Floods and Your Home Insurance Policy

When you begin learning about insurance, there are a variety of different terms and policy options that can be confusing. Many people do not understand the full extent of what their policies do and don’t cover, some do not understand what their deductibles and limits are, and others are not sure whether or not special situations are covered in their car or homeowner’s policies. All of these sources of confusion are easy to remedy with a call to your insurance agent or a fast read of your policy.

But not all insurance misinterpretations are safe. If you assume some insurable occurrence is covered by your current car or home insurance policy and it actually isn’t, you could be subjecting yourself and your family to financial risks that you simply can’t carry on your own. One constant source of this kind of risky misunderstanding involves flood insurance.

Many consumers presume that flood insurance is inherently included in their homeowner’s policy. Unfortunately, this assumption is so prevalent that many policy holders don’t ask their agent or insurance company if their Texas home insurance policy will protect against the damages associated with flood waters—they simply assume that it will. This notion can turn out to be an extremely expensive mistake after a flood actually happens because assuming that their home insurance policy provides flood coverage prevents them from taking the steps needed to find out the truth about flood insurance and protect their family and their possessions accordingly.

Now that we all know that homeowner’s insurance plans do not cover damage caused by flood waters, let’s figure out what actually counts as flood waters. The National Flood Insurance Program defines a flood as:

“A flood is a general and temporary condition where two or more acres of normally dry land or two or more properties are inundated by water or mudflow.”

The explanation of flood is simple enough to understand, but the reason that a lot of homeowners think it’s built-in to their home insurance policy is because several of the events that can cause floods cause other damages that ARE covered with a homeowner’s insurance policy. For example, a hurricane may cause wind damage to your house that is covered in your policy, but it may also cause ordinarily dry land to be momentarily drowned by water, which could flow into your home and damage your hardwood and possessions—but because those are flood waters, you will only be covered if you have a flood policy.

So make sure you have a flood policy in effect today. Whether you reside in a flood zone or not, its protection that is not offered in your homeowner’s policy but needs to be in place to secure you and your family.

Call Shipman Insurance Agency today at 903-297-4456 for all of your home insurance needs.

1 Comments

Margery said...
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WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 29 2021 8:24 PM