Property management is an unpredictable field. Months can drag by without incident, and suddenly you have two emergencies within the space of six hours. Mostly, they are fairly mundane; a tenant is locked out, etc. But every now and then, you get an emergency that has you flying out of bed at 2 am, because while you aren’t sure what you can do, you know that you have to do something. In that hair-raising category, we have:
- 2 inches of water on the floor of the entire downstairs (happened just this last week, Friday, October 18th)
- A car just went through the living room (more common than you would think)
- The tenant that informs you in a dazed voice, that “yes, well, my house is on fire?”
- “There’s water pouring through my roof.”
- And unfortunately, the list goes on.
It is a rather bleak record. A cursory glance doesn’t show anything encouraging in it, but there is a silver lining to each of those clouds. In every single case we just detailed, both the tenants and the owners had insurance. With the fire, which burnt the home to the ground with everything in it, the tenants had only just moved in and had obtained their insurance mere days beforehand. They were covered only because Empire requires that both owner and tenant have insurance, and will not sign a rental agreement without proof of coverage. *
The odds are always in your favor, they always say that it won’t happen to you. The chances are almost nonexistent, but that isn’t very comforting when a car goes through the front door-… and you aren’t covered.
Conclusion:
Most of our tenants either already had renters insurance, or intended to get it soon already. The owners are the same. They both recognize that what shouldn’t happen often does. You cannot foresee every eventuality, only work to make sure that the eventualities don’t have negative repercussions.
Empire is built on the principle that you must take care of the important before it can become urgent. The leak before it is dry rot, the mowing before it grows into a jungle. Sometimes, though, there’s no way to see it coming. Your insurance, whether owner or tenant, is the shield you use to protect from those unknown future events.
Happy Landlording!