There’s not a better place to be in the summertime than Albany NY and its surrounding upstate communities. Beautiful weather, lakes, mountains and a plethora of events and activities. As far as insurance for auto and home goes, its generally a quiet time with no major weather catastrophes. Yes, there can be some flooding in the Schenectady historic district and communities along the Hudson River, but it’s not a common occurrence in the summer, although more common during the spring with the winter thaw occurs.
Then comes winter and the picture can change quite drastically with ice and snow storms, high winds, and sub-freezing temperatures. The change in environmental conditions does heighten the need to have proper insurance protection for your cars and home.
Due to sometimes bad road conditions the rate of auto accidents tends to increase along with homeowners insurance claims for ice damage, roof issues, and freezing pipes. Or even injury from a slip and fall accident.
As an Albany NY insurance agency, we encounter the issues that people in our community have to contend with and always suggest proper insurance coverage to protect in the event of a car accident or damage to one’s home.
We highly suggest to our clients to maintain high liability limits on their car insurance policy for coverages such as bodily injury liability protection, property damage, supplementary uninsured and underinsured motorist protection, supplemental spousal liability, and personal injury protection including optional basic economic loss.
Regarding homeowners insurance in Albany NY and the Capital Region Area, we also suggest high personal liability coverage which protects you in case someone slips and falls on your property and is injured. In regard to the physical dwelling, we like to see our customers include building ordinance protection, underground line endorsement, as well as water backup protection for the spring thaw.
Sometimes when we approach the increase of coverage limits with clients or even potential new customers we get the “we don’t want to be over insured and have our premiums go up so high”. This is where the fun begins for us because we’ll prepare a quote with increased limits and added endorsements that we feel will adequately protect our insured and reveal that the price did not go up significantly at all. Most people end up taking the increased coverage and the peace on mind that goes with it.
Our goal is not to upsell someone at all, but to at least make sure they are aware of the common claims that we encounter for our area and suggest the coverages or limits that can help to protect them from significant financial loss. In fact, the increase in premium resulting from higher limits has virtually no effect on our bottom line as an insurance agency because the amount is so small. But it does help our clients and new customers to understand that we really do care about them and want to see them in comprehensive insurance policies that protect them.
So now that winter is approaching, please check your policy, see what your auto and home coverage is. If you’re unsure, call your agent, or feel free to call us here at the NY Insurance Hub anytime, we’re glad to help.