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Home insurers are dropping customers based on aerial images

wsj.com

481–490 of 712 posts

Re: Home insurers are dropping customers based on aerial images

#481

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If multiple insurance companies say you need a new roof, you need a new roof. Full stop. There’s no justification necessary.

Quite literally, what are you talking about? There were no "multiple insurance companies", there was a single insurance company that dropped the policy holder quoted in the article. Besides, the article quotes from insurance company agents that directly refutes what you are saying: "Brink, who worked for Farmers in Michigan, said some customers were dropped based on aerial images that were two or three years old. One…

I’m not sure why you’re sherry picking the article, it very clearly says multiple insurance companies are doing this, and you claim this is some sort of bad thing that would stop someone from getting insurance.

Your logic is completely falling apart, that’s why you’re confused.

Re: Home insurers are dropping customers based on aerial images

#482

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s worse than that actually; say the liar’s house burns down and the insurance adjuster finds the trampoline in the garden after the fact. As I understand it, the insurer can void the entire contract.

It isn’t always fraud or lying - you apply for insurance. Insurer asks you a million questions. One is “do you have a trampoline”? You honestly answer “No”. The fine print of the application form says you have to tell them if at any time your answers change. After a while, you forget it even asked you about a trampoline. Then, you get your kid a trampoline. Per insurance fine print, you are suppose to inform the insu…

Our economy runs on contracts. If one is able to avoid the terms of the contract by claiming one didn't read it, the whole system falls apart.

(When I bought a house, the sales contract was maybe 50 pages. I went to the escrow company to sign. The escrow agent was visibly annoyed that I leaned back in the chair and set about reading every page. One of the pages that needed to be signed said nothing but "I have read and understood this contract.")

Re: Home insurers are dropping customers based on aerial images

#483
post #219

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm unfamiliar with Canadian law, can you provide an example jurisdiction and required coverage?

In Ontario, the Compulsory Automobile Insurance Act [1] requires that all owners/lessees of vehicles take out insurance policies. The Insurance Act [2] sets out that the minimum amount should be $200,000. $200,000 is a much better floor than, for example, Ohio's $25,000. An Ohioan friend was injured by a motorist who had the minimum coverage. Her care cost more than that. The motorist who caused the injuries didn't h…

Thanks! That is mandatory insurance.

I agree that 200k is a much better minimum. Although I would think a deposit of $200k should be just as good as a policy of $200k... But the Ontario law doesn't allow for a deposit.

I wonder if there's a speciality business available in Ontario for single customer insurance, so individuals or businesses can self-insure without risk pooling.

Re: Home insurers are dropping customers based on aerial images

#485
post #484

Can someone explain to my house insurance is so important? I live outside USA and I never bought an insurance, a common situation in my country.

It’s required if you have a mortgage.

Even if you don’t have a mortgage, your home is probably worth several times your annual salary. Most people can’t afford that loss if it burns down, gets hit by a tornado etc…

Re: Home insurers are dropping customers based on aerial images

#486
post #375
post #338

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the issue is that in some cases the information is inaccurate and there are sometimes limited avenues for a customer to object if their insurance is cancelled based on inaccurate information. To the extent that the information is accurate, I agree. If you make an agreement with a company and buy insurance based on your statement that you don't have a pool, but then you do have a pool, I don't see any reason w…

Last time I was shopping for home insurance, an agent told me I was too close to a canyon, which I thought was strange because there are no canyons near me. They sent me a screenshot of the fire danger map where clearly it had the wrong location / coordinates for my address (they thought I was about a mile from where I really live). I pointed them to my address on Google Maps which has my correct location, but they s…

You should request your data from CoreLogic and see if the wrong location is in their DB, because they’re the broker for a lot of real estate underwriting data.

Re: Home insurers are dropping customers based on aerial images

#487

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Businesses want to maximize profits, but an insurance company that doesn’t pay claims will quickly have no customers.

Except for the mandated ones, like car insurance.

But if there are ten companies offering car insurance and one is known to never pay out, the customers will migrate to the nine who do. Car insurance may be mandated in some states but no one is forced into a particular company.

Re: Home insurers are dropping customers based on aerial images

#488
post #484

Can someone explain to my house insurance is so important? I live outside USA and I never bought an insurance, a common situation in my country.

It’s required if you have a mortgage. Even if you don’t have a mortgage, your home is probably worth several times your annual salary. Most people can’t afford that loss if it burns down, gets hit by a tornado etc…

Thank you.

Re: Home insurers are dropping customers based on aerial images

#489

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s an issue of scale. Similar to police tracking phones. Police have always been able to assign an officer to follow a suspect, but it’s expensive and therefore rarely done. If insurance companies can cheaply inspect everyone’s house from space, the end result will be to lower prices for people with homes in perfect condition and raise them for everyone else. This is potentially problematic because the people with…

Why is it not a good thing if insurance is more accurately priced? Insurance isn't a redistribution mechanism. And dilapidated roofs aren't a social good. Municipalities have actual redistribution schemes to make these kinds of repairs. I'll note that there's nothing at all redistributive about sneaking a trampoline onto your property, too. Further, I'll note that working class people also take pride in their houses…

It's incorrect to assume that more data points implies more accurate pricing, as we're talking about very limited very simplistic models. It's more plausible to envision those extra data points serving to confuse the market and make it less competitive, rather than actually helping to accurately price risk.

Every new data point partitions the statistical population size into two smaller parts, each with their own larger variance (ie the insurance company's risk). The insurance company could statistically combine the risk from each partition into the same original, but it's more likely they'll focus on the higher independent risk figures and raise premiums an outsized amount to cover each individually. And this effect is going to be more pronounced the more lopsided the partition is, leading to similar monoculture incentives as we see in the mortgage/housing bubble. For example, I'd bet there's somewhat of a correlation between insurance claims and whether a house is painted beige.

That is how rates can go up even when the extra data is fundamentally sound. But there can also be just enough extra information to be damning, but not enough to exonerate. For example after the "Do you have a trampoline" question, is there a follow up of "Do you let guests use it" ? Or perhaps a more formal "opt out of all liability coverage for the trampoline" ? Likely not.

Then of course there are places where the model is irrelevant or even outright wrong, because the thing being singled out seems like it rocks the boat. Like the driver surveillance devices that penalize focused acceleration due to perceived association with racing, when it's much more likely that the driver is actually paying attention to driving. Or penalizing people for going over the posted speed limit, when it's actually safer to go the prevailing speed of the road.

Re: Home insurers are dropping customers based on aerial images

#490

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To explain the lawsuit issue, here is a perfectly plausible scenario and how it could play out somewhere in the USA.: 1. A person is at a friend's house for dinner 2. Upon leaving to go home, they trip and fall trying to navigate an unlit path to their car 3. Their injury lands them in the hospital and requires a week or so of recovery time in which they could not work, and as they contract out they lose that money 4…

> 4. The health insurance that fully covered their injury, looks at the medical records and finds that the injury occurred on another property and calls the people involved and finds out about the unlit path In Australia, if you are seriously injured, you will be sent to a public hospital, where the government will fit the bill for your treatment. If it is a workplace injury or a motor vehicle accident, they might se…

> It isn't just about lawsuits, it is also about damages payouts. In the US, there is a very broad constitutional right to a jury trial, which extends to civil lawsuits; and (in many cases) the law entrusts the jury, not just with deciding whether the plaintiff has factually proven their case, but also with awarding damages.

The big damages are punitive damages, not damages for compensation. Since we have rather lax consumer protection laws we rely on the companies being afraid of having to deal with a huge lawsuit payout if they act suitably antisocial. Like the McDonalds hot coffee lady only asked for medical bills, but because McDonalds corporate refused to give her those, and continued to keep coffee boiling hot regardless of people getting injured that they knew happened constantly, because it made them money, the jury made it a point to award a ludicrous judgement to teach them a lesson.

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