Fire Insurance
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Archived Q&A and Reviews
Questions
Need Fire Area Homeowners Insurance Coverage
March 2014
I own a home in the ''fire'' area of Montclair. I currently have home and auto insurance with Traveler's and before that I was covered with Chubb but switched because Traveler's was cheaper. I need to get auto insurance for my soon-to-be licensed teenaged driver and the quote was over $3000 just for the additional car including the multi-policy discounts and good student discount. I've tried to find other carriers for homeowners as I know it is usually cheaper to bundle all the insurance policies together but I think I am stuck with either Traveler's or Chubb. Does anyone else have a carrier who will write a homeowner's policy in the ''fire'' area of the hills? Thanks in advance for any suggestions on how to lower my insurance premiums.
Don't want to be burned
I can VERY HIGHLY recommend Jared Norton with AAA. I know him personally and he has helped several people that I work with! Here is some info about Jared: Jared Norton is an insurance agent who has lots of experience getting high fire risk properties approved. Jared has over 14 years of experience in the industry and can also talk to you about ways to mitigate the costs of insuring a younger driver and discuss all the available discounts. He will really listen to you and your needs and will work with you to create an insurance policy that provides an excellent value. He was also in claims for over 10 years will be there to help you when you need him. His contact info: Jared Norton
Fire & Casualty Insurance Agent
AAA Northern California, Nevada & Utah
Phone: (650) 301-1384
Mobile: (650) 735-1384
How do I pick Fire Insurance?
Feb 2005
I am in the process of purchasing my first home, and my home loan officer suggested I start shopping around for Fire Insurance, but I have no idea where to start. Does anyone have suggestions on how to go about the process of looking for Fire Insurance? I understand it is easy to access quotes from different insurance agencies when it comes to car or homeowner's insurance, but when I search for Fire Insurance through Google, barely any advice or quotes are available. Can anyone recommend me a person or company where I can ask questions to gain a better perspective of what is good fire insurance coverage, as opposed to bad? I would greatly appreciate any information you could provide. Thanks. Jeffrey
When you say Fire Insurance, you probably mean homeowners insurance (which covers more risks than just fire). I would talk to an insurance broker, who can give you an idea of what kind of coverage you need and can get you quotes from several companies. David Shaffer in Lafayette is good. Then you can contact companies like CSAA that don't use brokers to compare quotes. I would recommend getting guaranteed replacement or extended replacement policy, with building code upgrade coverage. Dr
We bought our house three years ago. We were very surprised that it was hard to find home insurance. Apparently many of the big names have pulled out of the state because of the fires. We ended up with Safeco, which I believe still issues policies. However, I'm surprised this issue isn't covered more in the news and in government -- its a huge program.
Assuming you'd need a mortgage, you won't be able to get one without getting insurance, so the liability starts before the closing.
We were looking to buy a couple of years ago, and our agent warned us to call an insurance agents before even looking at houses in the hills. I've talked with a few, all suggested I'd buy elsewhere: most companies won't write new policies anywhere that is considered a fire risk (and both Allstate and Statefarm stopped writing new policies in all of CA)
I would just reach out to an insurance agent with the address of the home to see if they can find a company willing to insure it. They can run the address to see that and give you a rough quote, even if you don’t own it. We like and use Heffernan Brignole, and they represent several companies (vs for example State Farm which is just one company, and as we’ve all heard, isn’t even opening new policies in CA anymore :( ). Good luck!
https://brignoleandghiri.com
This same question came up on my neighborhood mailing list this week. We are in the Claremont area, 2 blocks from College Ave, so not quite in the "hills proper." State Farm and Allstate have both said recently they are not writing new fire insurance policies. A number of my neighbors have existing policies with them, but they are starting to get cancelation notices. One person was able to negotiate renewal with Allstate by doing some mitigation. Another Allstate customer who was canceled found insurance with AAA that only covers about 1/3 of their house's value. A neighbor just had a 10-year Travellers policy cancelled and is looking for a fire policy. Both Amica and State Farm denied a person who recently bought a house they had been renting, so they purchased a fire policy from Lloyds of London that only covers about 1/3 of their house's value. Another person who just moved to the neighborhood found their only option was to buy fire insurance through the state, facilitated by Farmers which handles their homeowner's policy. Hope that helps. It's pretty grim.