I am sure that people are interested to know: What are some ways to lower H.O insurance? and what type of discounts exist out there? Thanks for your help!

I raised my deductible from $500 to $1500 and cut almost $200 off my insurance bill...that is almost a 1/3 of the total cost.

Raising your deductibles is one way to lower your insurance premium. I always tell all of my clients that they should always go with the highest deductible that they can comfortably afford. Having a higher deductible tells an insurance company that you are not going to be turning little claims all the time and it tells them that you are willing to assume some of the risk. The higher the deductible you have, the less of a risk you are to the insurance company which means that there is a lesser chance they will have to payout. Therefore, the discounts that are available for higher deductibles are usually very nice.

Any time that you do anything that lessens the risk of the insurance company of paying out, will usually lower your homeowners rate. Here's a brief list of things that may be able to lower your insurance premium.

If the house is less than 8 years old
Having a full reporting burglary alarm
Full reporting fire alarm
Deadbolts, smoke detectors, fire extinguishers
Being close to a fire hydrant or fire department
Having no claims in the last 5 years
Good Credit
Sometimes level of education
Multi-policy discounts
Having the house in a low crime area
In house sprinkler systems

The main thing to remember when looking for a discount is that anything that makes your house safer and lessens the chance of you experiencing a loss will usually be able to qualify you for some kind of discount. Now on the opposite end of the spectrum, any thing that will increase the likelihood that your house will experience some kind of loss will either make your rate higher or will make your home completely uninsurable. Also there are many company specific discounts available. Therefore you should make it a point to consult this with your agent.

Before you start comparing premiums just make sure the policy type is adequate to the property. Insurance industry has 3 major packages:
- Homeowner's HO (best value for the money, maximum protection, meant for owner occupied property)
- Special Form (good enough, but not as good as the HO. Might be cheaper at the cost of excluding some coverages from the package)
- Dwelling Policy - DP (very limited in coverage, much cheaper)

So, it makes no sense to compare an actual HO policy to DP. You might save 20% of premium by getting just 50% of value. And DP will be offered to you as home insurance anyway, which is technically true.

Discounts: when you buy a property you cannot change the property itself much to make insurance premium lower. This is why playing with deductible is practically the only way to go. Besides one more thing, which is easy to control - insuring home and the cars with same company. It generates substantial discount (12-15-20%) not only toward HO insurance, but toward car insurance as well. It also gives much better care to the household since one person takes care of the entire business - it helps to eliminate gaps, maintain proper coverage limits.

BTW - life insurance policy also comes with HO (and car) insurance discount.

Make sure the insurance covers the home (and interior if preferred) only and not the land. Not a major discount on small lots, but if you have a large lot with the value of it worked into insurance, it could save you a few bucks.

LOL.....no.

You cannot insure the "value" of the land. What is it going to do? Burn? Flood? Someone going to steal it? Wind going to blow it away?

Insurance is for "improvments", contents and liability on the land.

Sorry, I had to.

The best discounts come from multiple relationships. Do you have vehicles? Insure your boat, your off-road vehicles, automobiles/SUVs with the same carrier and you'll see the best savings. As mentioned increasing your deductibles to your maximum level of self insurance is vital to decreasing your exposure. Do you have a personal umbrella policy? Multi relationships drive your costs down and service up. Don't forget life, disability, long term care, insurance on your income producting properties. The broker that writes all your lines will find ways to say you big bucks. If he doesn't and you're in Nevada or California call me. Heck if you have an interest in all of the areas mentioned give me your state I'll get back to you in 34 days with a very decent numbers based on your financials.

Joshua's post is RIGHT ON. There are any number of ways to get discounts on homeowners insurance. Best is to grill your agent and ask him to explore the discount possibilities for you. That's what he's getting paid for.

I have additional information if you're interested on my SAN DIEGO INSURANCE BLOG. You can start here if you like: How Much Homeowners Insurance Do You REALLY Need?

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