Home and condo insurance
A Canadian home policy earns its money in the two weeks either side of a thaw. Frozen pipes, ice damming, sewer backup and overland water are where the claims are, and they are also where the exclusions hide.
Freeze, thaw, wind and water
Fire is what people insure against. Water is what actually happens. Roughly half the personal property claims a Canadian brokerage handles in a given year involve water arriving somewhere it was not invited: up through a floor drain, in under a shingle behind an ice dam, or through the front door after a spring melt.
None of those three are covered by a bare home policy. Each one is a separate endorsement, and two of them are the ones most often left off.
What it covers
The building
The structure itself, on a replacement cost basis. Where the market allows it we place guaranteed replacement cost, which pays to rebuild even if construction costs have run past the number on your policy. In parts of the country that guarantee has become harder to get, and we will tell you plainly when it is off the table.
Contents
Everything that would fall out if you turned the house upside down. Jewellery, bicycles, art and instruments carry internal sub-limits, which is why a scheduled floater exists.
Sewer backup
Water coming back up through the drains. An endorsement, not a default, and the single most common gap we find on a policy somebody bought online.
Overland water
Fresh water arriving at ground level: an overflowing creek, a spring melt, a storm surge in an urban street. Available across most of the country since 2015, and priced against your specific address.
Additional living expenses
The hotel, the meals and the extra commuting while your home is unliveable. Quietly the most used part of a serious claim.
Condo unit owner coverage
Your corporation insures the building. You insure the improvements and betterments inside your unit, your contents, your liability, and the corporation’s deductible if a loss starts with you. That last one has grown into a five-figure exposure in a lot of Canadian buildings.
What it does not cover
An honest policy is read by its exclusions too. These are the ones that cause the most surprises.
- Gradual seepage, rot and anything the policy calls wear and tear.
- Freezing damage in a home left unheated and unattended without arranging for it to be checked.
- A home under major renovation, unless we endorse it before the work starts.
- Business property and business liability run out of the house. That is a commercial conversation.
Send us your current policy. We will read the endorsements page, which is the page that matters, and tell you what is missing.
Tell us your province. The rest follows.
A ten minute request, a named broker, and an answer that starts with what your province already covers.