Homeowner’s insurance covers accidents that happen at your home. While this coverage might seem straightforward on the surface, finding a company to protect your home is anything but crystal clear.
Each homeowner’s insurance company has its own approach to assessing risk. That risk assessment helps the insurance company deem what’s covered and what’s not, so it’s important to understand. Let’s take a closer look.
What You Own Matters to Homeowner’s Insurance Companies
Homeowner’s insurance companies are particular about what they’ll insure. Their role is to look for possible risky situations and assess them. The higher the risk in their minds, the more likely you are to file a claim. To help mitigate that risk, some homeowners companies will not insure for specific items or even some types of pets.
Here are a few examples of what can serve as a red flag or denial of coverage by a homeowner’s insurance company.
Trampolines
The American Academy of Pediatrics has strongly discouraged the use of trampolines at home because of the risk they pose to children. If a child is hurt on the premises of your home, they can file a claim against your homeowner’s insurance. Therefore, it makes sense that some carriers ask a few extra questions about a trampoline in your home. If you have a trampoline, make sure it’s not excluded from your homeowner’s policy.
Pools
While owning a pool certainly has advantages in the warm summer months, it can come with some unexpected extra costs. Specifically, your pool could increase the premium of your homeowner’s insurance coverage.
Most carriers require you to add a specific type of coverage called scheduled structural coverage to your policy when you have a pool. This scheduled coverage can increase the price of your premiums. Even with the additional coverage, some carriers won’t cover accidents that happen in your pool, and others may not even underwrite a policy for you if you own a pool.
Breeds of Dogs
Many homeowner’s insurance companies refuse to insure a home with certain breeds of dogs. The top 3 most commonly banned breeds include Doberman Pinscher, Pit Bull, and Rottweiler. Sometimes, other breeds that are banned include wolf dogs or wolf hybrids, Chow Chows, Akitas, German Shepherds, or Preso Canario (Canary Dogs). Some breeds have become synonymous with increased risk of injury, making them harder to insure.
Fire District Ratings
Fire district ratings, also known as ISO scores, are directly correlated with the risk of fire and speed of fire suppression in an area. Those ratings directly impact how likely a home is to be insured and the rate of its premiums. As evidence, in 2020, one fire district underwent an evaluation that resulted in the decertification of specific areas they covered. That decertification resulted in many properties seeing an increase in premiums. Knowing the fire district rating in your area will help you better understand what your homeowner’s insurance carrier is considering as they decide about your coverage levels.
Homeowner’s Coverage Varies Too
By this point, you know that homeowner’s insurance coverage varies by the carrier. What you might not realize is that the type of coverage can vary also.
When you’re choosing your homeowner’s insurance coverage, you’ll be asked to fill out some standard forms. While many of those forms are nearly identical between carriers, such as the ISO form and the HO3 form, others might look different. That’s because many insurance carriers will slightly tweak forms to align with their methods of determining what coverage to offer. These tweaks are often used to justify how the insurance company packages their endorsements and levels of coverage differently than other providers.
Here’s an example of how these tweaks could pan out for you. Consider one carrier that offers a level 1 basic coverage, level 2 better coverage, and level 3 with the best coverage. While those levels might seem straightforward, choosing a plan can get confusing as you try to determine which level includes specific coverage such as water backup, replacement cost, service line coverage, extended coverage for high-value items, and more.
Knowing what your homeowner’s insurance carrier covers on your policy is critical to getting the right coverage for your unique needs.
Going Through an Independent Insurance Agent for Homeowner’s Insurance Has Its Advantages
Because each homeowner’s insurance carrier has a different approach it’s important that you’re well-informed. Going through all the options can take a lot of time.
With an independent insurance agency like McGrath Insurance Group, you can save hours scanning through the various carriers and be confident that you’re getting the right coverage for your individual household and needs. Contact us today to request a proposal and start the process of exploring whether you can save money on your homeowner’s insurance policy.
