Those of you that own your own home know how hard you worked to be able to finally buy your own home, how much pride in ownership you have, and all of the blood, sweat and tears you have put into maintaining your home.

Your home is filled with almost all of your worldly possessions, things you have gathered up over many years. But those possessions are more than just things. They are memories of lost relatives, family and friends. They are priceless and can’t be replaced.

You try to protect your home and possessions the best that you can. But accidents happen, and some can’t be avoided. A spark from faulty wiring…a space heater falls over…an ember from a fire in the fireplace that you thought had long burned out…a lightning strike. These are but some of the causes of a fire that can turn your life upside down.

So what if the unthinkable happens. A fire burns down your house and you lose everything in it. Thankfully, you and your family were not home or were able to escape without personal harm. But everything inside the house burns down. “Thank God I have insurance to cover that” you think. Maybe you do and maybe you don’t. Whether you have the right type of insurance is a subject we will cover in the next blog. For now, let’s assume you have the correct type of insurance. Do you have the correct amount?

INVENTORY YOUR POSSESSIONS!!! You have probably heard someone tell you this before, and you probably ignored it. Don’t ignore this any longer. I can promise you that you will not remember what you had after a fire loss. In the fire cases I have handled, you would not believe the difference in the amount of property claimed by the homeowner in cases where the homeowner has taken an inventory of their property compare to those that did not. The average homeowner after a fire loss lists between 50-200 items of property lost in the fire when they don’t have an inventory of their possessions. Those that do inventory their possessions average over 1,000 items claimed in the loss.

You will forget more items that you own than you remember. And that translates to tens of thousands of dollars in property losses that you will not receive from your insurance company. Preparing an inventory will also help to make sure you are not underinsured. Don’t buy $100,000.00 in personal property coverage if you have $200,000.00 in possessions.

So how do you do an inventory? And how do you know how much to insure for? The inventory is the easier part, but it requires a little time and effort from you. One way to do it is to get a pen and paper and go from room to room and write down everything you see, from toothbrushes to furniture and everything in between. When you are done with the list, you won’t believe how many things you have accumulated. The other way to do it, and the quicker way, is to videotape every room in your home. Everyone has a video camera these days, whether it is a camcorder or on your cell phone. If you video your possessions, be sure to open every drawer so you can see what is in there, and don’t forget the attic, basement or crawl space, as well as stuff outside of your house.

OK. So now you have taken an inventory of your possessions. Figuring out how much it is worth and how much to insure it for is another matter. The easiest, but least reliable method, is to guess. I don’t recommend it, but it is better than not doing anything. If you do guess, err on the high side. It is better to have too much coverage than not enough, as an extra $50,000.00 in coverage is relatively cheap. The second method to value your property is to go item by item and add up the replacement cost. The best source to look up prices is the internet. If the item is new and you know what you paid, use that price. If the item is older or you forget where you bought it, I find a good place to look is on Amazon.com. You can buy pretty much anything on Amazon. This method takes a good bit of time, but it is worthwhile. A possible third method to value your property is to hire a public adjuster to prepare an inventory. While most people would think a public adjuster is only helpful after a fire loss, they can help you inventory your property and come up with a value before the loss. They use computer programs which value almost every household item. I have not confirmed that public adjusters actually offer this service, but I will attempt to find out and will update this blog.

Once you have completed your inventory and your property valuation, you are ready to purchase or update your homeowners insurance personal property coverage. If you already have coverage in place and it is not enough, you can call your insurance agent and increase your limits immediately.

One last item to cover on this topic is property that is limited or excluded. Most insurance policies contain limitations on the value of certain types of personal property, and in some cases, certain types of property are excluded completely. Examples of property with limitations are jewelry, guns, furs, electronics and art. For example, you might have a policy with a jewelry limitation of $2,500.00. That means that even if you own $50,000.00 worth of jewelry, the most you can recover is $2,500.00. In order to recover more than this limitation, you must buy increased limits, or schedule each piece of jewelry. This is another reason why it is very important to know the value of all of the property you want to insure. If what you own is significantly more valuable than the limited coverage amount under your policy, talk to your insurance company about increasing the coverage for that particular category of personal property.

I hope you find this information helpful. If you have any comments, or if there is a subject you would like for me to cover in a later blog, let me know.

Blog Post Provided By: Glenn Loewenthal: Atlanta House Fire Attorney