Homeowner's Insurance: Going up!!!!

[brokensky]

Originally Posted by Snugy

New to NC and trying to get my Home Insurance established. I'm in Onslow County, so I know I'll be paying more then other counties. My question is which company is better about taking care of their clients and making good on payouts if there is an emergency or hurricane...State Farm or Farm Bureau??? Please shed some light!!!

Gosh, you would do better to talk to folks living in Onslow. I have State Farm but I am located in the western part of the state.

Is there any way you can get info from your realtor as to who people in his/her office use? Any chance of talking to some of the neighbors you will have near your new house?

I noticed after Katrina that some of the insurance companies were absolutely impossible to work with, so I would suggest you do some research . . . you might also contact NC's Insurance Commission and ask for any documents they have relating to consumer complaints about companies that provide homeowner insurance in this state.

Good luck! These are difficult decisions.

[brokensky]

Originally Posted by NCyank

Ani, not everyone affected is a rich person in a McMansion or beach rental type home. In fact, those folks would be in the minority of those affected (but certainly a disproportionate amount of the insurance claim totals due to higher costs on the beach or waterfronts). My IL's are in Jacksonville, in a nice but still modest home and not on the beach at all. It's a military town, lots of families moving in and out...few of them in $450,000 homes or beach rental properties.

They have complained multiple times about the insurance rates, even toyed with the idea of moving to this side of I95.

On the way to their house we see miles of homes and farm properties that would be affected by hurricanes and high insurance rates. I'm not going to lump them all in with the beach McMansions but I still don't want to subsidize their home insurance.

Of course this means that perhaps my IL's won't be moving any closer....

I hope I didn't make it sound like this wasn't a problem for everyone.

My point was that the McBeach homes were costing insurance companies so much to replace that this had skewered the risk pool for everyone along the coast. The solution is to essentially share the risk throughout the state.

I am like you - I don't think it is fair for folks inland to have to share the risk. The better solution would be to restrict what could be built along the coast (and better protect our fragile coastline, at the same time).

Inland water surge actually causes more damage (in dollars) than hurricane damage along the coast, so this is why insurance premiums are higher in eastern counties than in western counties.

I think everyone can understand that premiums would be higher in areas most susceptible to hurricane damage. But I think having less beachfront homes (and homes that are beachfront and cost over $1M) would definitely have mitigated the insurance hikes.

It is getting more and more expensive to live in this state.