the replacement cost named in the policy is in fact correct. Get advice from brokers to find out what other properties are insured for with regards to replacement costs.

Remember, finding home owners insurance is just the start of the game. Your home appreciates with time, as do replacement costs, so it's no good taking out a policy ten years ago and hoping that policy will cover you at today's rates, unless of course your policy has an automatic inflation clause. You need to keep your home owners insurance policies up to date. Make sure you are covered for the right amounts. If you add to your property then make sure your policy covers that. Take pictures of your property as a record of the property.

It also often helps to shop around. Your policy, although competitive at the time you took it out, may now be expensive compared to other policies so make a date in your diary to review your policies every once in a while.

A great way of comparing insurance rates and quotes is to get a quote online from a company like Insure.com or Insweb. They get some basic information from you and then present you with a number of comparative quotes.

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