5 Situations that will make you wish you had Renters Insurance

Guest blog by Andrew Rombach

Whether it’s your first experience living in an apartment or you’ve been in an apartment for years, you may have wondered whether you should get renters insurance. It’s a good thing for every apartment dweller, or even those who are renting houses, to consider.

Renters Insurance

For those who don’t know, renters insurance provides you with various insurance coverages when you don’t own the structure you live in. Although policy coverage can vary from company to company, overall it’s meant to protect your belongings, cover your liability in case of accidents, and give you living expenses in certain situations.

If you don’t have renters insurance, you could be put under considerable financial pressure if something goes terribly wrong. A setback that costs thousands of dollars can be disastrous for anyone, but it can be especially problematic if a person is living in an apartment instead of owning a house because their funds are tight. If you’re scraping by paycheck-to-paycheck, you may want to consider the protection of renters insurance, especially if you can find yourself a good deal.

Situations That Beg for Renters Insurance

If you think you can’t possibly afford renters insurance or think you’d rather spend your money on something fun, you should check out the following situations in which renters insurance can make a big difference.

There’s a Fire

 Renters who don’t have insurance when there is a fire at their apartment stand to lose all their belongings.

 Even if you think you don’t have that many belongings, you have far more than you think. And all those little things add up quickly. Even a basic wardrobe with many of the pieces coming from secondhand stores still would cost hundreds of dollars to replace. And if you pay full price at department stores, your wardrobe would likely cost into the thousands to replace.

 Then when you factor in your furniture, computer, dishes, and everything else, the cost of replacing those items would be overwhelming for some apartment dwellers. Renters insurance would cover those items, and for a low price too. Renters insurance can be as cheap as buying a meal deal at a fast food restaurant once a month. You get peace of mind and are protected for a super low price.

 A Friend Gets Hurt at Your Apartment

If your friend falls down in your apartment and breaks his leg, many renters insurance policies will help pay for treatment of the injury. If you didn’t have renters insurance in this case, you might be on the hook for those medical appointments and treatment. It could also put an end to the friendship if you and he went to court to fight about who should pay for what if you didn’t have renters insurance.

A Tornado Hits

 Certain cases of extreme weather will be covered by some renters insurance policies. So, if a tornado strikes down near your apartment, your landlord will have insurance to cover any damage to the structure of the building.

 But if your belongings are sucked outside or smashed and broken in your apartment, that structure policy won’t cover you. You need your own policy to pay to replace those things.

 Someone Steals Your Stuff

 While inclement weather might not scare you as an unlikely threat, here’s one that’s much bigger – theft. If someone breaks into your apartment and steals your stuff, you only have two ways to replace it. The first is you have to hope the police catch the thief and recover your belongings. That’s a pretty bad plan to replace your stuff. The better option is to have renters insurance so you’ll get a check to replace those items.

 Something you may not realize and that offers you further protection is that your renters insurance may cover an item that is stolen from you even if you were outside your apartment at the time.

 One thing you need to be aware of is that if you live in a crime-ridden area, it may be harder to secure renters insurance. Or your policy may not cover theft at all in that situation. So be sure you completely understand what your proposed policy is offering before you begin paying for it.

 Your Dog Bites Someone

 If you’re a pet owner, your renters insurance policy will sometimes cover you for this situation. You’ll want to ask what your company will cover, just to make sure. And if they don’t cover it and you do have a dog, you should look for a company that does include this coverage.

Dog bites can be expensive. You don’t want to have to pay out of pocket if your dog bites someone inside your apartment or right outside. Keep in mind, even if a policy covers dog bites, there may be certain breeds they’ll exclude from their policy, such as pit bulls.

 Related articles to check out:

Home fire safety information

Talk to me today, Paul Carrigan, to find out how I can save you money on insurance needs.