Snap Poll on Homeowners Insurance to Value

Snap polls reflect questions posed by members of the Celent Executive Research Panel, a group of C level executives in the insurance industry. This question came about from a member who wanted to understand whether and how other insurers evaluate the quality of the interior of homes when it comes to calculating the replacement cost of the home. This deck provides a summary of the responses to a Snap Poll conducted October 18 – 22, 2021. 6 insurers responded to this survey over the course of 5 days.

The question that was posed was:

Background:

This question is focused on personal lines homeowners. This insurer is interested in how other insurers are handling homeowners inspections especially of the interior of properties. They have had a few scenarios pop up where properties were under-insured, and they believe that the main driver of the MSB cost estimator being low was that they were unaware of the actual quality of interior features (cabinetry, custom windows, moldings, flooring, etc.). They’d like to get any insights possible on inspections and how other insurers assess the quality of the construction and then calculate the required limit for a property (the ITV -Insurance To Value)

Questions:

Does your company offer Guaranteed Replacement Cost coverage?

What replacement cost estimating platforms/methods does your company utilize?

For the homes themselves

For contents

Other…

What percentage of your homeowners book is inspected?

On properties where you would not perform an interior inspection (such as a non-high value home), how does your company capture/verify details regarding the quality of the interior building elements?

Are you working with any insurtech firms to help with this? Have you launched video inspections? Or anything else?

Is managing the accuracy of the valuation, or ITC, of homes something your company is paying a lot of attention to? Or is it more routine in nature.