Floater Insurance: Simply Explained (2023)

A floater insurance policy is a specific type of policy that covers individual easily moveable items for additional coverage over a standard home insurance policy. This could be applied easily to items like expensive jewelry (which may not be covered when worn outside of the home or in specific circumstance like when it is placed in a locker at a gym), or collections – for example a record collection may not be covered under your normal policy if it is worth in excess of a certain threshold in total or if individual items are considered to be more valuable than a newly bought replacement (such as an album released on one label which has then since moved to another where it became very popular).

Why isn’t floater insurance a standard part of my house insurance?

It may be that there is some level of basic protection in your household insurance that operates in a similar way to floater insurance; this is normally for low value items that may be lost from garden sheds, porches, etc.

In the case of simple instances of loss it is often not worth claiming under your insurance for this because the increased premiums when you renew would probably consume much of the value of replacement.

However, this is for low value items only; high value items which are easy to transport represent a much higher level of risk for your insurer and these items vary from household to household, making it impossible for insurers to determine the precise level of risk involved for any particular policy owner or purchaser.

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How much floater insurance do I need for my possessions?

Only you can ascertain how much insurance coverage you need and you should speak to an insurance agent, broker or broker-agent to discuss your specific requirements and appropriate level of coverage. The rates or cost of a floater insurance policy is usually at least 50 cents per $100 value but will vary by location and other factors. 

It is worth noting that you usually need one floater insurance policy for every item you want to ensure you will need one policy for an expensive bicycle for example and another for a top of the range camera and potentially multiple policies to cover items of jewelry.

If you are uncertain as to what level of floater insurance you already have or what specific items are covered and for what value, you should consult your insurance contract or speak to your broker or agent to find out.

Additional Floater Insurance Definitions

• Investopedia
• CBS News

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