Will insurance cover furniture stolen from investment property I was selling?

My furniture was stolen from a rental house I was selling. The insurance company will not cover my 50K loss because it was a rental. They say I dropped contents coverage, but i wouldn't have done that on my own. Since I moved the furniture in there from my primary home to help the rental sell, I tried a claim on my primary home under the off-site clause. This was denied because the furniture wasn't in transit. Any recourse here?" in Yahoo! Answers

Based on your description of the situation, it seems to me that you previously lived in this property and then turned it into a rental?

I ask that question because it sounds like you possibly had it insured under a Homeowners policy. A Homeowners policy is only designed to cover owner-occupied dwellings (and their contents); however, if you moved out of the home and rented it out (without telling your insurance company), most Homeowners policies have a clause which allows the company to reduce your coverage to a specified amount (typically 50% of the original property coverage) and remove contents coverage if the home is no longer owner occupied. Some would just cancel your Homeowners policy flat out and force you to rewrite it as a Dwelling Fire policy.

Bottom line, though -- if you had a Dwelling Fire policy on it, you would have had to specifically include separate coverage for your own contents (I usually recommend this to at least cover appliances, but also furniture if you've got your own inside the unit.) If you never added it, there's no coverage -- period. Still, my guess would be that it's unlikely you would ever have paid the additional premium for $50k in contents coverage on a rental unit. (I could be wrong, of course.)

As with most things involving insurance, it's going to come down to the details. If they dropped the coverage for contents as a matter of course since the home was no longer occupied, there's really not a single thing you can do. (You agreed to the contract -- including the clause -- when you signed the policy application.) However, if you had it insured under a Dwelling Fire contract, requested contents coverage, and the contents coverage was removed, the insurance company should have documentation of when and why that coverage was removed (even if it's just a note in the file to say that X called and requested it be removed.) Sometimes these things ARE done in error. But you're more likely to get someone's assistance in clearing up the matter by asking nicely than accusing them of being incompetent jerks.

Also, as a general rule, it's much better to be honest with your insurance company about the situation up front than to find out later that you've screwed yourself -- and somehow, that's the insurance company's fault.

Good luck.

Only way it would be covered would be if you had set up insurance for a "furnished property." The contents portion of your homeowner's insurance was probably dropped in the transition from the property being your primary residence to a rental property. You might have a cause of action with your realtor if the property wasn't properly secured during the period it was being shown. But, your insurance company is off the hook.

OK, was the policy a homeowners policy, or a dwelling fire policy, or a vacant property policy? If it was dwelling fire or vacant, you have to schedule the personal property SEPERATELY to be covered.

Your own homeowners doesn't cover your stuff at an additional residence owned by you - you have to cover it under THAT policy.

If you had this "investment property" insured under a "homeowners policy", that's fraud - material misrepresentation, as it's not YOUR house that YOU live in. If it was on a dwelling policy, and there was no tenant in it, then the theft coverage is suspended automatically - as is vandalism and burst pipe damage.

Pull your original application - you possibly "dropped" the contents coverage when you went from a homeowners to a dwelling, or a dwelling to a vacant policy. ON both the dwelling and vacant policies, you have to declare how much contents coverage you want, and pay seperately for it.

Hmmm. Seems unusual also that they would suggest you "dropped" contents coverage. Typically you wouldn't be likely to carry contents coverage on a house you rented out unless there were significant things you owned in there while renting which would not be covered in the Building and Structures coverage, i.e. appliances, etc.

In a standard HO policy your personal property is usually covered from loss wherever it might be in the world, subject to deductible. However, they may have hung their hat on the fact you placed your furniture in another property you owned which did not have contents coverage. Possibly...

You may want to have someone else review your policies or see if there is someone at your state insurance board office or somewhere else that may be able to give professional advice. Might even consider talking to a buddy with a law degree...but there should be a dispute resolution process you can engage in with the insurance company. Good luck!