Home Is Where Your Heart (and Wallet) Is

Home might be “where your heart is”, but it’s also where a significant amount of your income is tied up.  Failing to protect it not only means you are putting the roof over your head at risk, but you could also be putting your family, your possessions, and your financial stability at risk as well. Having adequate homeowners coverage leaves you open for huge out-of-pocket expenses in the event of an unexpected occurrence.  Failing to check your policy can have disastrous consequences, yet many people assume their homeowner’s policy doesn’t need to be reviewed or touched again after the initial setup.  However, there are changes that can happen to your property that would directly affect your coverage, including…

• The addition of any structure such as a deck, patio, or pool. These not only affect the value of the home, but they can also be liability risks. Your policy would need to be reevaluated and you need to make sure you have proper coverage for not only the new features, but also for anyone who may be injured as a result of them.
• Major improvements to the home like upgrading appliances, re-modeling kitchens or bathrooms, etc. If you put a significant amount of money into renovation projects or upgrades around your home, you could end up losing that money if you don’t check that your policy coverage reflects that.
• Adding a large amount of “inventory” (stuff) in your home that equates a sizable sum of money. In other words, if you add a lot of expensive furniture, electronics, etc. but never reflect this on your insurance coverage, you might not end up receiving enough payout from your insurance coverage to take care of those lost items in a disaster. Your insurance should be periodically reviewed to ensure that you are staying current on how much coverage you actually need based on what you have both inside of and around your home.

If you are feeling antsy after this post because it’s been a while since you looked over your own homeowner’s policy, there’s no better time than now to fix that!  Carroll Marshall Insurance can help you review your current coverage, and determine if you need more, less, or if you can stick with your current plan.  We can customize a protection package just for you, so you know you are getting the very best coverage at a price that won’t throw your budget into distress.  Give us a call to schedule an appointment at our Winter Haven office!