Owning your first home is a huge step in your life and it’s all very exciting. In the midst of all the excitement, you need to purchase home insurance. That’s a given, but do you know what else you should do next? If you don’t, you should keep reading to find out why home inventories are crucial to have. Home inventories offer better coverage and guarantee you a faster recovery process, which is why it plays a critical part in owning a home.
What is a Home Inventory List?
A home inventory is a complete list of everything that you own in your house. It includes all of the contents in your home. This detailed list can be provided to your insurance agency in the case of a damaging event where your property is damaged or destroyed. Another important aspect you should add to your inventory list is jewelry insurance. In the case of a break in, jewelry is often stolen. Having these items on the inventory list and having them insured is encouraged if you’re someone who owns a lot of valuables.
Who Needs a Home Inventory and Why?
Every homeowner should have an inventory of what they own in their house. You may think this is unnecessary, but what if your house caught on fire and everything was gone? How would you figure out what was once in your house? That is why home inventories are extremely useful in situations like this. With this type of catastrophic event, a home inventory will be a huge help in filing a claim for everything that you lost. It will be written proof of everything that you once owned. It will make your life much easier and will save you so much time in the end.
How Will This Benefit Homeowners?
With an inventory list, you will be able to receive your claim faster, which means you will be able to get the items that you lost in a timelier manner. A home inventory list will be a huge time saver in regard to figuring out what has been stolen or what has been lost. It will be much easier on the homeowner to look at a list of what they had and figure out what is now gone.
What Should Be Included on the List?
When creating a home inventory list, there are a lot of different details you should write down about each item. Below is a detailed list of what must accompany each item.
- A detailed description of the make, model, color, size, and serial number
- The average priceof the item when it was bought
- Take note of what items were bought on sale
- Where and when the item was bought, also include any receipts and save them on a computer or cloud
- Make note of one-of-a-kind items or items that cannot be replaced
- Take photos of each item and store them on a hard drive or cloud along with the data above
Benefits of Using Professionals
Having an inventory list is written proof of what was in your house before and is evidence of what you did own. When this list is done by a professional, it is more likely that the insurance company will pay for everything that you claim was in your house that you lost. Home inventories can speed up the process of receiving your claim, which will get you your items quicker.
Take the extra step and secure your belongings in case of an emergency. Creating a home inventory list is simple and easy, especially when TJ Woods is here to help! We can assist you with any questions you may have regarding home inventories. Feel free to contact our agents, and we will be happy to assist you. Need to report a claim? We can help with that as well.
