Homeowner's insurance policy relative to firearms

[orpington]

I have as of late replaced typical Ikea junk with some nice antique pieces that I enjoy simply because they are works of art & craftsmanship, are functional, and can be had for pennies on the dollar for what this stuff once brought.

I called my insurance agent yesterday, assuming that contents were insured for Ikea grade stuff and if one buys better furniture one might need to increase one's premium. I was surprised to find that contents are insured for up to 75% of the value of the structure. In my case, contents alone could be valued up to slightly over $300k. Of course, total value of contents aren't anywhere near this. Might be $25 or $30k in contents including a few nice antiques.

However, exceptions include jewelry and firearms. Why firearms? This is limited to $2500. Very easy to surpass that! I would say it's because the insurance industry is likely anti 2A, and this seems logical, except jewelry is another such category and folks don't walk around anti jewelry and such.

So, I can collect several multi thousand, even $100k plus, pieces of furniture, and no increase in my insurance premium is warranted, but own a few revolvers and have to pay more to ensure they are properly covered???

 

[boom boom]

Jewelry and firearms are the two things that bring a reasonable fraction of the value when stolen leaving aside cash, gold, and silver themselves. Used to be electronics before the stuff became obsolescent when it left the store. An ipad, iphone, laptop etc. still brings a bit and so those things are still at risk. Your ipod, probably not.

Thus, having those things is a more risky bet for the insurers--there is plenty of stuff out there about the things that burglars take when they only have 10-15 minutes--hint, it will be the high value, easy to dispose of stuff mentioned above. It is not going to be your Chippendale furniture or Rembrandt etching unless it is a planned/commissioned burglary and you are a purposeful target.

 

[LRDGCO]

I believe it's driven by two things:

1) higher risk of fraud - certainly jewelry gone "stolen" in hard times is an old chesnut.
2) higher portability and therefore theft risk. Ye olde cat burglar is more likely to skip off with your Cartier watch and Purdey matched pair than your Chippendale dining set.

 

[AlexanderA]

However, exceptions include jewelry and firearms. Why firearms?

High value and lucrative targets for theft. You can get riders for firearms, or a free standing policy.

On the other hand, the fewer people that know about your collection, the better. I don't trust insurance, for that reason. I do trust extra layers of physical security. But your best line of defense is secrecy.

 

[mdauben]

I seem to remember that the NRA used to offer several thousand dollars of free supplemental insurance on you guns as part of your membership, with the option to buy more though them. I don't see anything about that on their website, though. Does anyone know if they still do that?

 

[orpington]

Yes, I have insurance through the NRA for my firearms. It would be, of course, cheaper and less of a hassle if my homeowner's policy covered them. I was aware of the $2500 limit for firearms. What I wasn't aware of was that contents are insured up to 75% the value of the structure. Until my conversation yesterday, I would have guessed it was minimal.

 

[boom boom]

Here is the link to Lochton which is the NRA's affiliate in insurance

https://mynrainsurance.com/insurance-products/firearms-armscare-plus

Can't seem to find the NRA casualty insurance that came with membership on the NRA website. Guess they may have dropped the free insurance as the NRA has taken some financial hits lately but do not know.

 

[Texas10mm]

The NRA policy is way overpriced.

Eastern Insurance for the win. https://www.easterninsurance.com/insurance-quotes/personal-insurance/historic-firearms

As I recall it's $140 for 40k of coverage.

 

[fpgt72]

Common,

You can say the same thing for classic cars and motorcycles.

 

[labnoti]

There's already a lot of threads on insurance, including homeowners insurance for firearms. Many policies do not have special limits on firearms for perils other than theft. Most homeowners policies have a lower limit on coverage of firearms for the sole peril of theft. This is not due to an anti-gun sentiment, but due to risk of fraud. Policies holders are much more likely to make a fraudulent claim for theft than they are for fire. The most popular items for fraudulent claims would be valuable ones that have low utility such as firearms, jewelry, and other personal property. I've singled out fraud, but the fact is these items carry a greater risk for loss from the theft peril whether it's a legitimate claim or not. Because of that, insurance products break that risk out into premiums for separate policies. You can get "valuable personal property" insurance from most homeowners insurance companies that covers guns, jewelry, high-end cameras and optics, fine art, furs, coin collections and so on. You can also find firearm-specific policies that are especially cost-effective when you have a particularly valuable gun collection. One of the advantages of these policies is they typically have no deductible. I keep my homeowners insurance policy premiums very low with a high deductible. My gun collection is closer to a half-dozen than the many-dozens some people have. I wouldn't be surprised if a loss of half of them would come in under my deductible.

 

[mgresh]

Well said labnoti. People do not understand the sublimits for guns (and several other named items) in their policies.

 

[Cemetery21]

Those sublimits for theft were there before the world was anti-gun. They were there when I was an adjuster trainee in the 70s and had long guns in the back glass of my pickup.

 

[Thomas Mayberry]

I talked to my agent about increasing my coverage. Of course they want a listing of all my guns complete with serial numbers. While I trust my agent, I'm not comfortable divulging that information to a company. I'll just continue hoping that a combination of where I live, a good alarm system, and my safe locked in a FEMA safe room will delay thieves long enough that they can't get my stuff before LEO's arrive. (or maybe I should leave a note for them that my neighbor has lots more nice guns in a less secure setting)

 

[Jim Watson]

Homeowners paid about 90% of my new house and contents after The Incident of 2010. Including $7000 to refinish smoke and water damaged guns.

 

[shoobe01]

...Of course they want a listing of all my guns complete with serial numbers...

Forget paranoia, the data gathering is the reason I went with the NRA insurance at the end. They don't care what I have. If I need a claim, some proof will be needed, but photos are good — just like replacing home furnishings typically, etc — and I take lots of photos.
All other insurance I tried wanted this whole sheet on each item. Of crazy stuff like when it was made, size, description, original price, appraised current price, etc. It was clearly a generic "old, valuable, artsy things" form, and is impossible to fill out easily, or accurately, for a typical firearms collection.

My other worry is electro-optics. I am covered for cameras, but No One understands thermal, night vision, lasers, etc. so it's actually unclear if they will be "camera gear" or "gun stuff" if there's a major loss.

 

[BKleine]

USAA Provides a rider for homeowners. I provided Serial #s and I have photos of all including ammunition. Only thing is you have to be Veteran/ active military or imediate relative. Mine covers around 25K +/- at this time.

 

[HPCadm17]

I would be very leery of giving any insurance company serial numbers of my firearms. Actually, I'd be leery even letting them know I own them. Conspiracy theory or not, if a confiscation order came and there wasn't a registry, they would look to other sources; insurance riders could certainly be one of them.

 

[rpenmanparker]

I have as of late replaced typical Ikea junk with some nice antique pieces that I enjoy simply because they are works of art & craftsmanship, are functional, and can be had for pennies on the dollar for what this stuff once brought.

I called my insurance agent yesterday, assuming that contents were insured for Ikea grade stuff and if one buys better furniture one might need to increase one's premium. I was surprised to find that contents are insured for up to 75% of the value of the structure. In my case, contents alone could be valued up to slightly over $300k. Of course, total value of contents aren't anywhere near this. Might be $25 or $30k in contents including a few nice antiques.

However, exceptions include jewelry and firearms. Why firearms? This is limited to $2500. Very easy to surpass that! I would say it's because the insurance industry is likely anti 2A, and this seems logical, except jewelry is another such category and folks don't walk around anti jewelry and such.

So, I can collect several multi thousand, even $100k plus, pieces of furniture, and no increase in my insurance premium is warranted, but own a few revolvers and have to pay more to ensure they are properly covered???

Insurance companies are all about the money. They require verification of value and purchase for pricey stuff like jewelry and, yes, also firearms in order to protect their profits. Are they also anti-jewelry? How about art? Are they anti-art? No! Their firearm stance is simply about the money.

 

[rpenmanparker]

I would be very leery of giving any insurance company serial numbers of my firearms. Actually, I'd be leery even letting them know I own them. Conspiracy theory or not, if a confiscation order came and there wasn't a registry, they would look to other sources; insurance riders could certainly be one of them.

Fair enough. Take the risk. But think which risk is greater, loss by theft or loss by confiscation. You will have to work that one out for yourself.

 

[Paul7]

The problem with having gun insurance on your homeowners is if you have a claim it can affect your other rates.

 

[rpenmanparker]

The problem with having gun insurance on your homeowners is if you have a claim it can affect your other rates.

That is true for all insured items on your homeowners’.

 

[lemaymiami]

Nothing in this world is free (and if it is there's always hidden costs attached that you'll learn about the hard way...). I have no problem with a low level allowed for gun coverage as part of a general homeowner's insurance (and although I'm no collector and my current weapons are well within the modest limits mentioned... If I want a rider for additional coverage I can understand when an insurance company wants to know exactly how much and exactly what are they covering... If that's their requirement I'd either comply to obtain the coverage, do without... or go to another company for that kind of coverage....

I've been lucky for many, many years to be covered by USAA and can't say enough good things about them...

Back when I was a young cop (all those years ago) we routinely filled out reports of thefts that anyone would have real cause to suspect were absolute fraud, phony, etc. We always expected a run of "tax burglaries" at year's end as otherwise fairly honest folks were encouraged by their accountants "are you sure you didn't have any losses in the amount of _______ this year?" Since I'm long out of police work I have no idea if this sort of stuff is still common. I do clearly remember an insurance investigator that I knew complaining that the instructions on how to commit insurance fraud regarding jewelry must have been written on the men's room walls at every precinct in a certain northern state's police departments... Seems a very high proportion of retired cops from that area were found to have reported a 50 to 60,000 dollar jewelry loss (after adding a jewelry rider to their policies...) within two years of their retirements - and subsequent move down to beautiful south Florida.... All of this was despite insurance companies wanting photos and appraisals of the items being covered... I even know exactly how you went about setting up this kind of fraud - but not on a public forum will I be posting all of the "how to's" involved.... Suffice it to say that you needed to do your advance work two to ten years before that retirement date to set the deal up....

Since jewelry doesn't come with serial numbers I assume that jewelry is the most abused area of insurance fraud by covered persons... Call me cynical but I have to lean toward insurance outfits in that area. Yes, I also know of insurance outfits that routinely deny coverage for this or that policy - and literally force their customers to sue them to get benefits they're entitled to - but in the specific area of firearms coverage I think that requiring additional info to cover a collection isn't unreasonable at all...

 

[Bo]

I have a separate policy for firearms with State Farm. I gave them a list of firearms with serial numbers and what each one is worth.

My agent called me and said "I see you have a S&W Model 19, I used to sell guns and, you don't have your listed at a high enough price, I think we need to increase the value."

I don't think many agents would do this.

State Farm covers all my firearms with no deductible. I like that.

 

[BigSteve57]

Insurance companies vary all over the place. It pays to check with your agent.
Mine has three tiers with regards to firearms.

1. The first is what you get with the basic homeowner's. Things like jewelry, firearms etc... are covered by a token amount, I think it's $1000.00.
2. The second is what is called a "Scheduled Personal Property Endorsement" which is specific to jewelry OR firearms OR something else specific up to $10,000. It covers all perils i.e. loss, theft, fire for the firearm and accessories like scopes, slings etc... This addition does not require me to list serial numbers, manufacturers. It's very inexpensive, it's very much like the coverage you can get from the NRA.
   
3. Finally there is a third category which is unlimited in coverage value but does require you to list each firearm and its value but serial numbers are still NOT required. The cost depends on your desired coverage.

Lastly, my homeowner's coverage cost doesn't increase if I make a claim, at least it hasn't so far. It's not like auto insurance in my case; I think that's true for most homeowner's policies but I could be wrong.

 

[Sniper66]

The NRA policy is way overpriced.

Eastern Insurance for the win. https://www.easterninsurance.com/insurance-quotes/personal-insurance/historic-firearms

As I recall it's $140 for 40k of coverage.

Hey, thanks for this tip.. I am paying twice that for $25k, an NRA endorsed company. My renewal comes up in 3 months which gives me plenty of time to research Eastern Insurance. I've had 2 different home owners policies and neither company offers sensible coverage at reasonable rates. As my collection inches up in value, I need good coverage to sleep well.