Insurance for garage and contents

[spschroeder]

Hi all,

Perhaps a unique situation, but I want to run it by you and get your opinion.

I live in a house in Southeast Wisconsin and have secondary property with a 30x40' garage (built in 2014) in northern Wisconsin.

I'm a little afraid I'm underinsured for what I have up north. When I built the garage, I contacted a northern-Wisconsin insurance company to write a policy for me to cover building materials & liability while I constructed, and then they re-wrote the policy as a 'fire' policy once the building was done. Basically, from what I gather, the policy covers the building up to the amount I prescribed in the event of a fire (enough to have someone else rebuild from ground up if it were a total loss).
I don't believe that this policy has any coverage for vandalism/theft, because when I asked them about that, they deferred and said this would be covered by my normal homeowner's insurance. My homeowners insurance company gave me a very basic answer of "yes, your personal property away from your primary residence is covered up to 10% of the personal property limit listed on your policy". I am okay with that amount for personal property, but it's likely not enough (and may not even cover ???) if there was excessive damage from theft/vandalism, wind/hail, or a tree falling on it.

I wouldn't mind just getting a full homeowner's policy for my second property/garage, but because it's not a habitable dwelling by code, I'm not sure that's even an option.

Anybody know insurance better than I do? Or know someone in the insurance business you could connect me to?

Thanks!
-Steve

 

[bfarroo]

I tried and basically came to the conclusion that since it is not a dwelling they will not cover the contents. You have to get some sort of business type policy(Big Money!). Also I'd verify what your homeowners policy covers,I spoke with several insurance companies and they all said that my homeowners policy would NOT cover any contents. The sad part is I can't get insurance on the contents of my shed which is 7 min from my house but if I had a camp or cottage that is 4 hrs away and I go there once a year they would have no issue covering it.

 

[ford33]

Talk to other insurance agents. Your situation is not unique and there is a policy that can be written to cover your needs. It doesn't have to cost you much money and may just be a rider on your existing homeowners policy. A rider is a provision in an existing insurance policy that is purchased separately from the basic policy and provides additional benefits at additional cost.

There is insurance for every situation. You just need to find a decent agent willing to do an analysis of your needs and offer several different options. If he comes back with one option, then go find another agent. He's not working hard for you. Make the agent perform the work. That's why a commission is paid.

 

[nadogail]

Is the workshop on the same property as your home? If the answer is yes, than I am of the opinion that you will be covered as an " out building" ancillary to your residence.

If it s a property you own, but do not occupy, the building might well be covered but the contents will be excluded.

My workshop is in a property adjacent to, but separate from the property my dwelling is on.
Because the house on the lot is a rental, I can only be covered for the structure, not the contents.

We creatively solved the insurance problem by putting a portion of the ownership of the property in my son's name. He rents the house from us, but owns a percentage.

The policy is written in his name ( he has an insurable interest ) and both the garage and it's contents are covered.

I suggest you have a sit down with your insurance broker, this may require more than you can expect from an agent.

 

[Streetbu]

I just spoke with my agent about this very thing. Detached garages are considered out buildings. The building itself is covered at 10% of the total of homeowners policy if its located on the same property. The contents of the building are covered 100% under your homeowners policy. This is all given that it is not a business. If its a business none of it will be covered at all unless you have a business policy on it. After talking with my agent, I'm covered, but not enough. I couldn't come close to replacing the building for 10% of my policy. The contents would probably take 3/4 of the amount of my homeowners policy. I need to raise my coverages. This is also a good time to take my smart phone and record a video of everything in the garage and house just in case I ever need it.

 

[fteufert]

My garage was covered for 10% of my houses replacement value when it burned. I did have full replacement coverage on my policy, which did extend to the garage contents.

I got more for the tools and shop manuals than I did for the garage.

They tried to cut back on contents, but I had part numbers, model numbers, and by chance I even had some pictures from a few years back.

For my shop manuals (over 100), they did research on EBay and paid $50 each. Not bad.

In the end, it was fair.

 

[JoeFin]

I called my agent over and we sat down and wrote a policy that covered my new addition as well as the existing house. I placed $100000 on the contents of the shop

Done

 

[wayne55]

When I first built my shop building, I just doubled the coverage from 10 to 20%.

 

[MFGJR]

OP--consider also whether you have a gap in liability insurance relating to the property where you shop is located.

Sent from my SM-G920V using Tapatalk

 

[bwringer]

Talk to other insurance agents. Your situation is not unique and there is a policy that can be written to cover your needs. It doesn't have to cost you much money and may just be a rider on your existing homeowners policy. A rider is a provision in an existing insurance policy that is purchased separately from the basic policy and provides additional benefits at additional cost.

There is insurance for every situation. You just need to find a decent agent willing to do an analysis of your needs and offer several different options. If he comes back with one option, then go find another agent. He's not working hard for you. Make the agent perform the work. That's why a commission is paid.

I suggest you have a sit down with your insurance broker, this may require more than you can expect from an agent.

Agreed -- there is insurance for every situation, and yours isn't all that rare. However, you may have to escalate or make a little noise to get your agent to do his or her damn job.

I had a similar situation a while back with inherited property a couple of hours away that I needed to cover until I could get it cleaned up and sold.

Basically, the staff didn't know how to do what I wanted and ended up just ignoring my request for a couple of weeks, which caused me some other problems. Before taking all my business elsewhere, I sent the agency owner one last voice mail and an email significantly lacking in warmth. He personally got everything sorted out in under 30 minutes and the cost was very reasonable.

 

[theoldwizard1]

... then they re-wrote the policy as a 'fire' policy once the building was done. Basically, from what I gather, the policy covers the building up to the amount I prescribed in the event of a fire (enough to have someone else rebuild from ground up if it were a total loss).
I don't believe that this policy has any coverage for vandalism/theft, because when I asked them about that, they deferred and said this would be covered by my normal homeowner's insurance. My homeowners insurance company gave me a very basic answer of "yes, your personal property away from your primary residence is covered up to 10% of the personal property limit listed on your policy". I am okay with that amount for personal property, but it's likely not enough (and may not even cover ???) if there was excessive damage from theft/vandalism, wind/hail, or a tree falling on it.

I think the "personal property" coverage from your primary resident is designed to cover only the CONTENTS of your building "up north". Get a copy of the full "fire insurance" policy and read it front to back. Maybe it does cover theft/vandalism and wind/hail.

The other big issue is personal liability on that other property. I'm not sure either company is covering you for that. You may have to go to one company to cover both properties. Consider cutting back on your liability on your primary residence and car insurance and going with a much larger "umbrella" policy ($1M).

Last, make sure you have an inventory of the contents including serial numbers and registration numbers. If you are storing car parts or incomplete vehicles you will basically get next to nothing for them in the event of a fire or stolen.

 

[Showkey]

I just spoke with my agent about this very thing. Detached garages are considered out buildings. The building itself is covered at 10% of the total of homeowners policy if its located on the same property. The contents of the building are covered 100% under your homeowners policy. This is all given that it is not a business. If its a business none of it will be covered at all unless you have a business policy on it. After talking with my agent, I'm covered, but not enough. I couldn't come close to replacing the building for 10% of my policy. The contents would probably take 3/4 of the amount of my homeowners policy. I need to raise my coverages. This is also a good time to take my smart phone and record a video of everything in the garage and house just in case I ever need it.

NOT always true on the contents especially if you have stuff.......read the policy......often there are limits on out of the ordinary stuff.......like.......guns, ammo, tools, vehicles ( like tractors, ATV, UTV,) collectibles, coins, jewelry, car parts, home brewery ......... Riders are often needed to cover the above stuff.

 

[shrttrackr]

If you are storing car parts or incomplete vehicles you will basically get next to nothing for them in the event of a fire or stolen.

Car parts or non-insured cars are NOT covered under your home owners policy (they are only covered by auto insurance). I race stock cars as well as several of my friends. One of my friends garage burned to the ground a couple years ago. None of the car parts or race cars were covered. Tools, on the other hand were fully covered. if they didn't have receipts, then they pulled the burned remnants from the fire as receipt and it worked.

You need special insurance to cover vehicles (race or in process of restoration) if the car is not plated/titled/insured. I asked my agent and they do not have insurance available for race cars (state farm). There are companies that specialize in this and they are not super expensive.

I still have not purchased insurance for my race car, but need to.

 

[shrttrackr]

I also found it interesting that the insurance company paid out on the garage in a very frustrating manner. They had to begin construction on the garage in order to receive a portion of the payout. Once it was at a certain stage of construction, they would be eligible for another portion of the payout. They were very frustrated as they had to save enough to get the construction process started in order to start the settlement process. I think it took them about a year to get it finally started.

 

[mach158]

Anything and everything can be covered you just have to discuss it with your insurance agent.

For some things such as special contents such as ATV's or a large amount of tools and special policy will need to be added. This also includes high dollar things in the home you may want to think about such as guns or jewelry as well.

 

[woodzy]

I will give you my thoughts, I had the exact same thing - my barn/shop was 4 miles from my house and it was covered under its only building coverage policy. The contents were covered by my homeowner policy. According to my agent (brother), the total contents of the barn shop would be the same coverage as the contents on the homeowners policy. So, if I have $150,000 worth of coverage on contents for the house, I would have $150,000 coverage on the shop/barn without any additional costs.

Now before you jump to some conclusion, if a tornado came through the city and wiped out both the barn and house, I would only have $150,000 total coverage for contents between the house and barn/shop. The odds that would happen would be pretty slim based on being 4 miles apart, and I was willing to take that risk.

Rewind to a year ago, when I just finished building my new home on the property of the barn/shop, now I have increased my contents to cover the additional value in the barn/shop because the odd just increased that some catastrophic storm / fire could cause damage to both places since they are only 350 feet apart.

Insurance company is AutoOwners if you want to check this out.

One more issue about adding a rider to the policy for contents in a different location. Those items will be depreciated and not new for old as what you get with a homeowners policy. So, it is in your best interest to have insurance on your homeowners policy that cover contents on a different location.

 

[theoldwizard1]

Anything and everything can be covered you just have to discuss it with your insurance agent.

Technically yes. But at what cost ? When they want 20-50% of what you paid for it, you might as well be "self-insured" for that item.

 

[theoldwizard1]

So, if I have $150,000 worth of coverage on contents for the house, I would have $150,000 coverage on the shop/barn without any additional costs.

Outbuilding contents are usually NOT covered at the same value as the primary dwelling contents. I don't recall the percentage, but I think it is <50%. Your $150,000 content coverage might cover the contents of the primary residence and outbuildings on that lot, but that does not means you have $150,000 coverage on the contents of a storage building on another lot.


I maybe wrong, but get it in WRITING from someone of authority (typically not your agent) at the insurance company.