Household insurance protects the precious valuables that make your house a home. This includes everything under your roof that isn’t a fitting or fixture, like your TV, paintings, clothing, and more.
You probably know how important it is to take out household cover, but there’s more to it than simply taking the first household insurance quote you find. There are a few pitfalls to avoid, but if you don’t make these mistakes, you’ll be certain you’ve got the right cover.
Under insuring and over insuring can both be tempting, but not insuring right can cost you a lot of money.
An individual may under insure their home contents if they want to pay a lower premium every month, while someone may over-insure their valuables in the hopes that they’ll be paid out extra if they ever claim.
When a claim is submitted, the insurer will need to check the value of the items being claimed for. They may do this by sending an assessor to your home or checking the replacement value of items like TVs. If you are underinsured, your insurance company will know and only pay out a percentage of what the item is actually worth. Here’s an example.
Your home contents are worth R500 000 and you insure them for R250 000. You’re therefore underinsured by 50%. Now, let’s say you claim for a stolen TV worth R10 000. Your insurer will only pay you 50% of the value of the claim, which would be R5 000 in this case.
Your insurance company will only pay out a maximum of 100% of the value of the items you claim for. By over insuring, you’d only be making your monthly premiums more expensive without reaping any benefits.
The value of some of your home contents, like your everyday clothing, can just be estimated. Individually, these items aren’t expensive to replace. However, your more expensive items, like one-of-a-kind couture, televisions, and computers, should be individually listed in your household cover schedule. You will need to tell your household contents insurer exactly what you paid for these and note their model numbers where applicable.
Depending on the item in question, the value of your home contents is highly likely to increase or decrease as time goes on. Every year, it’s a good idea to assess your household insurance and make sure everything is insured for the correct amount. If it’s too low, you’ll be under insured and if it’s too high, you’ll be paying more every month than you should.
It’s a good habit to to keep the receipts for all major purchases you make, as these are the valuables that are specified in your household cover schedule. If something happens to these items, your insurer will want to see the receipt for them to prove you do in fact own them.
When disaster strikes and your home contents are destroyed or your home is broken into, it can be hard to remember exactly what items might be lost or stolen. If you take photos of every room from multiple angles, you have a reference to use when you need to let your insurer know what must be replaced.
For cover you can be sure of, get a Household Insurance quote with us today. You can do your thing in your own time by getting a Household Cover quote online and ensuring every aspect of your cover is correct, so when claim-time comes, there are no nasty surprises.
Dialdirect is an authorised FSP and Insurer T’s and C’s online