If you rent your home, whether it is an apartment, house, condo, or duplex, a renters insurance policy will protect your space and possessions. A renters policy protects you in unfortunate situations where you are effected by fire, theft, water damage, and other circumstances beyond your control.
You can’t rely on your landlord’s insurance to cover your valuables. Landlord insurance only covers the building structure and not your personal property. But whether you are at home or away, renters insurance can protect you from mishaps. Because it provides coverage for your own items, damages, and other people’s injuries, you can feel confident that you will be protected.
What Renters Insurance Covers
Renters policies in California usually provide coverage for items and situations which include:
- Personal property: furniture, electronics, and clothing.
- Schedule personal property: if you want to cover an expensive item such as jewelry, this added coverage will help cover the item beyond what the base policy limit.
- Reimbursed living expense: pays for increased living costs if a loss makes your home uninhabitable. This covers things like food and a hotel/motel.
- Personal liability: in the event that someone is injured and sues you, this coverage pays for legal expenses, medical bills and other damages.
- Damage to your apartment: if the damage is caused by a covered loss.
- Identity restoration: this additional coverage provides you with a fraud specialist to help you if you are victim to identity theft.
- Weather: fire, storms, wind, hail, lightning, freezing, weight of ice, snow or sleet.
- Non-weather: theft, vandalism, riots, aircraft and vehicles.
Renters insurance may not cover:
- If you intentionally cause harm to property or a person
- Business operations or professional services (this is where you would need a Commercial Policy like General Liability)
- Ownership, operation, or maintenance of an aircraft, motor vehicle and some watercraft