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Insurance on your Guns


jerrodh

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Topic? Does normal home/renters insurance cover it? How did you go about getting it? is it a separate policy? I currently have liberty mutual but I am considering switching all insurance over to state farm.
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Some policies let you schedule up to a certain amount. Nationwide is $5k. Anything over that is not covered. Like the others said keep an excel file with a list of values and serial numbers along with photos off site.

 

A 1000 pound safe bolted to concrete is also good insurance.

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So, you can get protection from damage, theft, fire, lost, damaged in car accident... EXCEPT for if it breaks during use.... for cheap.

 

And, you have to itemize any gun over 10k and anything under 10k will be blanketed. You can insure guns, optics, Suppressors, and accessories.

 

If a gun breaks while using it you are fucked. But policies like that are about 30 bucks a year per 10k in guns. So 100k in guns in theory is about 300/year to insure from a company called Historic Firearms.

 

If you want a policy that protects guns if the break/blow up during use the cost multiplied by about 5x.

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This is who I use. Very affordable and they have a "blanket" option where you do not have to itemize each firearm as long as they are under a certain value. You insure the entire collection for a specific value. This is helpful for active collectors like myself because it would be impossible to keep the details up to date as I buy, sell, and trade to improve my collection.

 

https://www.easterninsurance.com/insurance-quotes/personal-insurance/historic-firearms-insurance

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I added mine to my homeowners insurance. You can get them appraised if you really want to otherwise you just state an amount you feel they are worth. They will ask for the gun make, model, serial number, and if they are in a safe or field use. You might want to take a picture of the gun plus the serial number and keep it safe somewhere. I e-mailed all my pictures to my agent.

 

You definitely should do this. It does not cost much and will cover your ass if you sell a gun and it is used in a crime. Sometimes a paper trail is a good thing.

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I just itemized mine and sent it to my state farm agent and they wrote a policy around the value. Similar to a jewelry rider.

 

Jewelry riders are usually pretty expensive. Is the rate similar for the firearms?

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Jewelry riders are usually pretty expensive. Is the rate similar for the firearms?

 

Through State Farm, I have a jewelry policy for some of my wife's more expensive stuff, jewelry is more expensive, as they figure your going to wear it regular and it also covers loss of stones and such.

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Just spend the money and buy a big safe. Insurance will be a huge spend and the safe will last forever. Make backups of your computer and keep it in there also, it will survive a fire....something insurance will never cover....lost photos and data.
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It is true that insurance is a yearly cost. But, if your safe gets overcooked in a fire the contents will get damaged as well. Why not both?

 

I assume every gun owner (in this forum) has a safe. Bear in mind that most safes can be unlocked in a matter of 15-30 seconds by a pro (this statement coming from a 12 year CPD veteran).

Edited by Diamonds
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For those out there thinking their safe will save them do yourself a favor and do a little YouTube soul searching. Those $1800 safes you buy at vances and cabelas really aren't safes at all. I the last year I saw one that was broke into with a crowbar and one who's contents didn't survive a fire. 5k is about minimum for a large safe that will do the job correctly.
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Jewelry riders are usually pretty expensive. Is the rate similar for the firearms?

 

Our Jewlery Riders aren't very expensive (about $1 per $1k per month), the firearms are about $.75 per $1k per month, but there was a $2500 minimum (as $2500 is covered under your standard contents policy). I have so many discounts with them though that I am unsure of the true cost.

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For those out there thinking their safe will save them do yourself a favor and do a little YouTube soul searching. Those $1800 safes you buy at vances and cabelas really aren't safes at all. I the last year I saw one that was broke into with a crowbar and one who's contents didn't survive a fire. 5k is about minimum for a large safe that will do the job correctly.

 

Absolutely True. If you just have standard firearms then insurance is good, if they are collectors, regular insurance will not replace or cover them.

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I believe my regular insurance covers up to 2500 or 5K in guns. Any serious collector should use a 3rd party "pay per year" agency that specializes in understanding WHY your Transferrable Machine gun is worth more now than it was 5 years ago when you bought it for 5K less.

 

This is simple people.

 

I use a safe to ensure my children don't have an accident (When they get to the age of curiosity). I have insurance to make sure I don't take a bath in the event of a fire/crash/theft.

 

Sledhead, "standard firearms" versus "collectors firearms" is nil if you have more wrapped up into your "standard firearms" than your homeonwer policy will cover. IE - You can own 30 glock 19's and they still may exceed the limit that your policy will cover.

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While safes don't stop proficient criminals from getting your stuff they deter/delay most from trying to get in. If one gets a decent safe, bolts it to the floor, and gets an alarm, you are in pretty good shape to protect your investment.
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While safes don't stop proficient criminals from getting your stuff they deter/delay most from trying to get in. If one gets a decent safe, bolts it to the floor, and gets an alarm, you are in pretty good shape to protect your investment.

 

I also this it come down to how much the criminal knows about the contents within the safe. I once heard (and it could be accurate or not) that most house-robberies are by someone you knew.. Or someone that knew/profiled you.

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Our Jewlery Riders aren't very expensive (about $1 per $1k per month), the firearms are about $.75 per $1k per month, but there was a $2500 minimum (as $2500 is covered under your standard contents policy). I have so many discounts with them though that I am unsure of the true cost.

 

That's about 200% higher than the Historic Firearms rates. I guess if you don't have much to insure it really doesn't make a huge difference, though.

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I also this it come down to how much the criminal knows about the contents within the safe. I once heard (and it could be accurate or not) that most house-robberies are by someone you knew.. Or someone that knew/profiled you.

 

Yep... the less people know about what you have makes it safer. No one is going to lug a plasma cutter into a house and risk jail time unless there's serious money to be had.

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Adding the extra coverage to your existing home owners policy is the easy button. At the same time, talk to your agent about other things that may not be covered without additions to the policy. Things that never crossed my mind were tool coverage (included limit was something like $1k), artwork, cash (my policy only covered ~$500 in cash), ammo (I added the ammo value to my extended gun coverage), electronics... I made adjustments to my policy to cover what I actually needed covered and the price went up ~$100/yr. Good piece of mind to make sure if anything bad happens I'm covered.
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While safes don't stop proficient criminals from getting your stuff they deter/delay most from trying to get in. If one gets a decent safe, bolts it to the floor, and gets an alarm, you are in pretty good shape to protect your investment.

 

Yep... the less people know about what you have makes it safer. No one is going to lug a plasma cutter into a house and risk jail time unless there's serious money to be had.

 

Sadly, you are one of the many who think your $500 stack on safe will "deter" a criminal.

 

In my area we had a rash of break ins by some meth heads. My buddies house got hit in the middle of the day. The same crowbar they used to open his backdoor was the same one they used to pry the front door of his his $1,800 Liberty safe open. Like I said, do yourself a favor and do some research before just assuming. These guys weren't after just guns, they were after anything that they could make money off of to get high. I watched a video on the tube that showed a guy open up a safe with one single well placed hammer blow to the front door. It triggered the e-loc system in his popular "safe" and opened like he had the code. If I know this info I am sure many criminals do to. You don't think a criminal has the means to carry asawszall? Go ahead and spend some time looking at how fast a one of those opens a safe up. There isn't a $1000 gun safe out there that would take a plasma cutter to get in it. But do what you want, it would be your headache not mine. Or just spend some time educating yourself.

 

We haven't even began down the bullshit fire rating discussion yet. Sure most guns can be replaced by insurance. I don't give a shot about my AR's or glocks, I care about my first gun that was passed down by my great grandfather. I care about my dad's first shotgun. I care about the guns that can't be replaced with any amount of money. So for me it was no question to spend 6k on a real gun safe. Good luck with your $500 shiny "deterren" cabinet.

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