Becoming the CEO of Your Personal Life –
A Personal Insurance Series: Staying Current

Private Client Group

When it comes to risk management and insurance, it’s important to apply your business best practices to your personal life as well. All too often, we overlook assessing our risks and updating our insurance when we make lifestyle changes, grow our wealth, and add (or delete) valuable assets. In this series, we will discuss common sense steps that you can take to be an effective CEO of your personal life.

When we make changes in our busy lives, it’s easy to forget how they may affect our personal insurance. As a result, people often have important coverage gaps or pay more premium than they should. Always share with your insurance broker if you have:

• A change in marital status.
• A change in household members—adult children who move out of the house or relatives who move in with you.
• A home renovation or addition.
• The purchase or sale of homes, rental properties, or vacant land.
• Installed loss prevention systems or devices, such as central station alarms, permanently installed generators, and water flow detection systems.
• A lease, purchase, sale, or donation of autos and trucks.
• A purchase or sale of watercraft, motorcycles, and ATVs.
• The use of your home as a VRBO or use of your auto for a ride sharing service.
• Children who obtain their driver’s license.
• Children who go away to college.
• Created a trust or LLC for ownership of insurable assets, such as a home.
• Become a member of a non-profit board.
• Hired a domestic employee, such as nanny, housekeeper, driver, or personal assistant.

When we work with prospective clients, we often find that their insurance coverage has not kept up with life changes. For example, it’s not uncommon to discover that they are still paying premium for an auto that was sold more than a year ago. We also find that a trust was created for homeownership, but was never added to the homeowner policy as an insured, or a home is underinsured after an unreported renovation.

At Parker, Smith & Feek, we conduct a substantial annual review with our clients to make certain that they continue to be adequately insured and that they receive all the premium credits for which they qualify. We also work closely with our clients throughout the year to provide guidance about life changes that may affect their insurance program and facilitate insurance changes that are needed.

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