Filing a home insurance claim can be confusing and frustrating, especially after an unnerving accident. Unfortunately, it is a process that most homeowners will go through at least once in their lifetime. It is important to know when it is appropriate to file a home insurance claim and what may happen when you do.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
You should generally file a home insurance claim after an accident if:<\/p>\n\n\n\n
While most of home insurance is designed to protect the physical home and your belongings, a portion of home insurance also covers liability. General liability under home insurance covers injuries and property damage that someone may suffer on your property. For example, say a fire starts in your kitchen and destroys a visitor\u2019s purse and everything inside. Home insurance can help cover repairs and medical bills someone else may face, as well as legal expenses you may be charged with after the accident. This is why most accidents involving other people, especially injuries, should generally be filed as a home insurance claim.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Even if things seem fine at first, injuries can grow into more complicated medical issues and lawsuits.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
This may seem like an obvious one, but many homeowners fall into the trap of thinking that their home insurance policy covers something it doesn\u2019t. A basic home insurance policy won\u2019t cover everything, and filing a claim for an uncovered peril is an easy way to get your claim denied.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Incidents that are commonly excluded from home insurance policies include:<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Insurance providers do often offer endorsements and additional policy floaters in order to cover common exclusions or limitations. For example, you may be able to purchase a jewelry policy floater in order to upgrade the coverage available for your expensive jewelry.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
This will only be applicable if you already have the endorsements, however. Changing your home insurance policy while a claim is open will not affect the current claim. If you do not have a jewelry endorsement for the claim that is currently open, you cannot change your policy to have it covered. The endorsement will instead take effect for any incident after the open claim.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Your deductible is how much you pay out of pocket before receiving compensation. For example, say a storm sweeps in and causes $15,000 in damage to your home. Your home insurance deductible is $1,000. This means that you must pay $1,000 toward repairs before receiving compensation for the remaining $14,000. In this case, it would likely be worth it to file a claim since the difference between the damages and your deductible is so drastic.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
However, say a storm caused $1,100 in damage. With a $1,000 deductible, the difference may only be around $100. In this case, you may want to think twice about going through the process of filing a home insurance claim.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
This can also apply if you don\u2019t reach your deductible. If a storm causes $600 in damage to your home with a $1,000 home insurance deductible, you cannot meet your deductible\u2014meaning you would spend more money trying to file a claim than you would repairing the damage to your home directly.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Before filing a claim, make sure to have any damage to your home appraised by a professional. They can quote you on the repairs, which gives you the idea of whether or not you reach your deductible.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Unless the damages are substantially higher than your deductible, you may want to reconsider filing a claim.<\/p>\n\n\n\n