Most homeowners review their insurance policy at exactly the wrong time.
After the hailstorm.
After the pipe breaks.
After the tree lands somewhere trees were never intended to land.
Or when they are selling the house and a buyer suddenly starts asking questions about the roof, prior claims and insurability.
For Plano homeowners, I think homeowners insurance deserves the same kind of annual checkup we give property taxes, HVAC systems and smoke detectors.
Not because you should spend your weekends reading insurance policies for entertainment. I can think of several hundred better uses of a Saturday.
But because rebuilding costs change, policies change, deductibles matter, and assumptions you made several years ago may no longer match the house you own today.
Here are eight questions worth asking your insurance professional before simply allowing another renewal to roll through.
1. What are my deductibles in actual dollars?This is my favorite place to start because percentages can sound deceptively harmless.
Depending on the policy, a deductible may be expressed as a percentage of the insured dwelling amount, and wind or hail can be treated differently from other losses.
Don’t stop at, “I have a two-percent deductible.”
Ask: What would I actually write a check for today?
Have your insurance professional show you the dollar amount under several common scenarios. The answer may be very different from the deductible you remember from years ago.
A deductible is essentially part of the risk you have chosen to keep yourself. You should know what that risk costs before a storm arrives.
2. Is my dwelling coverage still realistic?Your home’s market value and its rebuilding cost are not the same number.
Market value reflects land, location, neighborhood demand and what buyers will pay. Insurance coverage is concerned with repairing or rebuilding the structure after a covered loss.
Labor and material costs change. So does your house.
If you remodeled the kitchen, added a room, enclosed a patio, upgraded finishes or completed other significant work, ask whether your insurer has current information.
The objective is not to insure the house for whatever Zillow says it is worth. It is to have a knowledgeable insurance professional evaluate whether the policy’s assumptions still make sense for the actual home.
3. How is my roof covered now?In North Texas, the roof deserves its own conversation.
Hail and wind are facts of life here, and roof coverage can vary by policy, insurer and roof age.
Ask whether the roof is covered on a replacement-cost basis or whether depreciation or an actual-cash-value provision could apply. Ask whether the roof’s age changes your coverage or deductible.
If you replaced your roof, make sure your insurer has the correct date and keep the invoice, warranty and other documentation with your home records.
That paperwork can matter later when you sell, too. Buyers and their insurers may care about roof age and condition.
4. What isn’t covered that I may assume is covered?This is where homeowners insurance becomes less intuitive.
“Water damage,” for example, is not one single category. A sudden plumbing leak can be treated differently from long-term seepage, sewer backup or rising floodwater.
Ask your insurance professional to explain important exclusions and optional endorsements in plain English.
If flood risk concerns you, investigate appropriate flood coverage rather than assuming a standard homeowners policy handles every kind of water event.
The question is not merely, “What does my policy cover?”
It is also, “What am I financially responsible for if the cause falls outside the policy?”
5. Have I changed the house—or how I use it?Homes evolve.
Maybe you added a pool, outdoor kitchen, solar panels, expensive electronics or substantial home-office equipment. Maybe you started operating a business from home. Maybe household circumstances changed.
Your insurance professional should know about material changes that could affect coverage.
I am not suggesting you schedule an emergency insurance summit every time you buy a television.
But significant improvements, expensive additions or a meaningful change in how the property is used deserve a conversation.
6. Is my personal-property coverage realistic?Most of us underestimate how much stuff we own until we imagine replacing all of it at once.
Furniture. Clothing. Electronics. Kitchen equipment. Tools. Sporting goods. Holiday decorations. And the mysterious collection of objects in the garage that apparently became part of the family sometime around 2018.
Ask how the policy values personal property and whether special limits apply to certain higher-value categories.
Then create a simple home inventory.
It does not need to be museum quality. A periodic video walkthrough of rooms, closets and major belongings can create useful documentation. Store it somewhere you could access even if the house itself were damaged.
7. Am I comparing premiums—or actually comparing policies?Homeowners should absolutely shop intelligently. Insurance is a significant part of the cost of owning a home.
But a cheaper premium is not automatically a better deal.
A lower quote may have a higher deductible, different roof provisions, lower limits or exclusions that make it materially different from your current coverage.
Ask for a side-by-side explanation.
The goal is not necessarily the lowest premium. It is appropriate coverage at a competitive cost.
That distinction is especially important when homeowners feel pressure from rising ownership expenses. Saving several hundred dollars in premium can look wonderful until you discover you assumed substantially more risk to get there.
8. How could insurance affect a future sale?Homeowners sometimes think insurance becomes the buyer’s problem once the property is under contract.
Not entirely.
A buyer needs to insure the property, and roof condition, prior damage, repairs and other property characteristics can become part of that process.
This is one reason I encourage homeowners to keep organized records for major work.
If you replace a roof, repair plumbing, address water damage or complete a significant project, save the paperwork.
When you eventually sell, clear records can help answer legitimate questions with facts rather than memories.
And in today’s Plano market, details matter.
Why this matters more in today’s Plano marketAs of July 31, Zillow reported 968 homes for sale in Plano. Typical home values were $499,723, down 4.4% from a year earlier, and homes were going pending in a median 21 days. In June, 63.3% of sales closed below list price.
That does not mean every buyer has unlimited leverage or every Plano home is declining. Real estate remains neighborhood-, condition- and price-specific.
But buyers have more choices.
When buyers have alternatives, they can pay more attention to the total ownership picture: taxes, insurance, roof age, major systems, maintenance history and likely future expenses.
That makes good home records and proactive maintenance increasingly valuable for sellers.
For homeowners who are staying put, the lesson is even simpler: insurance is too important to put on autopilot forever.
Make this a once-a-year homeownership habitOnce a year, pull out your declarations page and schedule a short conversation with your insurance professional.
Ask about your deductibles in dollars, dwelling coverage, roof provisions, important exclusions, major property changes, personal-property coverage, liability limits and available alternatives.
Then save the updated information with your home records.
Twenty or thirty minutes may uncover absolutely nothing that needs changing.
That is a perfectly good outcome.
Insurance is one of those parts of homeownership where boring is often exactly what we want.
You do not need to become an insurance expert. You need to know enough to ask good questions and make sure the professionals advising you have accurate information.
Your home is probably one of your largest assets.
Protecting it deserves more thought than automatically renewing whatever happened to be in the file last year.
Kelly Vaughan
The Vaughan Team | Brokered by Keller Williams McKinney
Clarity, compassion, and a plan for what’s next.