Calling to start Insurance tomorrow... quick advice?

Ok, so Im WAY late to the game but am going to finally insure my stuff tomorrow. I'm going to call Allstate (my home insurance) and State Farm.

I will get it in writing that this is for 'professional' use (not additional hobby equipment in the house).

My question is this, if the deductible is $500... should I even bother with things like my 580exII?

If there is
$0 deductible I would want coverage for at least $20k equipment.
$500 = $17k gear
$1000 = 15.4k gear

Am I missing something? Is there an advantage to covering things like my nifty 50?

Side note I am also a videographer.

Thanks for the advice!

I'm pretty sure the deductible covers per event, not per item. So if ALL you gear was stolen, damaged in a fire, etc. you would be out $500 but they would cover ALL the rest. The only difference would be if you dropped your nifty fifty off a cliff, you just wouldn't make a claim.

I would strongly urge against using the same insurer that insures your home. If you have a claim, that could put your home insurance in jeopardy.

Hmm.. does State Farm have a deductible for commercial accounts? I have them for a 'personal' account and there is no deductible.

cory1848 wrote in post #10538245
I would strongly urge against using the same insurer that insures your home. If you have a claim, that could put your home insurance in jeopardy.

Anyone have any experience with this? I didn't realize they were related?

They aren't, provided it's not a rider on your home owner's policy.

Get a personal article's policy or if this is for business, a commercial/business policy.

List everything. I even listed my bags

Talking to a State Farm guy right now ( I do NOT have any other insurance through them ).

Commercial Article of Policy: $360 /year (covers $15k of gear)
Liability (need this to get the other): $229 /year (covers 1mil liability (2mil/year) 5k in computers ($100 deduct), 6k in random gear)

$USD 589/ year to be covered.

nicksan wrote in post #10538382
They aren't, provided it's not a rider on your home owner's policy.

Get a personal article's policy or if this is for business, a commercial/business policy.

In Florida, State Farm was using ANY excuse necessary to cancel H.O. policies. Didn't matter if it was related or not, if you made a claim, you got red flagged.

Not saying this will happen in your instance, however I would be very cautious of it.

Thanks for the input, I am thinking I will keep them separate.

The 'discount' they can offer anyways is for Auto PLUS home. I currently LOVE progressive and have allstate for home... so sounds like ill kep them separate.

cory1848 wrote in post #10541887
In Florida, State Farm was using ANY excuse necessary to cancel H.O. policies. Didn't matter if it was related or not, if you made a claim, you got red flagged.

Not saying this will happen in your instance, however I would be very cautious of it.

State Farm wasn't the only company doing that in Florida. Florida is only slightly better than a war zone as a place to insure homes, especially when rates are being held below the level of profitability.

cory1848 wrote in post #10541887
In Florida, State Farm was using ANY excuse necessary to cancel H.O. policies. Didn't matter if it was related or not, if you made a claim, you got red flagged.

Not saying this will happen in your instance, however I would be very cautious of it.

I have heard of that if you make excessive claims on your HO policy but not an un-related policy. It's not worth making a claim on your HO policy if it's not something serious. But you're implying that if you have both auto and home and have an auto accident, they will cancel your HO insurance. Do you know of any documented cases of that occurring?

Thomas Hopkins wrote in post #10542616
I have heard of that if you make excessive claims on your HO policy but not an un-related policy. It's not worth making a claim on your HO policy if it's not something serious. But you're implying that if you have both auto and home and have an auto accident, they will cancel your HO insurance. Do you know of any documented cases of that occurring?

Cancel or choose not to renew yes, That is exactly what State Farm and Allstate were doing here. Documented cases? Don't have the time to look right now, but it was all over the news in Florida a couple years ago. State Farm even backed out of the state until they were convinced to stay.

If you are a customer of State Farm or any other insurer, weather its Auto, Home, Commercial, etc, you are kept in a database and any claim you make is recorded. Get too many and they will drop you. Allstate was doing the same but not as severe as SF.

With all the hurricane damage down here, even with a separate hurricane policy, people were afraid to make claims in fear of being dropped. Once you are dropped, good luck getting new coverage at the same rate. People were mandated to go with the state run program Citizens at a cost of 3-4 times what they were paying. It hurts when you premiums go from $1000 a year to $4000 a year.

So I would not risk it for a $200 premium on photography gear. This is Florida I am talking about. I can only assume it would be different in other states but if they can do it here, they can do it anywhere.

On a side note...

Have you checked with Hill and Usher, Tom Pickard Insurance, or Marsh Affinity (PPA)?

You might get a better policy tailored specifically toward photography.

cory1848 wrote in post #10543003
Cancel or choose not to renew yes, That is exactly what State Farm and Allstate were doing here. Documented cases? Don't have the time to look right now, but it was all over the news in Florida a couple years ago. State Farm even backed out of the state until they were convinced to stay.

If you are a customer of State Farm or any other insurer, weather its Auto, Home, Commercial, etc, you are kept in a database and any claim you make is recorded. Get too many and they will drop you. Allstate was doing the same but not as severe as SF.

With all the hurricane damage down here, even with a separate hurricane policy, people were afraid to make claims in fear of being dropped. Once you are dropped, good luck getting new coverage at the same rate. People were mandated to go with the state run program Citizens at a cost of 3-4 times what they were paying. It hurts when you premiums go from $1000 a year to $4000 a year.

So I would not risk it for a $200 premium on photography gear. This is Florida I am talking about. I can only assume it would be different in other states but if they can do it here, they can do it anywhere.

I don't dispute they would have liked to get out of Florida and would drop people or not renew homeowner's policies but what I want to know is if it was linked to non-homeowner's policies. I don't think so but I'm open to learning.