Renters insurance is a type of insurance designed to help tenants who are paying rent to live in rental property. The types of renters insurance coverage generally fall into three categories: personal property, liability, and additional living expenses. We will cover these at a high level below:
Personal Property
Very simply, personal property is stuff that a tenant owns. Everything from furniture to clothing to pots and pans are considered personal property. When designing a renters insurance policy, it is important for tenants to assess the value of their stuff. The value will help determine coverage limits. This way, if their stuff gets damaged due to a covered event, then their renters insurance policy will reimburse them the cost to repair or replace the item(s) up to the policy limit. For example, if a water pipe bursts in the rental property and ruins a closet full of clothes valued at $600, and if the renters insurance policy has a personal property limit of $2,000, then the tenant may be reimbursed up to $600 for replacing the clothing.
Liability
For the types of renters insurance coverage, liability relates to repairs or bills where the tenant is at fault. In other words, if the tenant is responsible for property damage or injuries sustained by the tenant’s guest while on property, then it is the liability coverage that will help the tenant. Similar to personal property, liability also has coverage limits that will protect up to those maximums.
Additional Living Expenses
Also known as loss of use coverage, this type of renters insurance coverage is exercised when you need to be temporarily relocated because the rental property is uninhabitable. These types of expenses can include hotel and food bills. For example, damage from a water line break may require the tenant to temporarily relocate to a hotel. The hotel expense may be covered under the renters insurance policy up to the coverage limit.