Are you shopping for home insurance in Colorado Springs? We can help. We provide house insurance plans for scores of homeowners just like you who want the best price, the best coverage, and the best customer service. That’s what’s made Mikeal Taylor Insurance Agency a top five homeowners insurance agency in southern Colorado.
The traditional American dream includes a beautiful home and a white picket fence. Unfortunately, your dream home can become your worst nightmare if it isn’t properly covered by home insurance. One accident is all it takes to destroy your picture perfect life. That is why having good home insurance is so important.
We know you have many choices when it comes to choosing a homeowners insurance agent in Colorado Springs. That’s why when you request a free quote from Mikeal Taylor Insurance Agency, you get a very competitive quote with friendly customer service.
Learn More: What is Home Insurance?
Home insurance is simply insurance that covers your home and its contents. It is made up of several small policies, and those vary based on how much coverage you want or need. Not only does standard homeowners policies cover your home itself, but it usually also gives you legal protection in case you are sued by someone. This is often a result of them having an accident on your property.
Homeowners insurance is used to insure your primary residence, rental homes, vacation homes, mobile homes, and land.
Types of Coverage Offered by Most House Insurance Policies:
- Coverage For Your Dwelling: This covers your home’s structure. This includes not just the wood, brick or stone construction. It also protects the air conditioning or heating unit, your plumbing and electrical wiring. It is important for to have enough coverage within this category to completely rebuild your home in the event of a total loss. There are three main ways to insure your structure. The replacement cost, which is the cost of replacing property without a deduction, but this usually includes a limit on total dollar amount spent. The extended replacement cost covers over and above the replacement cost, usually by 20%. The third type of coverage on the structure of your home is the actual cash value. This covers your replacement costs, minus depreciation.
- Coverage For Other Structures: This covers damage to other structures on your property. Good examples include a detached garage, a shed, fences or the like.
- Coverage For Personal Property: This covers your personal items that can be destroyed or damaged. Examples of these personal items include sporting goods, clothing, electronics and furniture.
- Coverage Over Loss of Use: This pays for your living expenses if you have to move out of your home while it’s being repaired.
- Coverage For Legal Liability: This coverage protects you if you ever face a lawsuit. A lawsuit can be the result of an injury on your property.
- Additional Coverage: There is more coverage you can add to your home owner’s policy. Ask us at Mikeal Taylor Insurance Agency about what these are and the benefits associated with them. Many times, issues like floods aren’t covered under regular home insurance policies. That is just one example of the many possible additions to your coverage you can get. We of course recommend this if you are in a high risk area.
Other situations covered by homeowners insurance:
- Vacant Building
- Windstorm
- Flood
- Earthquake
- Mobile Home
- Landlord
- Farm and Ranch
- Condominium/Townhome
How Home Insurance Works?
Homeowner’s insurance works to restore what was lost in an accident or in the event of a natural disaster. When disaster strikes and your roof caves in, when a fire rampages through your home, or any other unforeseen event or accident destroys your home, house insurance gives you the opportunity to rebuild your dream.
If you don’t have home insurance and disaster strikes, you will have to pay for your home’s restoration yourself. Unless you have an enormous amount of savings, you likely can’t afford this. No one can, which is why you need to have home insurance. You are taking too big of a risk without it. In addition, if you have a mortgage, you are often legally required to insure your home.
Do You Need Legal Protection Included in Your Home Insurance Policy?
In short, yes, you need legal protection within your home insurance policy. This financially protects you if someone is hurt on your property. It also covers you if your family member damages someone else’s property. According to the Insurance Information Institute, the liability portion of your home insurance policy also covers the legal costs associated with being sued. Typically, liability has set limits to how much it will pay out. This is usually around $100,000. Therefore, if you have substantial assets, you might want to think about additional liability coverage. Liability also provides medical coverage for a person who injures themselves on your property.
Do You Need Accidental Damage In Your Home Insurance Policy?
Accidental damage insurance is the part of your policy that covers an unexpected or accidental action. For example, it’s considered an accident if you drop your computer and it smashes to pieces. This aspect of your insurance policy doesn’t cover plain wear and tear. It is there truly for the unexpected. Since by definition an unexpected accident isn’t something you plan, having this contingency within your policy is a good idea. It is especially a good idea if you have kids or have kids visit your home regularly. Kids are often the cause of many accidental damage claims.
What About Valuable Personal Property?
Personal property not considered part of the home dwelling are often NOT covered by homeowners insurance. This includes jewelry, musical instruments, or certain other valuable keepsakes. However, it is possible to write an outlier policy to cover such items. Such policies are not that expensive to add. It is very important to discuss this coverage with us when you request a quote.
How Much Coverage do You Need?
Each house will need slightly different coverage. Our experienced team at Mikeal Taylor Insurance Agency are happy to help you determine what coverage you need. However, according to Farmer’s Insurance, the following are the questions you need to ask yourself when considering coverage amounts:
- How Much Would it Cost to Rebuild Your Home? This isn’t the amount you owe on your home. Instead, this is how much it would actually cost you to have your home rebuilt as it stands today. When determining this amount, consider local construction costs. Also, consider your square footage and style of your home. Look at the type of materials used in the construction of your home. To find out about your local construction costs, call your local builder’s association. For an easy assessment, multiply the cost per square foot it takes to construct local buildings by the square footage of your home. This will give you a pretty good estimate of how much it would take to replace your home.
- How Valuable Are Your Possessions? The second thing you need to consider when determining the amount of coverage you need is the value of your personal possessions. This includes appliances, electronics, jewelry, furniture and clothing.
- How Valuable is Everything Together? This is the cost of replacing the structure of your home, outbuildings, recreational vehicles and the possessions within. The total cost of everything.
- What Are Your Other Assets? These are things you own that don’t have anything to do with your home. These could be threatened if you are sued. Examples of other assets could include investments.
- Do You Need Additional Living Expenses? These are costs that will pay for you to live at another location during restoration if your home is damaged.
Do You Need to Make a Home Inventory?
A good way to assess what it would cost to replace your possessions is a home inventory. You might assume you can remember everything you own, but you can’t. To test yourself, name everything you own in one room of your home, without stepping in and taking a look. See, it’s not that easy. To help you construct your home inventory, read below:
- Include Everything: Make sure you include everything in your list. For example, curtains, clothes, photos, TVs, jewelry, artwork, furniture, toys and rugs. Everything! This is a challenge but needs to be done.
- Make a Video: One way to make this process easier is to video your house room-by-room, naming items and their value as you go. Then, store the video in another location, like a safety deposit box. If the worst happens and you need to replace your possessions, you can watch the video and take notes.
- Use a List Form: If traditional pen and paper is more your style, you can do it that way too. Be sure to store your list in another location as well.
Having either a video or list will save you so much time in the event something happens to your home. It will also ensure you don’t forget any important items when you are replacing items.
What Does Home Owners Insurance Cover?
We touched on this briefly earlier. Most often, home insurance covers any damage that occurs to your home. It also protects you against legal troubles if you are sued. It covers most damage caused by natural disasters, but there are exceptions. For example, most policies don’t include damage that is caused by your neglect as a homeowner, earthquakes or flood. Most policies will also replace the loss of jewelry, art or other priceless possessions.
Also, insured homeowners are covered for various assets according to the Rocky Mountain Insurance Information Association.
How do Home Insurance Claims Work?
We usually recommend you take out a high deductible policy. However, Mike doesn’t recommend going higher than $1,500 on your deductible. Our team also recommends you don’t file claims unless you must. To file a claim, call us when something happens.
Let’s assume you had a tree fall on your roof during a storm. We will send out an assessor to determine the amount of damage done. You will then hire a repair man to fix the roof. Our company will pay for the needed repairs Of course, depending on what the claim is it might be handled differently. A theft or something else that causes the loss will process differently. If you are unsure how to go about filing a claim, call us, and we will walk you through the process.
Is Renter’s Insurance Different?
Yes, renter’s insurance is different from regular home insurance. Renter’s insurance covers your possessions within a rented house. This is the coverage you need if you don’t own the property you live in.
If you are a homeowner or landlord who is renting out your property, you need a specific homeowners insurance. However, you do not need to cover the value of the renters personal property. Your renter covers their own possessions within the structure.
What is Unoccupied Home Insurance?
According to Fox Business, most insurance companies will require a separate policy for unoccupied property. An unoccupied home is considered property that the owners have left but will return to soon. A vacant home is property that is left completely empty without any personal possessions. Call us today, and we will let you know if you need a separate policy for your unoccupied home if you are leaving for an extended amount of time.
How Much Does Home Insurance Cost?
The Federal Reserve Bureau says the typical cost of homeowners insurance varies anywhere from $300 to $1,000 annually. A good way to know what your costs might be is to divide your home’s value by 1,000. Then, multiple that number by $3.50 for your estimated cost. Note, that is only an estimate. For an exact number, see Mike for a consultation. This will give you a better idea of how much it will cost to insure your house.
What Makes Home Insurance Premiums Increase?
Because we base your insurance premium cost on how much it would take to replace your home, the size and materials of your home will alter the amount it costs to insure. You might also see an increase if you file several claims. That is why we encourage you to use your home insurance only for the sudden and unexpected things, not normal wear and tear of your home. Other factors that could make your home owner’s premiums increase is a rise in the crime rate in your neighborhood. Whether or not you live in a danger zone for wildfire can also affect your insurance premium. Therefore, your insurance costs are greatly dependent on your state’s catastrophic trends.
How do You Get Home Owners Insurance?
Homeowners insurance is one of our top selling insurance policies we sell. Call us at Mikeal Taylor Insurance Agency. We walk you through the process of getting house insurance. Our goal is to protect and restore your dream if it is ever endangered. Our team works tirelessly to ensure you will never lose all you have worked so hard to achieve.