The 2024 hurricane season began on June 1st and recent inclement weather has led to flooding in certain areas that should cause homeowners to ensure that they are sufficiently insured.
Insurance Commission of The Bahamas’ Manager of Intermediaries and Market Conduct, Darrin Rodgers advises that home insurance policy holders read their policies. He said, “you go to the bank or whatever lending institution would often time tell you it’s a requirement to have the insurance in order to get your mortgage. You get your mortgage but you don’t know what you got when you got your insurance policy. Go ahead pull those contracts out, read those contracts. It is imperative that one determines what is covered. So you have to look at the coverage, you have to look at exclusions and exceptions, ensure that flooding is there. If flooding is not covered I would encourage you to visit your insurance company and determine how best you can work that into the contract.”
Rodgers says that often times people get home insurance coverage because it is required. “Yes, a lot of time we would have found complaints coming into our organization where persons would have said oh I don’t have this, I thought I had it and when you review the documents you find well no you didn’t sign up for it unfortunately.”
The Insurance Commission official advised that persons negotiate the best contract for you, stay current on your payments and ask the right questions.
