A Collectors Guide To Self Storage Insurance

You started collecting antique books years ago. Now you have discovered online auctions and wow, your collection is taking over your home. You decide to store some of the books to sell later. You have listed several on the auction sites already but need a safe place to store all of the ones you will not be keeping. You packed them up and thought they were safe. Then disaster struck. The units were vandalized. Now many of the books are damaged. You bought self storage insurance but was it enough?

Most good warehouse owners will offer you insurance coverage for your goods stored at their facility. They can offer you short term insurance for 1 or 2 months. If the facility does not offer the amount of coverage you need or you do not feel comfortable with their coverage shop around for your own coverage. Often you home owners insurance policy will cover your items when they are placed in a warehouse storing facility. Check with your agent before purchasing the warehouse policy. Find out if the policy covers natural disasters such as floods, fire and theft.

Consider purchasing a separate tenants policy to cover expensive items like furniture, heirloom china and collectibles. You want your goods to be adequately covered from a disaster or unfortunate event.

Normally a self storage insurance policy will cover damages or lost property due to burglary, wind or hailstorms, fire or smoke damage, lightning, vandalism, water damage or building collapse.

Read your policy carefully. Some policies do not cover losses due to floods especially after the huge losses claimed after hurricane Katrina. You may have to shop around to find a policy that covers floods.

Make sure you get enough coverage to replace the cost of your goods. If the value of your collections is 10,000 dollars and your insurance coverage is just 40 percent of the value, you will only receive 4,000 dollars. Of course the more coverage you want, the higher the premium. The normal household contents is valued at the replacement cost while antiques, boats and collectibles will most likely be valued at their market value.

Most self storage insurance policies will cover the contents such as personal items. Sports equipment, trailers, motorcycles and boats are often included. A separate policy will be needed to cover any business or commercial property. Documents and digital data will be valued at their new stationary costs.

Some self storage insurance policies might exclude important documents such as deeds, bills, securities, notes, money, jewelry and precious stones, watches, boats, furs, and some vehicles. Many of the items that could be excluded like deeds and money, jewelry and precious stones should be stored in a safe deposit box instead of a public facility to store them. Other items that might be excluded in a normal policy are stamps, lottery tickets and anything living like plants or animals. Before you decide on a particular company or policy, read the policy carefully to be aware of what types of property it covers. Having all your collectible books destroyed only to find out they are excluded from your policy can make for a very bad day.

When you decide to store your excess books in a facility, get all the facts on if and how much self storage insurance the facility offers. You were thorough in your research before you signed the policy and your agent has issued the replacement cost of the books for their market value.
 
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Disclamer: This entry is intended to promote our partner StorageMart and some or all participants received compensation.

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