What type of insurance can we help you with? Click here to contact us.

Build Your Own Homeowners Insurance Policy

Build Your Own Homeowners Insurance Policy
Shopping for homeowners insurance in Florida, if you want to be a truly “savvy” shopper, entails understanding what’s included in a basic policy and what is available as a possible “add on.” There are two ways you can customize your own homeowner’s policy – adjusting the amount of coverage for standard types of coverage and adding riders for additional coverage.
What is included in a “basic” homeowners policy?
The basic, standard elements of homeowners insurance with most insurers include the following:

  • Dwelling Coverage. This covers you for repairing or replacing your home in the event of fire, storm damage, or any covered event. There are many factors affecting the cost of your dwelling coverage, but the general rule of thumb is to get a policy that covers you for 80% to 100% of the replacement cost of your home.
  • Detached Structure. It only makes sense to cover your garage, shed, fence, or other detached structures on your property and not just your dwelling proper.
  • Personal Property. Your policy is going to cover personal property inside your building up to a certain limit, which limit is often set as a percentage of the dwelling coverage.
  • Loss of Use. Loss of use cover pays for your hotel, food, and other relevant expenses incurred while you are forced out of your home because it needs to be repaired for a covered incident.
  • Liability. To a limited degree, most homeowners policies will cover you if an accident occurs on your property that injures a visitor (not a resident). A $100,000 liability limit is typical.

Beyond The Basics: Possible Riders
You can adjust the amount of dwelling coverage, liability cover, or any other part of the basic types of homeowners coverage to fit your needs. But you can also adjust your policy to your needs by adding any of the following riders:

  1. Scheduled Personal Property. This allows you to add extra personal property cover for things like expensive jewelry, musical instruments, sports equipment, or others items that might otherwise be excluded.
  2. Yard & Garden Coverage. If you have a particularly lush, green, well manicured lot, then consider adding a rider for your trees, turf, expensive plants, other landscaping, and even for mowers and yard care equipment.
  3. Data Recovery. For some who store a lot of important data on computers, it may be worthwhile to add coverage for the cost of restoring lost data.
  4. Identity Theft. It can cost a lot to get your life back together again in the wake of identity theft. The fraud charges, legal fees, and change of personal information (as much as possible) can sometimes be covered on your homeowners insurance.
  5. Water Back Up. If water damage due to backed up drains or sump pumps is a major concern for you, it may be worth it to add water back up cover to your policy.
  6. Business Property. This rider adds extra coverage to protect business related property located in your home. If you work from home or store items you plan to later sell at home, this is a good add-on.
  7. Green Improvement. Green improvement cover pays for the extra cost of replacing damaged property in your home with more energy-efficient versions.

These are not the only 7 homeowners insurance riders you could possibly add: there are many more, depending on your particular insurer. To explore other ways to customize your policy, contact Flagler County (FL) Insurance Agency today!