Does Homeowners Insurance Cover Roof Leaks?
When you’re deciding how you want to protect your home, especially with homeowners insurance, it’s very important to know exactly what you’re getting into and how far exactly your coverage goes. Of course, homeowner’s insurance is an important tool for making sure that your investment is properly protected from perils, and to make sure that when the worst happens that you aren’t entirely financially responsible for getting your home fixed. So, to get to the heart of the matter, are roof leaks covered by homeowners insurance?
How Homeowners Insurance Works
To answer this question, we must first understand exactly how homeowners insurance works. Essentially, homeowners insurance covers damage from specific perils. The perils covered can vary from policy to policy, but typically a policy will cover fire and smoke, hail storm damage, electrical storm damage, theft, vandalism, and a few other items. Fortunately, in most cases, you can buy extra coverage for perils that aren’t covered, like flooding, war, and many other perils. Really the only things that you won’t find coverage for are intentional misuse, termite damage, and anything that is the result of poor maintenance.
On To The Meat Of The Question, Will Homeowners Insurance Cover Roof Leaks?
This is an excellent question, and the answer isn’t as clear cut as you may have liked. It depends on the cause of the roof leak. If the roof leak was caused by a covered peril, then in most cases it can be covered but if the roof leak was caused by something that was uncovered or poor maintenance it’s likely that it won’t. Let’s break this down further with some examples.
Let’s say that your area just got pelted with a nasty hail storm, hail was falling so fast and hard that it could easily be mistaken for rain if it wasn’t so loud. You’re held up in your home because you don’t want to risk being outside during such an intense hail storm. The hail continuously pelting your roof causes damage and creates a leak that comes into your house. This is an instance where you would likely be covered by your insurance, and you’d be able to either get repairs paid for in full or in part.
On the other hand, let’s say that your roof is in disrepair from normal wear and tear. You figure that it might be okay to put off calling in a roofing contractor to get it repaired because it’s served you well so far. Then the first rainstorm comes and you notice that you have some leaks coming in. Unfortunately, this is a scenario that is likely to not be covered. On the bright side, if your roof is still under warranty from the roofing company they may be able to repair it for you free of charge. This can depend a lot on the warranty provided by the roofing company, how long it’s been since the roof was installed, and exactly what your agreement with the roofing company said.
Homeowner’s Insurance Can Keep You Financially Safe From Perils
Having a good homeowner’s insurance policy that covers perils that are likely to happen in your area is a key component to making sure that you won’t be entirely responsible for damages when things happen that are out of your control. Fortunately, most homeowner’s insurance policies are relatively affordable for the most part and anything that isn’t covered by the base policy can likely be added on for an extra fee. Your home is an investment, and making sure that your investment is covered can save you a lot of money and also a lot of headaches in the long run.
