Things to look for on home insurance policy this storm season

SANTA ROSA BEACH, Fla. ( WMBB ) — Hurricane Beryl is estimating $2.5-$4.5 billion in damage to our West. This serves as a reminder to check your home insurance policies as storm season continues.

Local insurance agents say you should check your policy this year to make sure it has Personal Property Replacement Cost. This will ensure you get paid to fully replace an item, not its depreciating value over time.

“If you have a five-year-old refrigerator, instead of them just giving you pennies to the dollar or give you $400 bucks to replace your refrigerator, there’s no way you could possibly replace a refrigerator so you’re going to be shopping at Goodwill,” said Daniel Morrow, Ryland Morrow Allstate Agency. “If a bunch of people are doing the same thing, obviously there’s no availability. So first of all, the replacement cost is huge.”

Walton County Emergency Management told News 13 they suggest residents over-ensure rather than under-insure and get flood insurance if they are in an evacuation zone even if it’s not technically a flood zone.

Both the county and agents learned lessons from storms like Hurricane Ian.

“Hurricane Ian hit down in Tampa. It flooded about eight feet of water up to six miles inland. And probably a huge percentage, I don’t want to put a number, but a huge percentage was X flood zone people who had eight feet of water in their living room,” Morrow said. “That is hundreds and hundreds of thousands of dollars of couches and TVs and bed sets and Keurig makers and forks, knives, everything was damaged, and then all the drywall for the house as well. They could have just bought a policy. For $300-$600 bucks a year.”

To help to make claims easier Morrow tells his customers to take a video of their home and everything inside it.

“You should look at every room, every cabinet, every piece of jewelry you have. You should go through every garage, all the tools and sheds and everything you have at the house. So you can hand that recording over to the insurance adjusters when a hurricane destroys your property,” Morrow said.

Morrow said if you have any repairs done, using the My Safe Florida Home Program or not, get a wind mitigation test to get more discounts on an insurance policy.

After the past five years of storms, Morrow said many Florida home insurance companies folded causing policy prices to rise. Morrow said he has seen renewal prices dropping for this year.

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