Personal Liability Insurance Basics

Much like the case is with personal property insurance it's important to consider additional insurance coverage. Here's a look at the basics and importance of having personal liability insurance.

Understanding the need for personal liability insurance makes it easier to choose the right policy for your needs. Homeowners most definitely need liability insurance. Renters, as well, are often surprised to discover that they need liability insurance.

Liability means responsibility. If you are found liable for an accident or an injury that happened in your home or around your property it means that you are being found responsible for the damage or the injury that has been caused.

You can be liable for an accident or injury without being found to be malicious. Your intention may never be to hurt someone, but intent and responsibility are not always interconnected. Accidents can happen despite your best intentions. There are many things that can happen when we least expect it and there are many things that can happen that we honestly just never thought would happen.

These incidents are the reason that liability insurance is really so important. You might never think that someone would slip and fall down your hardwood steps or that your sweet little dog might take a chunk out of the plumber's ankle. These are unforeseen incidents that you can be held liable for.

Renters need to carry a policy as well because the landlord can often make a case for renter liability versus home owner liability. Most of the time this is the result of failure to report something to the landlord. Sometimes these are things that are foreseeable but are highly unlikely to occur. You might not have made an issue about the wobbly front step because it really wasn't that bad. Alternatively, you may have told the landlord verbally, but without documentation it is certainly not unheard of for a landlord to claim you didn't report something.

Personal liability insurance is not a free ride nor is it encouragement for you to become irresponsible about your home's needs. We do, however, live in a highly litigious society where an accident often means free money provided that you hire a lawyer right away.

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