Homeowners Insurance Options

[king183]

Does anyone have recommendations on homeowner's insurance companies? I'm buying a house and have been shopping for homeowner's insurance and can't quite make out what to think. I've received quotes from Farmers, USAA, Liberty Mutual, State Farm, and GEICO. Farmers is by far the most expensive. Liberty Mutual is by far the least expensive. And USAA receives the best reviews, though they are the second most expensive. In fact, Liberty Mutual is almost half as expensive as the others. Financially, of course, I want to go with Liberty Mutual, but I'm skeptical because they're so much less expensive. The coverage offered by all of them is roughly the same (Liberty Mutual has a slightly lower cost-to-rebuild estimate, but not too much). I spoke to my realtor and he said Liberty Mutual is relatively new to the Oklahoma market and may be able to offer such a low price because of the fewer number of claims they have here.

Does anyone have any thoughts on this?

[JayhawkTransplant]

I just switched to Liberty Mutual after my premium doubled with Travelers last year. I expect that they baited me with a great premium and will steadily raise it in the coming years.

[bhawes]

Trust the Big Three State Farm, Framers and All State.

[gamecock]

Trust the Big Three State Farm, Framers and All State.

My experience with Allstate has been great. They paid a large claim on my car (hail damage) and replaced my roof two years ago. I haven't compared recently, but when I signed up with them 8 years ago, their rates were much better than State Farm.

[MadMonk]

Been with State Farm for nearly 20 years. Never had a problem with them that I wouldn't have had with another company and all claims have been handled quickly and fairly.

[Paule4ou]

We just switched to Liberty Mutual as well. Very good rates as they are aggressively looking to expand their market share in OK. They were almost half as expensive as the 2nd place carrier.

[kbsooner]

Ha we had just switched from Liberty Mutual bc our rate increased 120% over a 4 year span. I would suspect you will get good rates for 2 years then then escalation begins!

[BBatesokc]

We are with Liberty Mutual and have never found better rates. Just completed my latest claim with them last week after a tree fell on our house. Easy to deal with, and very generous with our claim. Way more than it took to do the repairs. Used to have Farmers but the rates kept going up and claims were a real pain.

[Midtowner]

Having had to deal with insurance companies when they won't pay, I'll say State Farm and All State are some of the most unreasonable ones to deal with.

My policies are with Farmer's and I've always been impressed.

[kevinpate]

Having had to deal with insurance companies when they won't pay, I'll say State Farm and All State are some of the most unreasonable ones to deal with.

My policies are with Farmer's and I've always been impressed.

No disagreement as to the 'good hands' folk, although my direct experience with them has been limited. However, both professionally and personally, I've only once found State Farm difficult to work with, and that incident was resolved once push came to polite, but firm, shove.

[BBatesokc]

My biggest gripes with Farmers were that each time they paid on a claim, it was never enough and the contractor had to get them to give more money. The incident that caused me to look elsewhere was when a crook roofer told us we needed a new roof after a hail storm hit our area. A neighbor down the street got a new roof so I figured he was telling the truth. Farmer's sent a rep out and the rep said my roof had almost zero damage. Not even enough to replace any shingles, let alone the entire roof. I called three more roofing companies and all agreed that there was NO damage to my roof. I'm fine with that - but the issue was that Farmer's considered that a claim - even if they paid out zero and determined there was no damage. You get just a few 'claims' within a year or two and they will not renew you. They knew a scam roofer had lied to us, but they wouldn't budge. So I took my business elsewhere and I'm glad I did. We saved a lot of money and LM has yet to raise our rates.

[stick47]

Never filed a claim though had HOI for 30+ years. State Farm jacked up my rate nearly double in 2009 so I went with Chayse Gibbons (Chayse Ins in Edmond) and by putting the deductible at $2K I'm paying less than $600/yr for our new home.

[BBatesokc]

With the recent storms, some homeowners were in for a shock when they learned 'wind and hail' damage usually carries a much higher deductible for them than other types of damage. My rep said we were lucky that we had a set deductible specifically for wind and hail. Most of his client's deductibles are set at 1-2% of the insured value.

[bhawes]

Hey BBatesokc I have State Farm I have a claim open but they have not came out because a friend of mine said to have several roofer come out first. He told me the same if they come out and dont fine any damage they still file it as a claim so hopefully since State Farm has not come out yet I hope Im OK until I can get a few estimates.

[SoonerDave]

We just switched to Liberty Mutual as well. Very good rates as they are aggressively looking to expand their market share in OK. They were almost half as expensive as the 2nd place carrier.

I'd advise caution. Have already heard of some folks with LM comprehensive auto insurance getting runarounds on payments for cars destroyed May 20. No personal experience, so can't vouch either way, but just keep that caveat out there.

[mkjeeves]

My insurance is up for renewal. I'm thinking I might be under-insured for a catastrophic loss, especially considering we just remodeled stem to stern. What are the going sq ft rates to build (or rebuild) a new home in the 2100 sq ft size with wood floors, lots of tile in the bathrooms, granite tops, two fireplaces, rock and brick etc.

[stick47]

$105 to $120 sf

[foodiefan]

anyone have any experience with AAA for auto/homeowners? Just got a quote and they cut my Farmers renewal rate by 47% and homeowners by 52%.

[Bellaboo]

I dumped Farmers a few years back for State Farm, no complaints so far, saved me about $600.00 per year with multi (home & auto) coverage. No problem with a claim so far either.

[Jeepnokc]

I use farm bureau for almost all of my insurance policies which range from umbrella policies to business liability to home owners and have been very impressed when I have needed to make claim. After this last tornado, they settled with me and I had check before most of my neighbors adjusters were out. They were very generous in their settlement. I use usaa for cars and one of my life insurance policies. I love them and feel very secure with them but they are just too expensive for homeowners in Oklahoma. Usaa had my car claim settled from the tornado before my neighbors adjusters were out also. If they come anywhere close to the cheapest quote for homeowners i would use usaa as i think they take the best care of their members. also, remember that usaa gives a rebate back if they have a good year with good investments and low claims as they are member owned. I switched to fb after farmers jacked my rates over a ice/ tree claim about eight years ago.

[soonerguru]

I use farm bureau for almost all of my insurance policies which range from umbrella policies to business liability to home owners and have been very impressed when I have needed to make claim. After this last tornado, they settled with me and I had check before most of my neighbors adjusters were out. They were very generous in their settlement. I use usaa for cars and one of my life insurance policies. I love them and feel very secure with them but they are just too expensive for homeowners in Oklahoma. Usaa had my car claim settled from the tornado before my neighbors adjusters were out also. If they come anywhere close to the cheapest quote for homeowners i would use usaa as i think they take the best care of their members. also, remember that usaa gives a rebate back if they have a good year with good investments and low claims as they are member owned. I switched to fb after farmers jacked my rates over a ice/ tree claim about eight years ago.

I also use Farm Bureau and they have been very good. However, after last year's hail storm we had a devil of a time getting the adjustor to pay our roofer. It was actually a nightmare and I had to resort to calling higher ups to get it done. Clearly they were overwhelmed by the volume of claims. Also, they told me last year they weren't taking on new customers. Perhaps this has changed. Despite the bad adjustor, they have been very good to us and we use them for home and autos.

[foodiefan]

thanks everyone!! I'll definitely get quotes from SF and FB. I believe that USAA only for military and family. . .have heard really great things about them I'm really interested in feedback on AAA as they gave me a really great quote (homeowners was $960 v. $1836, car 269 v 425/6 mos from Farmer's). . .may try a new thread with that in the title.

[Bill Robertson]

Homeowners insurance rates seem to very hit-and-miss. After reading two posts about Liberty Mutual being very reasonable I got an internet quote from them being that I have to renew in a few days. The internet quote was just a bit over twice what I'm paying Farmers. An agent called an hour or so later and said the internet rates are always high and she had reviewed the information and the real rate would be much cheaper. Her quote was still 20% higher than Farmers.

[ctchandler]

King183,
As SoonerSoftail said, rates (as well as cancellation policies, claim payments et al) are very "hit-and-miss" so I have hesitated to give a recommendation. But, I will say that I have had State Farm since December, 1972 for my home(s), cars, and a boat for a while and have had many claims (I'm on my third State Farm roof since 1985) and never had a problem. Last May, I was hit by the hail, and within less than a week I had $22,000 in my hands for my car and home. I'm sure my rates will go up but only because all rates are going up due to the recent massive problems we have had in Oklahoma. The one thing that surprised me was when Farmer's was calling me annually for three or four years. They wanted my business. I told them that I wouldn't change companies/agents for a "trivial" amount because I was happy with how I had been handled over the years. Well, each time they were about $100 more than State Farm and I finally told them to not bother calling anymore since they couldn't even match my price. I think the same could have happened if the situation were reversed but I don't know. Just look up everything you can about their cancellation practices, try to find information about the agent you might choose, and of course price must be comparable to others in the area. Not cheap, but fair. When my long time agent retired, I signed up with an agent in the OKC area but after about three contacts with them I was not happy and switched to another agent that I had heard was very good and, he is and I am happy again.
Good luck in your search,
C. T.

[kevinpate]

My experience with SF is just about as lengthy as ctchandler's experience. I know some have had issues with SF, but I have not, with one exception, and well, that worked out in the end. By this point, they'd have to tick me off pretty bad to walk away.