Category: Home Insurance

Homeowners Insurance: Does Your Sandpoint, ID Home Have Enough?

Posted on by AgentInsure

One of the largest investments that you’ve made in your life is probably your home. For that reason, it is crucial that you ensure it is insured. More than that, though, you need to ensure that your home has adequate coverage, especially in case your home were to suffer serious roof damage during a winter storm. Studies show that two-thirds of homes in the United States are underinsured. Is your home in Sandpoint, ID, among those two-thirds? Let’s hope not, but just in case, here are a few tips to help make sure your home is not underinsured:

  1. Floods and earthquakes are not typically covered under a standard homeowners insurance policy. Therefore, you may want to consider adding disaster coverage to your policy. This is especially since the Sandpoint’s average rainfall throughout the winter is significantly above the U.S. average.

  2. Make sure that you opt for “replacement cost” instead of “actual cash value”. Otherwise, you may find that you don’t receive a settlement check that is high enough to cover the replacement of the items within your home.

  3. See if your declarations page contains information about “loss of use” coverage. If you don’t have it, you may want to consider it. This type of coverage will help you pay for somewhere to live while your home is being rebuilt after significant damage from a storm.

  4. Avoid choosing the policy with the lowest premium. This isn’t always the best policy for you. While you don’t want to have to try to scrounge up the money each month to pay your premium, you do want to make sure that your home has the proper coverage.

The last thing you want to have to deal with is finding out that you don’t have enough coverage on your home after a major storm. You can avoid this by contacting your independent agent in Sandpoint, Idaho, as soon as possible for a review of your policy or to receive a new quote.

Get Online Home Insurance Quotes in Rathdrum, ID

Posted on by AgentInsure

When comparing online home insurance quotes for your house in Rathdrum, ID, it is important to make sure you look at identical policies. Insurance companies will ask different questions and provide different levels of coverage, which can make navigating multiple quotes challenging. By making sure the individual aspects of various policies are identical, you can ensure that you are, in fact, comparing identical policies. Here are the pieces of the policy to look at.

Types of Coverage

A homeowners insurance policy will include several different types of coverage. Common coverages that are found in most policies include:

  • the dwelling, which is your house
  • any other structures on the property
  • your personal belongings

Levels of Coverage

Within each of the above three categories, there are different levels of coverage that an insurer may provide. These are:

  • replacement cost, which pays the amount needed to replace your possessions
  • actual cash value, which is the depreciated value of your possessions
  • market value, which pays the current value of your home
  • stated value, in which the insurer determines a specific value you are insured for

These two factors change from policy to policy, just as deductibles do. In order to make sure your comparison is accurate, only compare policies that have identical types and levels of coverage.

Customize Your Quote

To see quotes for your own home, you can use our website. We make it easy to customize coverages, so you can easily compare identical policies. Should you have any questions about a quote you come across, feel free to give us a call. We have local, licensed insurance agents that can answer any questions you might have.

Affordable Homeowners Insurance Rates in Idaho

Posted on by AgentInsure

There are several tactics homeowners can take to find the most affordable homeowners insurance rates available to them. Here are two ways you can try lowering your premiums, if you live in Idaho.

Install a Security System

Many insurance companies provide a discount to homeowners who install security systems. Typically these discounts are given as a percentage, and the percentage is determined by the type of system installed. While most insurance companies extend this discount, you should always check with your insurance agent to make sure that you will receive it.

Combining Insurance Policies

Most insurance policies also offer discounts to people who have multiple policies with them. As a homeowner in Idaho, you likely also have a car, if not two, and perhaps an RV, boat or ATV. Each of these should be insured. If you do not have all your policies with the same company, consider combining them for an additional discount.

Get New Quotes

Anytime you are considering making a significant change to your home, such as installing a new security system, it will alter how insurance companies calculate your premiums. Therefore, immediately preceding or following such a change is a good time to shop around for a new homeowners insurance policy. Your current insurer may not provide as large a discount as one of their competitors.

If you have recently made such a change, or if your policies are with different companies, use our simple rate comparison tool to see if you can save money by switching insurers. It will pull quotes from major insurers in Idaho, so you can see how your current one compares.

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