Are You Properly Insured with Personal Property Insurance?

It’s easy to determine how much your homeowner’s insurance policy should be worth. These policies are based on the value of your home’s structure. However, not all homeowner’s insurance policies include personal property insurance coverage for your possessions.

Generally speaking, most insurance companies will insure your belongings for a certain percentage of the overall value of your home. This coverage is usually between 50 and 75 percent. What this means is that if your home is insured for $200,000 and your contents portion is 25% of that amount then your contents are insured for $50,000. This may not even come close to what it will take to replace your belongings in the event of a disaster, though. You will need to take an inventory.

Go through your home room by room and make lists of everything you own. If possible, notate serial numbers, manufacturer names, models, purchase cost, and time of purchase for everything. If you have receipts for items, this will be even better since you can prove the amounts you initially paid for your belongings. You will need to do this for furniture, clothing, jewelry, games, movies, cutlery, plates, fridges, blenders, the stove, and so on. Since you probably have far more than you can name off hand it will take a little while.

You should also take inventory of anything in your garage and outside your home (lawnmower, bicycles, deep freezers, etc.) Take pictures of it all from room to room. If this seems like too overwhelming a task or if you don’t have the time then consider hiring a professional inventory service – the cost will be reasonable and you’ll save a ton of time. The finished list will give you an idea of how much it will truly cost to replace your belongings and before you consider it a waste of time and money you should know that your insurance provider will require one anyway before allowing you to make a claim.

The next step is to find out any limits imposed by your policy. There are some things you may want to purchase a separate policy for. Here is a list of the items that will have a low coverage value and that you may wish to insure separately:

• $1000 - $3000 – Jewelry, guns, & silverware.
• $1000 - $2500 – Business property (inventory, business cards, business computer, etc.) and sports/stamps/other collectibles.
• $200 - $500 – Money.


You may also want to buy additional coverage for high end electronics, furniture, or anything else that will cost more to replace than your policy will cover. You can usually double your coverage for a relatively low rise in premiums and will give you better peace of mind in the event of disaster. Your most fond memories can’t be bought, but there’s no sense in not having the ability to replace other things if they are lost.

When looking for cheap contents insurance, it is advisable to take time and compare the different rates offered by different companies.

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