Home Insurance - When to Involve Insurance Company, Submit a Claim?

[Nir]

Hi, is a Home Insurance (rental) similar to car insurance where claims can significantly affect premium? Is it true that after 3 claims the insurance company can decide not to insure additional properties for you, discontinue your insurance or something?


For example, do you involve your insurance company for a small leakage from the ceiling OR as long as it is less than say $1,000 just fix it yourself
(meaning pay a professional to fix it without involving insurance)? Another example, you had a break-in, door is broken say $1000 damage.

Involve Insurance or not that is the question.

THANKS.

 

[dplummer]

From my experience it`s better to have a higher deductible, it lowers your premium. Look after the small damage your self & save the insurance claim for a large one. I have heard of insurance companies dropping clients after claims. Don`t know if there`s a magic # like 3 strikes & your out. A lot depends on the $$ amount of the claim & if the property is worth insuring. The claims adjuster will report overall condition of the property back to the underwriters. Best of luck!

Doug

 

[Nir]

Thanks Doug,
By small damage do you mean under $1000 or even under $5000?

my deductible is high too for the same reason - it lowers premium.

it`s just so stupid that we have insurance but can`t really use it, meaning there is a catch - you use it you literally lose it. unbelievable how much power those insurance companies have!

Regards,
Neil

 

[NorthernAlex]

I am meeting my insurer this Friday. I will add this to my task list!

 

[HeatherBrandt]

We had an incident last year when a mystery (large) truck drove down the street of our rental property and ripped out the power line to the property. We contacted our insurance company because we had no clue what the final cost would be. It was a weekend and winter, of course.

At first it looked horrible, the city was going to make us pay for everything they did, and our electrician suggested that everything in the house would have to be brought up to code!

Luckily the city finally decided it was not our fault and the electrician managed to fix the power connection point without a major reno.

I phoned the insurance company back and asked if I had the option to "unsubmit" the claim depending on the cost once the bills were received. They said yes. While they wouldn`t admit to our rate going up, we would definitely lose our "claim free status" for 3 years which was worth 10% off our insurance. We decided not to claim as it was a break even proposition and then there was the concern that our rates might actually go up.

Good Luck

 

[Nir]

Hi Heather,

Thanks for sharing!

That`s exactly the kind of feedback I was looking for. any experience involving insurance companies.

Glad it turned out to be a minor one for you.

Regards,
Neil