Home Content Insurance

Do You Need Home Content Insurance?

Not everyone needs home content insurance, but check this handy reference before you decide to forgo it all together.

Home Content Insurance is absolutely vital for anyone who has furniture, cabinets and flooring, computers, clothes and other valuables, that they wouldn’t be able to replace in the event of a major loss, like flood, fire or earthquake.

The word, “Building and Contents Insurance” is generally a term we think of in commercial real estate to pertain to commercial investment property (the building) and the contents inside it. Contents can include things like furniture, cabinets, paint, carpet, drywall, machinery, computers and more! When you are putting together a building and contents insurance policy with your provider, it’s a good idea to document everything that you want to have insured under the home content insurance policy and keep this type of inventory list on file with the insurance agent and/or at an off site location, such as your safety deposit box or other file back up provider, so that you have access to it in the event of a major loss at your building due to fire or flood, for example.

However, many of us also think of building and contents insurance as it pertains to our personal residences. You can definitely get a home content insurance policy for your home (building) as well as the contents inside. In fact, many people who don’t have a building policy (such as renters or condo owners) can still get a customized contents insurance policy by talking to an insurance representative or getting some online insurance quotes. I have a condo and we, the condo owners, are responsible for everything “from they drywall in,” in the event of fire or flood. We are also responsible for our own major systems, such as heating and plumbing. (We found out about that the hard way, when one of the builder’s water pipe suppliers used faulty piping and we became engaged in a class action lawsuit to try to recover the costs of replacing our hot water pipes before they burst and flooded our homes…. but that’s another story.)

Anyway, if you are getting a condo or renter’s insurance policy, be sure to find out what it entails. Usually this is just another name for a home content insurance policy. You may not be covered for things like floods, earthquakes, etc. and some of your more valuable items, such as jewelry or computers, may require a separate insurance rider. Read your policy carefully and talk to your insurance agent if you have further questions.

Inventory What You Have Before Sticking Your Home Content Insurance Policy In The Drawer

One easy way to document what you have in your home, if you don’t want to make a big professional list, or hire someone to do an inventory for you, is to take a camera or video camera through your room and record what’s in each place. If you know how much you paid for a certain couch, or what make/model your TV is, etc. you can just talk about that as you film. It’s very easy, and it will give you a good track record to work off of, should anything go wrong and you need to cash in on your home content insurance policy!