Why work with a specialist property insurance broker

The bulk of our work is four property classes: senior living and care communities, apartment and multifamily buildings, hotels and other hospitality property and car wash operators. We also place build-to-rent communities, condominium associations, property management firms and equipment dealerships, and every one of those classes has its own guide.

A short list matters because underwriters in each class ask their own questions. A senior living file is read level of care by level of care. A car wash file turns on tunnel equipment and the income lost while it waits for parts. An apartment file is read building by building for roofs, wiring, plumbing and water losses. A broker who places these constantly knows which answers an underwriter needs before the submission goes out, and that is the difference between a quote and a request for more information.

Commercial property can be written by admitted carriers, by surplus lines carriers, or by the residual markets a state sets up for property the private market will not take: the FAIR Plans, the coastal wind pools, and the Texas and Louisiana facilities. Which of these will look at a building depends on its class, its state and often its exact location.

We work those routes together, so the recommendation you receive reflects every market that will consider the building rather than the one a broker happens to know best. We also weigh carrier strength alongside price. In most states the guaranty fund stands behind an admitted policy and does not stand behind a surplus lines policy, and an owner deserves to know which of the two they are buying.

A residual market exists for property the private market will not take, and a building placed in one is worth taking back to the private market as soon as a carrier will look at it again. On the Mississippi coast, for example, we ask at every renewal whether a private carrier will now take the wind that the state pool has been writing, because the answer changes from year to year and an owner who never asks keeps paying for the pool.

Premium is the number every quote leads with and the one that says least about the next bad year. So we set competing quotes side by side on the terms that decide what a claim pays, and only then on price:

• the wind and hail or named storm deductible in dollars for your buildings, since a percentage of a large insured value can be a surprising figure;
• the roof settlement basis, replacement cost or a depreciated schedule;
• cosmetic damage and other exclusions written into the endorsements;
• where a building is financed, whether each option meets the loan's insurance terms.

You see every quote that comes back, including the ones we would not recommend, and the reasons are written beside them. The steps behind this are set out in our placement process from submission to binding.

A schedule of values is usually treated as paperwork until the day it becomes a payment document. In states with a valued policy statute, the limit stated for a building can decide what a total loss pays. Everywhere else, an out-of-date value decides whether the owner carries part of the loss through a coinsurance penalty or an exhausted limit.

We check the schedule building by building against current rebuilding cost before the file goes to market, and we tell you when a limit is too low for the building behind it, flood limits included. On an account with several buildings, we list each one separately at its own value, even where the policy carries a blanket limit.

An owner with buildings in several states, or at both ends of a large one, often carries exposures that no single carrier prices well together: hail in one place, a coast in another, a wildfire edge in a third. Rated as one block, the whole schedule tends to be priced against its worst location.

We present a schedule like that as it really is, with each location described on its own facts, and where it pays to do so we place each exposure with the carriers suited to it. The result can be two or more sets of terms on one schedule, and we set them out that way so you can see what each part of the portfolio costs and why.

A financed building has to satisfy two parties. Before an option reaches you, we check it against the insurance section of the loan documents, so the program you choose is one the lender will accept rather than one that has to be reworked after binding.

We also keep the liability placement visible on its own. In some places liability costs move with the courts and the venue as much as with the building, and a good property price can be undone by a liability renewal nobody looked at. Showing the two separately lets you see what each is costing you.

Some of our work arrives after another broker has had a decline. The reasons are familiar: a coastal location, a roof in the hail belt, a site near a burn scar or the wildland edge, an older building with original systems, or a river town that has flooded before.

None of these is a reason to stop. A hard file needs more evidence and more markets: dated roof and plumbing work, a winter plan, a mitigation record, a loss history explained claim by claim, and a submission sent early enough to reach every carrier with capacity to spare. Where a peril that nobody requires is still a real exposure, such as earthquake on a fault line or flood outside the mapped zone, we price it and show you the cost, so a decision to decline it is an informed one. The guides to property insurance in each state describe how this works where your buildings are.

We say plainly what a policy will not pay for. We say when a loss history means an improvement in terms is still a renewal or two away, when a building outside the flood map needs flood cover anyway, and when a limit has fallen behind rebuilding costs. We will also tell you when the program you already have is priced fairly for the market as it stands, and that moving it would not help.

If that is the kind of broker you want reading your next renewal, start a quote with your declarations page, or reach a licensed broker directly with a question first. Where the firm is based and the classes it places are set out on about Property Insurance Partners.