Do you have earthquake coverage in your homeowners policy? It's a question that's really never answered until an earthquake hits close to home.
Our bet is most people in California have earthquake insurance. We remember back in 1997 when there was an earthquake in the Little Rock community in Escambia County, Ala., that shook houses for miles and miles. Some of those houses suffered damage and several driveways were cracked. Most homeowners who had cracks in the walls of their home assumed it would be covered but they found out otherwise.
We asked an insurance agent at the time what would have happened if a house had significant damage or was destroyed by an earthquake and the homeowner didn't have earthquake insurance. We were told that homeowner needed to hope that there was significant damage to other houses to grant an emergency declaration from the federal government to get federal assistance involved. Otherwise they were in trouble.
After the 1997 earthquake you could add it to your policy for less than $20 a year for most houses – depending on the value. Today that price is between $100 and $200.
We're not advocating people to go out and add earthquake insurance to their policies, but we do want to make people aware that they may not have earthquake coverage on their existing policy.
Our suggestion is to check with your insurance agent to see if you have earthquake insurance and if not, the decision is left up to you. But we don't want people to assume they are covered and then find out they are not.
A lot of houses began shaking over the past week or so as three earthquakes occurred in the area. We've heard of no damage. We just don't want people to assume if an earthquake severely damages their home that their insurance will cover the repair costs. Check with your agent.
