Insurance for your collection

1957Braves

Saw an article on another forum mentioning a company that has specific sports collection insurance. I've thought about it and wanted to get some opinions. How, if at all, do you insure your collection? Is adding to your homeowner's insurance the best? Going through a specialty company? Anyone ever had to make a claim and how smoothly did it go? Any input would be very much appreciated.

alifaxwa2

Collectinsure.com

DM23HOF

Cincinnati Insurance. Amazing company. I ditched my old Collectinsure for them.

coinspacks

i use collectinsure but here is another one
https://www.minicocollectiblesdirect.com/app/#/

and another

http://www.thefia.com/html/collectibles.html

secretstash

@DM23HOF said:
Cincinnati Insurance. Amazing company. I ditched my old Collectinsure for them.

Care to share the reasoning? I am with Collectinsure so am curious as to your experience or cost assessment between the two.

DM23HOF

I finally got around to having my insurance agent analyze and opine on the policy I was using, and they performed a very clear comparison for me on several fronts— the salient one being ease and size of cash payout in event of a claim. I also feel more comfortable with a company that has great financial resources, while not sacrificing a personal touch when interfacing with them, so it was the best of both worlds.

49ersGuy

you can save 15% or more on Geico.

KendallCat

Matt - thanks for the info. I use Collectibles Insurance and they have been great. Is Cincinnati actually in Ohio. Being an hour away would be beneficial if I ever had the need to talk to someone face to face over some lost 1988 Topps baseball rookies!

KC

secretstash

TY for the answer dm23.

Anyone ever have a claim with Collect Insure? How did it go and did they hassle on payout or any issues?

totallyradd

I had a stack of cards stolen when the house we were renting was broken into about 5 years ago. They were raw and didn't hold a ton of value, maybe 150-200 combined, but I don't think they covered much, if any of that price range. Our renters insurance kinda hosed us all around on for what we claimed as missing. Then they wanted to drop us immediately after we filed our claim. I was ready to scream.

I would like to get my collection insured to avoid this situation if something ever happened again.

1957Braves

Thanks for the responses everyone. I certainly can get this info by calling the company, but how do you start? Do you need a list of each item in your collection? Do you estimate a dollar amount your collection is worth? Do they do a validation or appraisal of what you have?

swankdaddy7

So can anyone recommend an appraiser or how to go about finding a decent one?

BLUEJAYWAY

For a start. I would assume as far as appraisals go if the cards are graded, PSA/BGS it would be easy to establish a value based on VCP or other value listed periodicals. Also completed sales from EBAY for the cards involved for raw or graded. Saving all receipts for amount paid for the cards involved may be of help in value establishment. In regard to unopened, if you have any, and it is BBCE purchased maybe a call to them could establish a value via their buy/sell price. Along with any receipts. If you have any real high end valued cards into the thousands, many forego the ins. and rely on a bank safe deposit box. For the peace of mind of having the card safe means more than getting a replacement value in case it is lost,stolen,or damaged in a fire/flood and losing a treasured card. A friend of mine believes in Smith and Wesson and a pitbull for his "insurance". Maybe these points can help you on your way for appraising your collection. Good luck.

brad31

Collect insure does not require an appraisal. They ask you to put on a schedule individual items over $5K. They tell you to take photographs of your collection. I have never had a claim so cannot tell you how thatboarr works.

secretstash

Has anyone filed a CollectInsure claim and what was the process/outcome?

fur72

If you own a home talk to your insurance agent. I just added an umbrella policy to my home owners insurance to cover the cards for XX amount of value. I did the same for our cell phones. Much cheaper than doing it via the vendor.

brad31

Who is your insurer fur 72? Used to try to insure my cards that way and always ran into a $10K limit on an umbrella for collectibles. Did they require an appraisal?

Jimmy_Commonpants

You want to look into what is called a "Stated Value Policy" because there is a lot of confusion and deception out there in the insurance business. I don't know for sure that these are even available for sports collectables. People have run into problems insuring classic cars when they file a claim only to find out that without a Stated Value policy, you are getting depreciated value(so you are compensated for that 66 Corvette you bought based upon it being a 50-year old car, not a highly sought after and restored classic). Collectables(outside art, vehicles, etc..) are probably the most difficult thing to get a good policy on because the markets are so volatile and insurers aren't going to get burned insuring your cards at some inflated value just because some grading service reports auction prices at that level. Most policies offered with standard insurance policies are going to have a limit around $10K or so too. Also, "specialty" companies will likely drop you immediately if you ever file a claim.

packCollector

@secretstash said:
Has anyone filed a CollectInsure claim and what was the process/outcome?

I have filed a couple lost in the mail claims with them. It was pretty painless and I got the check very quickly. No experience with a large scale loss but am told that as long as you have some kind of documentation like receipts , pictures , etc you are fine. and any individual item over 5k needs to be scheduled

fur72

@brad31 said:
Who is your insurer fur 72? Used to try to insure my cards that way and always ran into a $10K limit on an umbrella for collectibles. Did they require an appraisal?

State Farm. No apprraisal. I work in IT for an insurance brokerage company one of our underwriters turned me on to it.

1957Braves

Update- I called my insurance agent and asked him to review the options. He mentioned that some of the specialty insurance companies have high deductibles, storage requirements, and the claim payout process was often dodgy. I am not mentioning any specific company.

After he spoke with the underwriters of my home owner's policy, the have an option to insure my collection for $1 per $100 of value. I need to provide and maintain a list of items and the value I believe they have, adding and subtracting as necessary. No deductible applies. This is the best option for me and my modest collection.

After speaking with him, I would suggest those who are considering insurance to very carefully review the policy details of each option to ensure you're making a sound decision.

Thanks to everyone for their responses.

blu62vette

I would think homeowners policy would be about the priciest way to go. The umbrella option mentioned earlier is very interesting.

The specialty collectors tend to be much cheaper as this is what they do. I would stick with one of them. I am on the coin side so I use Hugh Wood.

Paying a 1% premium sounds very high.

lawyer05

I use 2 german shepherds.

lawyer05

no they know to stay outside the card room...