Home Renovations
Spring is here and that means it is renovation season! Home renovations and repairs can help improve curb appeal and make your house feel more like a home. Whether you’re doing small touch-ups, updating your kitchen or adding a whole new addition, here’s what you should know about your insurance before getting started.
Insurance during the Remodel
While you remodel your home, you need to make sure that you have the proper liability coverage in place. If you hire contractors to work on the home, they may have their own coverage, be sure to ask them before the project starts. But handymen and friends of the family, if injured, will have the ability to place a claim against your home insurance policy.
The materials you choose to use during the home remodel could have an effect on your home insurance premiums. Make sure to follow the most recent code guidelines when making improvements and invest in materials that fortify your home against damage so you can see a discount reflected in your home insurance policy.
Finally, think about your contents during the renovation. In some rooms, you may have to find temporary, offsite storage for the contents. This can take them out of the purview of your policy and expose you to risk of loss unless you have a supplementary plan of coverage for them while they are offsite.
Renovating or making repairs in or around your home can make your property safer. Maintaining your property to remove potential hazards is a great way to lower your risk of being liable if someone injures themselves on your property. For example, repairs and general maintenance that make your driveway safer can help lower the chances of someone slipping or falling and taking you to court for damages or injuries; and making upgrades, like replacing your roof or adding a connected burglar or fire alarm, can be an excellent line of defense against common hazards that might benefit your insurance, too.
Insurance after the Remodel
Once you remodel your home, your property value will increase as will your replacement costs. And if any redecoration is included in the remodel, the value of your personal property might have increased as well. All of this translates into a need to update your home insurance policy to reflect your new values. Raising your limits ensures that you can get exactly what you need out of your policy in the event of a post-remodel insurable incident.
It’s not difficult to update your home insurance policy to reflect these changes. Just give us a call, let us know what you’ve updated, and we can help you decide what your new property and contents limits need to be. Since this will likely increase your insurance premium, you can also consider raising your deductible a bit in order to balance it out.
Heritage Insurance
100A Fairford Street Moose Jaw
306.693.7640
nohassleinsurance.ca