With the holidays now over, all of the joy and excitement fade into memory. What does last, however, are the gifts that you may have received. And while we all know it is the spirit of the holidays that matters, we still want to keep our special material possessions safe. That means placing protection on those which are expensive. If you recently added items such as art, antiques, jewelry, coins, or other expensive gifts to your personal property, then it's important to make certain that they are properly insured under your 2021 insurance policy. Scheduled personal property insurance or personal property supplemental insurance can make sure that you ring in the new year assured that you are fully covered, for both the old and the new.
What Is Scheduled Personal Property Supplemental Insurance?
Scheduled personal property is a type of personal property supplemental insurance. It allows a person to supplement their homeowner's insurance policy with additional protection on specific valuable items like jewelry and artwork.
Doesn't Homeowner's Insurance Already Protect My Personal Property?
While homeowner's insurance does protect personal property, it has several limitations. First of all, it will set limits on the amount of reimbursement you can receive for categories of items and individual items. By consulting your full homeowner's plan you can find out what these limits are. But if a person's plan offers $1500 of coverage for jewelry this means that if they own $500 worth of jewelry, and that is stolen, they will be fully covered. However, if they own $3000 worth of jewelry, and all of it is stolen, they will only be covered for half of the value of the stolen items. Similarly, a plan may set a limit on any single piece of jewelry. If the limit is $500, and all of a person's jewelry is valued at less than that, then they will be fine, but if they own one ring valued at $1500, it is likely worthwhile to schedule that piece of property.
Scheduled personal property has several additional advantages in offering personal property supplemental insurance protection over homeowner's insurance. By scheduling property, you are able to provide additional protections to those items covered in this way. For instance, while most homeowners' policies cover fire and theft, many do not cover loss or damage due to personal use. Personal property supplemental insurance can protect items from much more than a standard homeowner's plan.
There are a couple of additional advantages that scheduling personal property has over a standard homeowner's plan in providing protection for your valuables. The first is that personal property supplemental insurance can provide coverage with no deductible or with a much lower one than homeowner's insurance. And second, scheduled personal property insurance is not subject to depreciation. So while homeowner's insurance will only pay the current value of an item, scheduled property insurance pays the cost to replace the item. For instance, if a person wants to insure very expensive electronics that they purchased a couple of years ago, homeowner's insurance will calculate the value lost years later, and only pay the remainder, scheduled personal property insurance will allow you to replace the items at no cost to yourself.
Advantages of Scheduled Personal Property Supplemental Insurance
- Ensures your most valuable items are fully covered.
- No depreciation.
- Low or no deductibles.
- Additional coverage (such as loss and personal use damage.)
- Cost-saving over increasing the entire value of the homeowner's plan.
What Happens Without Scheduled Personal Property Protection?
Without scheduled personal property insurance a person risks the protection of their most valuable items. While homeowner's insurance is effective at covering a lot of things, it is not enough for individual expensive items. A homeowner's insurance policy only offers coverage for "unscheduled items," these are the items that fall into general categories, but are not itemized and individually insured.
Scheduling your most valuable possessions allows you to most fully protect yourself against any possibility of loss or damage. To find out more about how to schedule your personal property and the many advantages it has, reach out to us here at Arnold Insurance.
