OT: Umbrella Insurance

[exsdgal]

Hello

I hope everyone had a wonderful long weekend. I have read the discussions here about the need for Umbrella Insurance, and I agree with that. However I could not find a response for the following –

1. What is the right policy amount? Do folks with current umbrella policies have a certain threshold value for this insurance? What is the good asset to policy ratio one should aim for?

On a similar token, do you increase the policy value with each annual renewal?

2. So far I am only aware of getting umbrella insurances along with my auto and home insurance. Is there a vendor who is able to write a stand alone umbrella policy?

TIA for your valuable feedback.

Cheers.

[an]

I don’t know if there’s a single “right policy amount”. Everyone have different needs. It depends on your assets and risk exposure (owning your own company, owning rentals, etc). It also depend on your budget. I have $1M policy right now and it cost me only $199/year. It’s the right amount for me right now. If I get a rental for example, I might increase that to $2M or $3M. I have all my insurance with AAA, so I can’t really answer your 2nd question.

[Coronita]

It depends on how much assets you have, and what type of assets you have that are not “protected”

I’d say $1million umbrella is the miminum AFTER you have already maxed out your auto/home(s) liabilities (probably around $500k each)..

Please note though if you own watercrafts, rental prop, etc, you probably need to make sure the liability on those are up to snuff to, otherwise there *might* be a gap in coverage (or you might not be able to get umbrella at all).

You can buy standalone umbrella, but each of your liability from auto/home/etc must meet certain minimum liability coverage requirements. But umbrella is usually cheap if you get it along with a package with your homeowners and auto. For awhile, I believe Allstate and AAA was writing standalone umbrellas.

[earlyretirement]

Yep, the others provide good advice and I agree with it.

Amounts for umbrella coverage just depend on your personal situation and the amount of assets you have/own. Obviously, the more you have, the more umbrella coverage you want to get.

No reason to hold a multi million umbrella coverage policy if you have little assets, IMHO. Coverage is very affordable these days.

I do think you can buy stand alone coverage but most places will ask you to have minimum amounts on your car, home, etc. as flu mentioned. It’s always cheaper to bundle it all together.

[exsdgal]

Thanks for the info flu. I will check with AAA and AllState if a standalone policy is still possible.

My home and car was with Wawanesa, and to pick up an Umbrella policy I switched to Farmers. However a comparable maxed out liability home/car policy at Farmers was about $1000 more than the Wawanesa rates. Ideally I would like to get my old Wawanesa policy back, with a standalone umbrella policy.

As for the limits, I constantly wonder what is the right balance. Eventually I hope to find the optimal ratio.

Thanks again for all your suggestions. My policy renewal is a couple of months away, if you think I should consider any other vendors I am all ears 🙂

[earlyretirement]

Check out American National Insurance company based here in San Diego. Their rates were really great and customer service was wonderful. PM me if you want and I’ll send you contact information for my agent.

[EVSDCA]

[quote=AN]I don’t know if there’s a single “right policy amount”. Everyone have different needs. It depends on your assets and risk exposure (owning your own company, owning rentals, etc). It also depend on your budget. I have $1M policy right now and it cost me only $199/year. It’s the right amount for me right now. If I get a rental for example, I might increase that to $2M or $3M. I have all my insurance with AAA, so I can’t really answer your 2nd question.[/quote]

Would you mind to let me what insurance company that you use? Can you please give me the contact info? Thanks!

[XBoxBoy]

For what it’s worth…

My wife and I wanted an umbrella policy, and we found that getting a homeowners/auto/umbrella bundle through Geico was the best deal. But shop around, because every company has differences. (For instance AAA wouldn’t even write us a homeowners policy since we live in La Jolla.)

XBoxBoy

[an]

[quote=evsdca][quote=AN]I don’t know if there’s a single “right policy amount”. Everyone have different needs. It depends on your assets and risk exposure (owning your own company, owning rentals, etc). It also depend on your budget. I have $1M policy right now and it cost me only $199/year. It’s the right amount for me right now. If I get a rental for example, I might increase that to $2M or $3M. I have all my insurance with AAA, so I can’t really answer your 2nd question.[/quote]

Would you mind to let me what insurance company that you use? Can you please give me the contact info? Thanks![/quote]
It’s AAA. You can go to their website and put in a quote request. They’ll contact you. That’s how I did it.

[Author]

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