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Differences Between Policies

The difference between a "dwelling policy" and a more comprehensive HO3 or HO5 homeowners insurance policy.

If a national or well known homeowner's insurer is offering to cover your vacant home, be careful what they are offering you because the coverage could be drastically reduced and not what you expect.

As we have discussed in other sections, a dwelling policy is what is offered to you by a homeowners insurance company that finds out your residence will be vacant or unoccupied by the primary owner and their family. As we mentioned, most insurance companies will not even take a vacant home risk, and many will just terminate you as a current customer. Those that do offer to keep you as a customer in this situation, offer a watered-down coverage called a dwelling policy. We are able to find insured's superior coverage terms equivalent to what the insured was afforded when they were living in the house (favorable HO3 or HO5 terms).

Instead of providing an "all risk" policy, a dwelling policy provides a list of "covered perils." If the cause of loss is not on the short list, there is no coverage under these policies. In a typical dwelling policy ,here are the most common covered perils on your home listed below:

Fire, Lightning, Windstorm, Hail, Explosion, Riot, Aircraft, Vehicles (for example, a dump truck ran into your house), Smoke -- That's about it under most dwelling policies.

We can secure insurance that is "all risk coverage," meaning everything not specifically excluded is covered by the policy. There are so many other things that can happen to a home when the owner is away, other than the short list above, all-risk coverage is essential. There could be a massive tree that falls on the home that causes $50,000 of damage. There could animal damage like moles, woodpeckers, or possum. There could be snowload damage. Vandalism, in many of these dwelling policies is not covered where it's fully covered under other programs.

Although "all risk" coverage is vastly superior to the dwelling policies the marketplace typically offers, we can find our insureds a policy where the premium is about the same and in some cases much less. (better coverage terms at no additional cost).

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