Home insurance is an important item of ownership. Now lot of us trust the agent we buy insurance from or broker who helped us getting the house and never check the details. Here are some items you can talk to your agent or insurance company with and save a few dollars (I pay 20% lower premium than what I was paying earlier)

The home insurance coverage comes in with coverage for following items:

1. Coverage A : Dwelling or Mobile Home Coverage
2. Coverage B: Separate or Other Structures
3. Coverage C: Personal Property
4. Coverage D: Loss of Use
5. Coverage E: Personal Liability
6. Coverage F: Medical Pay to Others

 In addition, there is lot of extensions of these coverages.

Now it is important to note that most insurance companies provide you these insurance promises tfor replacing you components for named events depending upon the state you live in.

In addition there is deductible on this policy that tells you in event of unfortunate loss, how much you have to pay in addition to what you would get from insurance company.

For those who are serious home buyers here are tips that i used to bring down my premiums:

1) For coverage A, insurance company uses software to estimate the possible replacement cost. Give them a call and ask them what parameters they are using. Sometime the agent may have added custom kitchen or cathedral roof for you house, that would add at least 5% -10% of your annual premium. Make sure you have such elements in your home. If not ask them to send a person to verify and take this item off the valuation

2) For deductibles, try to keep you deductibles as high as you are comfortable with. I am sure if you are home owner, you have already saved enough and are saving so that you can keep your house maintained. We get carried away by looking at the deuctible as if we would have lot of liability. Remember insurance is for big unfortunate events of your life. For small repairs under $2,500, it is easy for an average income person to get the repairs done. By just making your deductible from $500 to 2,500, you would save nearly 10% - 15%  of your annual premium

3) For extended coverage, this coverage provides you additional protection in case of inflation in cost values. Say in an event, the cost of repairs exceeded the insured value. In such circumstances, the extended coverage factors or amounts would kick in pay for extra cost involved. keep this factor around 125% - 150%. this would also save you up to 5% of premium depending upon who you do business with.

4) last, keep your all your insurance needs with one company. Multi policy discounts are 5% - 10%. So you would pay lower premiums on both policies. if you are a professional, then companies provide professional discounts also.

So that is how I saved 20%of my premium. It is my home and I do not mind paying for small repair costs.

Of course if event happens then these small savings may cost you a more but if no event occurs and you finish great, you saved a lot of money over years to use for some of your petty expenses.

Hope this helps. If you have more questions and want to know more about insurance, write to me or ask question in forums. I would provide as much in writing as possible.

"Helping others is what fuels your own life" just said it.