What type of disaster is covered by my Homeowners Insurance?

For people living in America, natural catastrophes such as hurricane, earthquake, flood, mudslide, tornado and wildfire have become a reality of life. You can wake up in the morning and find that your house is water-logged, or there is a tornado all of a sudden without giving you any chance to take precaution! Even there can be an earthquake when everything seems to be absolutely perfect and your house is damaged by the tremors. The worst thing is that you can’t do anything to avoid it or even take any preparation beforehand to protect your things from getting damaged; it happens all of a sudden! Although these disasters are often termed as “Acts of God” and cannot be avoided completely, their effects on life and property can be greatly minimized by various types of insurance policies.

 It is the responsibility of a person while buying an insurance policy to give due consideration to all the factors that may cause damage to house and possessions. Instead of leaving things on your fate, start by making a list of all the natural disasters that may cause even the smallest damage to your home. If you live far away from the sea and do not bother about tornadoes, still check out if there is any history of landslides in your region that has slightest relation with tornadoes. Also the extent to which protection is required must be decided beforehand. Once you have the list, discuss it with your insurance agent, broker or company representative and find out the most suitable policy that will give you maximum coverage. You may require buying more than one policy if a single policy does not cover all the disasters.

 
Most of the Homeowners Insurance policies have two separate lists - disasters that are covered and the exclusion statement that mentions the cases not covered under the policy. While your insurance advisor or agent will emphasize upon the covered list, you must act smart by reading the exclusion statement first to know what is NOT COVERED.

 Fire and lightning are the most commonly insured disaster and all the homeowners’ insurance give coverage for this. All the damages caused to your property due to accidental fire in your own building, forest fire or fire from the house next door, fire resulting from lightning strike are covered for in the policy. Hail or windstorm is also covered by all the policies. Damages to the roof, windows and the sides of your house caused by strong winds and hail are covered in the policy. Damage caused to the detached structures of your home such as garages, fixtures and storage sheds are also covered. However, trees or shrubs destroyed by the winds are not covered in the policy unless particularly mentioned. Damages caused to the roof on piling up of snow and ice is covered in the policy. If you are living in a windy area or near the sea, make sure that you have a policy covering these damages.

Explosion, although not a common occurrence, is covered in the homeowners’ policy. If you are located near the mines or chemical factories, you should give special thought to buy a policy for this reason. Any damage to your property caused by explosion is fully covered by the homeowners insurance. Even if your house is near the airport, the chances of your home being hit by an aircraft are slim. However, if such unfortunate incident happens ever, the damages can be recovered if you have insurance coverage. Smoke from fire in your house or some other source may damage part of or the entire house. The insurance policy pays for cleaning of the furniture and getting the home repainted at times. All the damages caused to your property during riots or civil commotion is covered in the policy only if, you are not involved in the movements. Damage or loss of possession in the event of theft and vandalism are covered in the policy. Damages caused due to sewer back, broken water pipes or due to water from the fire hoses are covered for in the insurance policy.

 Therefore homeowners’ insurance policies are the most reliable and safest to provide protection to your property from the above-mentioned perils.