How in the world do houses get homeowners insurance while being remodeled????! Or under construction? Or are these fairly recent changes in the inurance industry?

To start with, my State Farm agent of almost 20 yrs refused to write me a policy when we first bought our new-old home. She said "Finish the remodeling and then we'll talk." So my realtor referred me to an independent agency, that signed me up...then 2 months later requested a photo of the house after we put the new roof on. We sent it to her, she sent it to the main company which promptly dropped us because it had T111 wood siding!!!!!!! Nice, they got 3 premium payments out of me. We were going to do the siding ummmm NEXT year AFTER the addition is built. The dingbat insurance lady didnt even know they made wood siding...she asked "is it weather resistant?" OMG. Apparantly she is used to $350,000 homes and not my little house.

Good grief i have T111 on my current home and it has been insured for the 8 1/2 yrs I've lived here, no problem.

So now we need to plan how to approach this, preferably with a different agent. Now there are alot of homes that i have seen that look like mine or slightly worse.....do these people all have to go without homeowners insurance? What to do what to do..........I am all for being self insured, but we just aren't there yet, and what worries me is the liabilty portion....what if we have someone working on the house and they get injured? Yeah that.

We recently bought a rental property and when it came time to insure we sought out quotes from 4-5 different agencies. All the agencies are different - and I think within the agencies, there are are plenty of differences between the agents! This may just be a matter of asking friends or neighbors who their agents are (maybe someone with a similar house) and going from there.

Food for thought. When we bought our rental property, our insurance agent explained that our liability insurance from our primary residence would carry over to the rental property. I don't know why or how, but for a small increase in the premium, that addendum was put on our policy. If nothing else works, you may want to find out if that's a possibility for a second residence.

 What a frustration for you! For certain you need to check with at least one Independent Insurance Agent. They write policies through many different companies. 25 years ago, when I bought a house, I needed coverage before the closing date or there would be no financing. I tried different companies and was told the process takes time, postpone closing and they would get back to me! With two weeks left, I called an Independent Agent and had coverage in place in 3 days, at a fraction of what I expected to pay. (AND it was a very good company)

With writing policies for many companies, this gives the agent the ability to hunt around for what you need, and find you the best deal. Different companies off discounts for different things! My independent agent watches our auto policy and every six months checks with me for an update on our status. Depending on what applies to us, she has saved me hundreds of dollars over the years.

 Good luck to you!

They won't insure beside you have wood siding!  nuts  more then 50% of houses here have wood siding.  it is under our vinyl siding.  it is not a issue here.

Around here the issue isn't wood siding, it's the T-111 siding in particular.  It warps in the winter and lets the interior of the walls get wet and the houses get black mold.  So, many companies won't insure it.  Some independent agents still work with companies that will insure houses with t-111.  Hope you can find someone who does.

We lost the insurance on our old house when the insurance company found out it was vacant. Doesn't matter we've had policies with them for 20 years and had no claims. Or that we checked on it every day and we had friends a few doors down that kept an eye on it. We were finally able to get a high cost, low coverage policy from the same company. When the policies next come due, we'll consider whether we still want to continue coverage with them.

My only advice is to keep looking. You'll probably find someone to cover you, just not the coverage you would prefer or at a price you want to pay.

Jill

What is the difference between t111 siding and reg wood siding? if you don't take care of wood siding here , the rot etc would wreck the house.  we get lots of rain. 

brick is common back east.

Maggie Trudeau:

Around here the issue isn't wood siding, it's the T-111 siding in particular.  It warps in the winter and lets the interior of the walls get wet and the houses get black mold.  So, many companies won't insure it.  Some independent agents still work with companies that will insure houses with t-111.  Hope you can find someone who does.

Michelle ... any chance an agent could just write you a liabiity policy on the house to protect you while the remodling is going on?  Not the greatest situation, but ...

You can check with the best homeowners insurance companies.

They are well experienced, think differently and will guide you very well.