We all know that home insurance can cover some pretty scary stuff, but what if your house is scary all by itself? If you’ve got creaky doors, bubbling brews, and spooky, scary, skeletons, you might need more than your average coverage. So, here are some of the things you may consider when insuring a haunted house.
How to insure a haunted house.
Liability
Let’s start with the basics: A heck of a lot of liability coverage. Liability coverage for your home is the part of your insurance that can help you pay for medical bills, legal fees, and settlements if someone is hurt in your home. Considering there would probably be a lot of ghosts scratching people, making people fall people down stairs, throwing objects at people, and generally exacting their vengeance on all who dare to enter, the house would probably have to have a high limit of coverage, to say the least.
Personal property
On the same token, whoever owns that house (the living ones) should have plenty of personal property coverage, which can help you cover damage to your belongings due to:
- Fire and smoke damage
- Lighting
- Windstorms
- Falling objects
- Burglary/Theft
- Hail damage
- The weight of sleet, snow, or ice
- Certain types of water damage
- Explosions
- Vehicle or aircraft damage
- And the big one in this case: Vandalism.
A haunted house would be particularly prone to these types of risks, especially if the “throwing plates” thing is considered vandalism. So, the homeowners will need a lot of overall personal property coverage. They may possibly need high-risk home insurance carrier because of the heightened risk, since it may be tough for them to get normal home insurance.
Jewelry & valuable items coverage
The homeowners may or may not need this type of coverage, depending on if they have expensive items lying around or if the poltergeist was brought into the home through a valuable item. If they did need this coverage, though, they would need to add it to their policy. Homeowners’ insurance policies typically only cover valuable items up to a certain amount – and that amount is usually low. So, if a haunted ring was somehow destroyed by a covered loss because of the dark energy inside it, it might be a good idea for the homeowner to have valuable items coverage so that they could replace the ring with a similar, less haunted one.
Loss of use/Additional living expenses
If the situation got so out of hand that the homeowners were forced out of the home by the activity, they’ll want to check their policy for Additional Living Expense (ALE) coverage. ALE coverage can help give you additional funds to keep up your quality of living while you’re forced outside of your home due to a covered loss. For example, after a house fire, your property coverages could help you replace your items and rebuild your home. Your loss of use coverage, however, could help you bridge the gap between the cost of paying your mortgage for the month and renting an extended stay hotel room while your home is repaired.
Vacant home coverage
It would also be a good idea for the homeowners to read their insurance policy through to see how long their home insurance covers a vacant house. Even if the house is full of spirits, a carrier would probably still consider the home empty, which poses a huge risk for them. If a person isn’t living in the house, it becomes more prone to squatters and vandalism. If there were a fire, there would be no one to “alert the media” and protect the homeowner’s and the carrier’s investment.
Even if the homeowner was trying to sell the house, they may still need vacant house coverage if the home is on the market for longer than their home insurance policy will cover. Depending on the level of the haunting, it may take a long while before anyone takes the house off the owner’s hands.
Are perils that exist only inside of the home covered under a home insurance policy?
One of the more interesting questions our horror movie buffs had are from movies like 1408. When perils like fires or earthquakes happen inside of the home, but there are no visible signs of the event outside, are they covered by home insurance?
First and foremost, flooding and earthquakes are typically excluded from home insurance coverage. So, unless the homeowner specifically had policies for those perils, they wouldn’t even be able to start this conversation. That being said, what if the homeowner did have an earthquake or flooding policy?
One could argue that the damaged items inside the home could be covered. You could also argue that there’s no proof of widespread damage in the neighborhood. So, a carrier couldn’t be sure that the damage was due to a covered loss or just the actions of the homeowner. Either way, we suppose they would have to check with their carrier about if and how they would file a claim.
And so marks the end of our basic theories. These coverages may be the absolute minimum a homeowner should worry about if their house was haunted. Still, there could be a lot more coverage needed or a few more caveats that your homeowners’ insurance carrier might have about insuring the haunted house.
For now, you don’t have to be haunted by the thought that you don’t have enough home insurance. Just call our agents today! We’ll get you quotes from different carriers on the affordable home insurance coverage that fits you. To start getting your free quotes, just give us a call, fill out our online form, or LiveChat with a professional today!