The Vent Part Quatre

[Udella&Wiz 325]

My husband's been getting on my nerves a bit lately.

I'm trying to help him fax something, I told him to use a coversheet. He keeps saying he doesn't need it, he doesn't need it, blah blah.

I told him to do it anyway if he doesn't want his fax getting lost and I took a business writing class in grade 12 so he really -should- do it.

Way too many little things are irritating me with him these days... he just has no drive to do anything properly.

I need a job.

Hehe...welcome to marriage....and yes somedays I wonder too. No coversheet? pfffft...what is he thinking...it WILL get lost!

[antda 13]

Interesting discussion about insurance......

If you don't mind...Can I ask a quick question?....

Question: Supposingly if a person is the owner (but not the one being insured) of a life insurance policy (lol..yeah, it's back to that topic again...sigh...)....And the owner of the policy dies off. Can they "pass on / give" the ownership of that policy to somebody else if they are named in a will, or by any other means? Or does the policy terminate, as soon as the owner dies off? In other words, is the insurance policy considered part of the 'estate' of the dead owner and treated like such to be given to others, without the insured person's knowledge? Scary to think of what the outcome of that would be.....

Any thoughts, ideas, suggestions, etc. would be appreciated. Thanks....

Ant

Edited June 30, 2010 by Ant+D+BabyA

[antda 13]

P.S. My Vent (lol..yes, I came here to vent too): I hate paying for homeowner's insurance. Why on earth do I need such, when it barely even covers anything and has so many 'does not cover' clauses to it.....

And even if I were to make a claim on such, the rates will go up....

So what's the point...? Lol..I'm better off saving the money than paying for insurance....Sigh.....

Please convince me as to why I need homeowner's insurance....Enlighten me, before I have to go pay the bill....

Ant

[Hugglebuggles 60]

Well, really the point of homeowners insurance is to cover you in the event of a major loss or catastrophic event. Is your home was to burn to the ground tomorrow, along with everything inside of it, and you didn't have any insurance, what would happen? It's very unlikely you would be able to pay to rebuild your home and replace all its contents out of pocket. You would be homeless and have nothing. Obviously that is a very extreme case, but it can and has happened to to a lot of people. It covers you for things that you probably think won't happen to you, but can. If someone breaks in your house when you're not home and steals thousands of dollars worth of personal property, if a tree falls on your roof and destroys a section of your home, or maybe there is a major wind/hail storm that takes off half your shingles, there's coverage for that. You just never know. To fix these things out of pocket would be ridiculously expensive. Also keep in mind that there are lots of things a standard home policy won't cover, but there are a million extra coverage endorsements that can be added (for an extra fee of course) that can fill coverage gaps you may be concerned about. It's all about figuring out what you have and thinking about what extra you might need. You also have liability insurance in your homeowners policy. Liability situations can occur anytime, anywhere and for reasons you couldn't even imagine. It could be something stupid like the mailman tripping on the walkway up to your house and breaking a leg. Suddenly he is suing you for medical expenses, lost wages, etc. Or a family pet biting someone who wanders into your yard. It doesn't matter of you invited them or not- you could be found liable.

As far as the life insurance thing Ant, I really don't know how that works. I work strictly in home and auto, we have a separate life/health department who handles all of that.

[antda 13]

Hugglebuggles-Thanks for your quick and helpful reply...

Lol...Ok...So it looks like I have to send the cheque in after all...Sigh..I'm not happy about this, but I guess I have to do such, be it that I have no other choice in the matter...Grrr.....

Ok...Based on what you wrote..It covers...

Fire, Theft, Trees falling on the roof, Major wind/hail storms, Liability, Biting from Pets....

Lol..Some apply to me, some don't....

Tree damage (we have a lot of tress around here), and Major storms (it snows a lot around here) would be the ones I would need..Thanks for providing more info about that too, as we were wondering about the coverage regarding that too (lol..the wording in the policy was kind of confusing..for example, it only covers certain natural disasters, but not others).....

But I don't think I need Fire (we don't smoke, there are no forest fires), Theft and Other Crime (we live in a very low/no crime rate area..), Liability (heck..we can't even get the mailman to come to our door...we have to go pick up our mail a mile away, and not too many people know even where to find our street...), or Biting from Pets (we don't have any pets..)

Nevertheless...We're still covered, in case something does happen, I suppose....

I find it funny though that we can't just "pick and choose" as to what part of the insurance that we want, so that our rates will be lower...Or better yet, why can't one have a choice to not have homeowners insurance at all....

Do we really need all that coverage?

On that note: Are there any other ways to lower one's homeowners insurance premiums? We already have good credit and we have the highest deductable...We tried combining both home and auto onto one company, but couldn't get the best rate that way, so we had to go separate with that....Anything else we can do to lower our rates?

Sigh....I feel broke today.....

Ant

Well, really the point of homeowners insurance is to cover you in the event of a major loss or catastrophic event. Is your home was to burn to the ground tomorrow, along with everything inside of it, and you didn't have any insurance, what would happen? It's very unlikely you would be able to pay to rebuild your home and replace all its contents out of pocket. You would be homeless and have nothing. Obviously that is a very extreme case, but it can and has happened to to a lot of people. It covers you for things that you probably think won't happen to you, but can. If someone breaks in your house when you're not home and steals thousands of dollars worth of personal property, if a tree falls on your roof and destroys a section of your home, or maybe there is a major wind/hail storm that takes off half your shingles, there's coverage for that. You just never know. To fix these things out of pocket would be ridiculously expensive. Also keep in mind that there are lots of things a standard home policy won't cover, but there are a million extra coverage endorsements that can be added (for an extra fee of course) that can fill coverage gaps you may be concerned about. It's all about figuring out what you have and thinking about what extra you might need. You also have liability insurance in your homeowners policy. Liability situations can occur anytime, anywhere and for reasons you couldn't even imagine. It could be something stupid like the mailman tripping on the walkway up to your house and breaking a leg. Suddenly he is suing you for medical expenses, lost wages, etc. Or a family pet biting someone who wanders into your yard. It doesn't matter of you invited them or not- you could be found liable.

As far as the life insurance thing Ant, I really don't know how that works. I work strictly in home and auto, we have a separate life/health department who handles all of that.

Edited June 30, 2010 by Ant+D+BabyA

[The_Dude 1,142]

I have the Echo and The Bunnymen song "Lips Like Sugar" stuck in my head. Some how, some way, this is all your fault Nev.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ft7dI3Krdjg

[Sprailenes 47]

I have the Echo and The Bunnymen song "Lips Like Sugar" stuck in my head. Some how, some way, this is all your fault Nev.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ft7dI3Krdjg

Omg I love echo and the bunnymen!

[Marilyn. 340]

wrong thread

Edited June 30, 2010 by Marilyn.

[The_Dude 1,142]

Omg I love echo and the bunnymen!

I do too, but for the life of me, I can only remember the lyrics to about 1/4 of that song, and of course, the chorus. I had it on my mind since I woke up this morning, and of course now, I see there is someone on these boards whose name is lipslikesugar.

[Danu 19]

Hugglebuggles-Thanks for your quick and helpful reply...

Lol...Ok...So it looks like I have to send the cheque in after all...Sigh..I'm not happy about this, but I guess I have to do such, be it that I have no other choice in the matter...Grrr.....

Ok...Based on what you wrote..It covers...

Fire, Theft, Trees falling on the roof, Major wind/hail storms, Liability, Biting from Pets....

Lol..Some apply to me, some don't....

Tree damage (we have a lot of tress around here), and Major storms (it snows a lot around here) would be the ones I would need..Thanks for providing more info about that too, as we were wondering about the coverage regarding that too (lol..the wording in the policy was kind of confusing..for example, it only covers certain natural disasters, but not others).....

But I don't think I need Fire (we don't smoke, there are no forest fires), Theft and Other Crime (we live in a very low/no crime rate area..), Liability (heck..we can't even get the mailman to come to our door...we have to go pick up our mail a mile away, and not too many people know even where to find our street...), or Biting from Pets (we don't have any pets..)

Nevertheless...We're still covered, in case something does happen, I suppose....

I find it funny though that we can't just "pick and choose" as to what part of the insurance that we want, so that our rates will be lower...Or better yet, why can't one have a choice to not have homeowners insurance at all....

Do we really need all that coverage?

On that note: Are there any other ways to lower one's homeowners insurance premiums? We already have good credit and we have the highest deductable...We tried combining both home and auto onto one company, but couldn't get the best rate that way, so we had to go separate with that....Anything else we can do to lower our rates?

Sigh....I feel broke today.....

Ant

It would be good to pick and choose I suppose but keep in mind as well things like fire can happen from electrical causes too, or a grease spill on the stove...lightening strikes etc (don't mean to scare you, just food for thought). We lived in a very low crime rate area in Kingston and we had a bunch of little nitwits go through one night and steal radios and cellphones and things from people's cars. They didn't hit ours thankfully, but if they had the homeowners policy covered anything inside the car that was stolen. Even if we weren't at home and something like that happened it would cover it, my aunt had a bunch of christmas presents stolen from her car at a walmart one time. As it was inside her vehicle, with the police report and reciepts of everything she bought she got them covered. Never know when crappy stuff might pop up!

Edited June 30, 2010 by Danu

[trailmix 77]

I'm kind of anti-insurance - but, there are things you insure because you can't afford to replace them out of pocket. How about sewer backup in the basement? Don't know if you personally have a basement Ant, but it's a consideration if you do - it's pretty common.

Here you can pick and choose a bit, for instance the 'premium' insurance will cover you if something 'mysteriously' disappears, or if you drop grape juice on your carpet or if you are moving your tv and drop it and break it. Those are things you can choose not to have.

But, if you think you could handle the payment required if your house did burn down (as an example) and you have no mortgage (any bank I have dealt with requires proof of insurance) then why not cancel it. If you can't afford to replace your house out of pocket then it's probably a bad idea.

[Flames9_RN 358]

Dryers are a huge fire starter as well!!

[Pauley 2]

Dryers are a huge fire starter as well!!

Thank you for earworming me with The Prodigy's "Firestarter". I appreciate that.

[Hugglebuggles 60]

The thing with home insurance, is a lot of it is based on the value of your home, which is something you really can't change. Your dwelling coverage is calculated based on how much the company thinks your home would cost to replace from the ground up in the even of a complete loss. The more that coverage is, the more the insurance will cost.

Take a look at your personal property coverage. It should be anywhere from 50%-70% of the coverage you have on your dwelling. If it is any higher than that, you are likely paying for extra coverage you may not need. Something else that can be done in regards to personal property, is you are probably paying for replacement cost. We write all of our policies with replacement cost. This means that in the event of a loss they would pay whatever needs to be paid for you to replace your items- old for new. However, if you opt to have actual cash value (ACV) on your personal property, that can save you a good bit of money. You just need to think about what would happen in the event of a loss. The insurance company would only pay what they deem is the value of the items after their value has depreciated. That usually isn't going to be enough to fully whatever is lost. A lot of companies won't write policies with ACV personal property, but if your company will, that could be a way to save.

Here you can pick and choose a bit, for instance the 'premium' insurance will cover you if something 'mysteriously' disappears, or if you drop grape juice on your carpet or if you are moving your tv and drop it and break it. Those are things you can choose not to have.

Very true! A lot of people don't know that T-mix. I'm sure Canada differs in some way, but here a normal homeowners policy is an HO3, and the premium policy that T-mix just described would be an HO5. The main difference is in regards to personal property. With an HO3 you have coverages on named perils only (ie. fire, theft, etc), while with an HO5 it is all perils (ie. spilling grape juice on the carpet) With an HO5 you will always pay more.

Generally when we're dealing with higher value homes or people with a lot of assets, we automatically write an HO5. So make sure you have an HO3 Ant!

[Marilyn. 340]

nevermind .lol

Edited July 1, 2010 by Marilyn.