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Casper0312 Posts: 438
4/3/2022
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Hi there... I was wondering what others are doing, if anything, to insure their comic book collection.
Most regular HomeOwners or Renter policies require you to appraise and schedule each book individually. This is fine for some high end graded books, but even then there is a deductible and typically an 80% cap on cash value vs current market value.
I've been seeing quite a marketing explosion for specialized collectible insurance companies such as Collectible Insurance Services, which claim they insure without appraisal for under $25k and seem to cover for many things excluded in my regular homeowners, including lost in mail nd offsite storage.
Being me, this seems too good to be true and there must be something I am miss9ng. Do any of you have experience with any of these companies? Any you recommend or recommend to avoid?
While I don't have the most valuable raw collection, I think it is time to start getting some good protection in place.
Thoughts?
-David
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collectibleshop Posts: 2358
4/3/2022
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Hey David,
you'll find tons of threads/experience on the CGC forums about this subject. probably most in Comics General, but you can do an insurance or collectibles insurance search for all forums too. one thing I found out with collectinsure company was that if they think you're any kind of dealer, even if just a collector with some things for sale, they call you a dealer, and you pay a much higher premium plus a $200 deductible. Have you asked about rider policies on your homeowners insurance? A previous regular insurance Co when I was living at my previous (parent owned) house had coverage of possessions, including collectibles and art, furniture, electronics, appliances, carpet, etc, for up to 80% of the value of the house (I think it was 80%, might have been less), which was enough to cover my stuff with no extra premium. They would want a list, but they didn't say we needed appraisals. The head of the company told me as long as the stuff was in the house when damaged, it was covered. Fortunately we never had to test that. If the possessions were worth more than that percentage, then we could get a rider policy, but we never asked about that to get the cost, since we didn't need it. so shop around.
I'll email you some companies I found off the CGC forums, and I only contacted collectinsure once to see probable cost and it was too high (they designated me as a dealer, and wanted more than what we used to pay for the whole house at my previous home, which was FAR more valuable than my collection), and haven't tried the others.
you can start a search in this forum: https://boards.cgccomics.com/forum/8-comics-general/ , and there's more in other forums.
edited by collectibleshop on 4/3/2022
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Hammerstone73 Posts: 48
4/5/2022
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I personally recommend Collectibles Insurance. The prices seem reasonable for the coverage of their policies, the exclusions seem reasonable and they're easy to work with. A simple email with value amendments to the policy is all that's required to add items over 25k to the policy.
With that said, the real measure of any insurance company is how are they about paying a claim. Unfortunately I had a claim (different type of collectible) about 15 years ago. The loss occurred outside the home and exceeded the policy coverage. They did their due diligence to validate the claim and then promptly paid the covered amount. My fellow traveler had a significantly smaller loss, he filed his claim through his home owners policy and had a very difficult time getting paid. He went through a criminal type investigation before they would pay out. we had two very different experiences.
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