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Home insurers are dropping customers based on aerial images

wsj.com

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Re: Home insurers are dropping customers based on aerial images

#701

Post by gmd63 »

imgabe wrote: post #333
gmd63 wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Home insurance companies are leaving Florida because it's not profitable to operate in an area with so much vulnerability to hurricane damage. Also, the only thing stopping medical insurers from denying coverage or increasing prices for people with pre-existing conditions is the Affordable Care Act.

The whole point of insurance is that there is a relatively low probability of a relatively high expense event happening. In all likelihood, the thing won't happen to you, but if we all pool our money together and you are the unlucky person then you're covered. A pre-existing condition is not a low probability event. It is a 100% certainty that you have to pay for it. In that case the insurance is just a middleman who…

I imagine insurers are working very hard to identify which low probability events are likely going to happen for specific people. They might be doing detailed continual examinations of their homes for example.

Re: Home insurers are dropping customers based on aerial images

#702

Post by windexh8er »

barrysteve wrote: post #680
windexh8er wrote: post #527

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm sorry but this comment makes no sense. Where did you get that insurance companies are now "surveiling you 24/7"? If my insurance goes up, and it has, because of people defrauding insurance companies then I would fully expect my insurer to protect their bottom line and my rates by dropping those customers playing unfairly. What I don't agree with is insurance companies punting the decision making process to an alg…

It was a rhetorical question. Why not increase surveillance to 24/7. There is no defrauding going on. You don't own someone's behaviour or property simply because you "insure" them. You get to reject claims and put your opinion on what "fraud" is, through the proper channels. Taking photos and dropping customers is going around the proper channels and tyrannizing your customers. How that is not obvious to everybody i…

Do you really believe that a majority of insurance holders own their home outright? They don't. Which means a financial institution, other than the "home owner" does. That loan binds the "home owner" to a set of responsibilities - one of which is keeping the home insured. This isn't a new phenomenon.

Taking photos from public airspace isn't "tyrannizing" anyone, as much as you seem to want it to be.

> You are leaning in that direction anyway.

The irony...

Re: Home insurers are dropping customers based on aerial images

#703

Post by tekknik »

paulcole wrote: post #687
tekknik wrote: post #685

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I’ve been paying under $1,200 in rent for 10+ years in a neighborhood where houses are now pushing $800,000. You’re either rent controlled or bullshit. Either way your situation is far from the norm and had you bought a house 10 years ago that’d put us right on the tail end of the crap housing market and you still would’ve ended up better buying. Since you can’t seem to do math well, 10x12x1200=$144k just gone. If…

> You’re either rent controlled or bullshit. Neither. Shitty apartment and a lot of hunting lol. And it was under $1k until COVID started. Going to be $1300 at my next renewal in July. > 10x12x1200=$144k just gone Yes. I'll admit I'm not familiar with the logistics but I assume the government refunds the homeowner's property taxes and reimburses for costs like appliances, repairs, landscaping, etc. when the time come…

Yea this just doesn’t make sense. You live in a market with $800k houses down the road but your apartment is $1300/mo? Do you live in a dirt pile because free markets say rent can be charged what it’s worth. If your apartment isn’t worth what the market can charge it may literally be unlivable.

But then you go on to claim you have a lot in investments, or something along those lines as it wasn’t clear. Your story’s dots aren’t connecting.

Thing is, I think you’re actually desperate to own a home, as am I. And now your justifying your desperation with this flawed idea that renting is somehow cheaper. There is no reality in which this is true, that’s why you see the bulk of people flocking to buy and all of us complaining that the party is over.

You’re wrong.

Re: Home insurers are dropping customers based on aerial images

#704

Post by paulcole »

tekknik wrote: post #703
paulcole wrote: post #687

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You’re either rent controlled or bullshit. Neither. Shitty apartment and a lot of hunting lol. And it was under $1k until COVID started. Going to be $1300 at my next renewal in July. > 10x12x1200=$144k just gone Yes. I'll admit I'm not familiar with the logistics but I assume the government refunds the homeowner's property taxes and reimburses for costs like appliances, repairs, landscaping, etc. when the time come…

Yea this just doesn’t make sense. You live in a market with $800k houses down the road but your apartment is $1300/mo? Do you live in a dirt pile because free markets say rent can be charged what it’s worth. If your apartment isn’t worth what the market can charge it may literally be unlivable. But then you go on to claim you have a lot in investments, or something along those lines as it wasn’t clear. Your story’s d…

> You live in a market with $800k houses down the road but your apartment is $1300/mo?

Yes that is correct. Ladd's Addition in, Portland, OR. The floor for fixer-upper houses within a half mile might be $500k but I see $800k+ very regularly. I'm sure you can find something to quibble with here though.

Somehow in my 40-year life I've always managed to find small, cheap, shitty apartments in good neighborhoods. I guess either I am the luckiest person alive or most people aren't excited to live in small, shitty, and cheap apartments?

> But then you go on to claim you have a lot in investments, or something along those lines as it wasn’t clear. Your story’s dots aren’t connecting.

I put a few thousand into index funds each month. I could easily buy a house with cash in a place where I'm not excited to live.

But why would I? I don't want a house. I like my cheap small shitty apartment because it's in a great neighborhood. My money's growing just fine. I have enough.

> And now your justifying your desperation with this flawed idea that renting is somehow cheaper.

You're wrong.

I said that renting can be an attractive decision despite having no home equity at the end.

I understand that owning a home can be an attractive decision as well.

I just think that people who are fanatical about how bad a decision renting is are generally wrong.

Re: Home insurers are dropping customers based on aerial images

#705

Post by Brian_K_White »

maxerickson wrote: post #577
bradley13 wrote: post #573

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This. Houses in the US are tinker-toys. They don't gave the structural strength to support a decent roof. Where I live in Europe, roofs are usually ceramic shingles, which should easily last 50-100 years or more. Of course, the down side of higher quality building standards is cost. Building a houses here costs a minimum of half-a-million, and quickly hits a million...

US roofs are commonly built to deal with snow loads of ~50 pounds per square foot. I don't think it's gonna be a big deal to support tile using the same techniques (it would just need to be accounted for).

Snow doesn't matter. Rafters designed for a cheap roof plus snow need to be stronger to support slate or tile plus snow. It's a static addition to whatever else.

Re: Home insurers are dropping customers based on aerial images

#706

Post by alright2565 »

tekknik wrote: post #666
mvc wrote: post #556

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So in the richest country in the world parents can't let their kids play on trampolines because a neighbours kid having an accident on one would bankrupt their insurance company. Meanwhile, toddlers do active shooter drills like they are fire alarm drills. Totally logical country you got there with a perfectly reasonable approach to risk.

Hmm, when I was a kid while at my friends house I had a small statue fall on my head from a bookshelf. I still have the mark from it. My parents were informed, and with two of them nurses they decided to just watch me for concussion. My parents didn’t sue them, just chalked it up to accident. A friend of mine broke their arm on another friends giant trampoline. Again, no lawsuit. These days parents will sue their chi…

After you go to the hospital for an injury, your health insurance company will send you a letter asking where the injury occurred so they can try and get someone else to pay for the treatment.

This process is called subrogation and it is out of the control of the injured person.

Re: Home insurers are dropping customers based on aerial images

#707

Post by jodrellblank »

antiframe wrote: post #487
bilegeek wrote: post #433

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

I want to reply to your (antiframe) comment from 21 days ago in the Alzheimers discussion ("Can you point to some evidence that increased saturated fat consumption does not increase LDL? Or that there is no link between serum LDL levels and plaque build up? Or are you making a different claim?") but there's no reply button anymore; here is a talk from Dr Paul Mason about it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_lRXZfs6Sjs

Specifically that high levels of LDL alone are not what causes plaque buildup, and why not. Higher LDL cholesterol goes with lower chance of death, found a review of 19 cohort studies over 68,000 people, published in the British Medical Journal, for one.

Re: Home insurers are dropping customers based on aerial images

#708

Post by tekknik »

alright2565 wrote: post #706
tekknik wrote: post #666

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hmm, when I was a kid while at my friends house I had a small statue fall on my head from a bookshelf. I still have the mark from it. My parents were informed, and with two of them nurses they decided to just watch me for concussion. My parents didn’t sue them, just chalked it up to accident. A friend of mine broke their arm on another friends giant trampoline. Again, no lawsuit. These days parents will sue their chi…

After you go to the hospital for an injury, your health insurance company will send you a letter asking where the injury occurred so they can try and get someone else to pay for the treatment. This process is called subrogation and it is out of the control of the injured person.

> This process is called subrogation and it is out of the control of the injured person.

Absolutely not my experience at all. Even still, the insurance company has no right to press charges.

Re: Home insurers are dropping customers based on aerial images

#709

Post by tekknik »

paulcole wrote: post #704
tekknik wrote: post #703

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yea this just doesn’t make sense. You live in a market with $800k houses down the road but your apartment is $1300/mo? Do you live in a dirt pile because free markets say rent can be charged what it’s worth. If your apartment isn’t worth what the market can charge it may literally be unlivable. But then you go on to claim you have a lot in investments, or something along those lines as it wasn’t clear. Your story’s d…

> You live in a market with $800k houses down the road but your apartment is $1300/mo? Yes that is correct. Ladd's Addition in, Portland, OR. The floor for fixer-upper houses within a half mile might be $500k but I see $800k+ very regularly. I'm sure you can find something to quibble with here though. Somehow in my 40-year life I've always managed to find small, cheap, shitty apartments in good neighborhoods. I guess…

> I put a few thousand into index funds each month. I could easily buy a house with cash in a place where I'm not excited to live. But why would I? I don't want a house. I like my cheap small shitty apartment because it's in a great neighborhood. My money's growing just fine. I have enough.

Because you’re not lighting rent money on fire every month. I’m sorry you can’t understand this, and all I wanted to do was help you understand. But it isn’t my money so keep the delusion, I don’t care anymore.

Re: Home insurers are dropping customers based on aerial images

#710

Post by radlad »

callalex wrote: post #640
radlad wrote: post #592

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You are entitled to find your own home insurance, you do not have to use the bank's choice.

Is that really an option when there are another dozen people bidding on the house though? (I haven’t been through the home buying process yet)

Having bought a home, I would expect so (and we did.) You're not submitting home insurance to the seller. This happens after your offer is accepted, and you're working with the bank and title company at this point.
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