Five Steps to Taking Control of Your Organization’s Property Insurance

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By Mike Liguzinski, Divisional President, Specialty Human Services

As a leader of your organization, you would never intentionally put your business’s ability to provide services to its client base at risk, and yet, failing to adequately value your insured assets does just that. Nonprofit organizations, who do not have thousands (or millions) of dollars set aside to repair and replace damaged properties and goods, become especially vulnerable.

Start by having an honest conversation with your insurance agent. If you have an established organization, it’s possible that you have not recently discussed the details of your policy or reviewed the policy language to identify gaps in your coverage. Once you conduct a review of your current coverage, work with your agent to:

  1. Get a formal replacement cost appraisal of your building. You should repeat this step about every three years with an appraiser you trust.
  2. Create an inventory of your organization’s assets. Be sure to include pictures, videos and a record of the valuation of all contents.
  3. Talk to your agent about adding an annual inflation endorsement or provision to your policy, which will help ensure your policy limits are on pace with actual inflation.
  4. Ask your agent about adding a blanket endorsement and/or Agreed Amount Clause to your policy, which requires property values to be appraised annually.
  5. Conduct a review of ALL coverages, exposures and sublimits with your agent and confirm they are all included in your total worst-case-scenario estimate.

“Integrity is doing the right thing […] when no one else is looking…”
– Charles Marshall, Shattering the Glass Slipper9

A moment of incurred loss is NOT the right time to discover you did not carry adequate limits for your building, your contents, or your loss of revenues. Take action today to ensure you assets are fully protected – don’t get caught “swimming naked!”

  1. Marshall, Charles W. Shattering the Glass Slipper. Prominent Publishing. September 2003.
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