My car was broken into last night while parked in my garage. I’ve called and filed the report with the police, but whoever did it left no damage to my car. The bike was locked to the roof rack, as was my storage bin…I came out this morning to both of them missing and THE WHOLE RACK removed!
My question is this: How do I handle this with my homeowners insurance? My bike, Powertap wheels, laptop, wetsuit, helmet, and shoes were all stolen. I have receipts for everything as well. How do I present to my insurance company that a $3000 bike and a $2000 laptop were stolen, not to mention some $1500 wheels?!
I have All State covering me up to about $65,000, but is there a limit to each item stolen, etc?
I have to call them ASAP, any advice would be great!
When my hockey stuff was stolen, i did just what you typed in your message. Tell them everything you had and show them the proof. Your rates will go up a bit, but it is worth it
if the car was in the garage then this might be coverd by your home owners. Just remember to never use the word “Racing” when refering to your bike/wheels/powermeter etc. as most ins. does nto cover any items related to “racing” as per my insureance guy.
I echo the post that says don’t refer to your bike as “racing.” Personally, my renters insurance covers my bike, as long as the bike isn’t used to win money in a race. Just to avoid any confusion, I never refer to the bike as a race bike (or race wheels or race anything for that matter) when dealing with insurance.
By the way, why was the bike in your garage and not your house?
I have American family. I just called because I’m going on vacation with my bikes. They said they will cover them for 10% of policy while away from the house. I didn’t ask about while at home.
My brother drove into garage with bike on top. Ruined the bike. The insurance company payed for it. Don’t remenber how the deductable played into it. They always want pictures. They accept race pictures.
I loaded the bike up at 5:30 am, had to go into the office for a few hours, then I was planning to leave about 3 hours ago on a weekend trip.
And I live in a building with AMAZINGLY high ceilings…so I never have to worry about the dreaded “crunch” if I were to leave the bike on pulling into the garage.
So anyway, it was only there for about 2-3 hours unattended. And really there are only a few people who SHOULD be in the garage…
Look on the bright side - once you get the ok from the insurance company damn are you going to have some fun shopping: bike, wheels, power meter, etc. AND a laptop!!!
Same happened to me…My mountain bike was confiscated out of the garage. Home owners ins paid for it. I built the bike myself, so I had to get an itemized list of everthing and what the replacement cost would be. Also had a local bike shop give an estimate for replacement with a POC for that bike shop. They gave me exactly what it would cost to replace the bike minus the deductible!
Good luck!
“They always want pictures. They accept race pictures.”
That’s good to know…I’m going to call now, I don’t have the report in hand yet as I reported it to the police over the phone, but at least I can get the claim started.
If I can’t use the term “race”, what do I use? Just second set of wheels? or is there another, more appropriate term?
I’m in the industry and here’s the way a standard policy works. You have up to 10% of your personal property coverage amount to pay for anything that happens to your belongings anywhere in the world. This would be subject to your deductible so let’s hope that’s not too high. There are limits on theft for specific items, (jewelry, firearms, etc.), but you bike isn’t one of them. Your company will be doing their research on the replacement cost but you need to do your own too. Remember, these people don’t get tons of these types of situations with a valuable bike so you will be the expert in this case. Make sure you show them that you are the expert and “tell them” what you are wanting it replaced for based off the research you’ve done. This is always helpful.
“Look on the bright side - once you get the ok from the insurance company damn are you going to have some fun shopping: bike, wheels, power meter, etc. AND a laptop!!!”
All the new parts will be fun, though I’m out for this weekend!
Oh, and the new laptop I’m not looking forward to either, mine had SO much work info on it. Luckily I don’t think anything was professionally or personally sensitive that I know of, thank God.
Thank you for the info. I have the receipts for everything except that roof rack itself. I also have a good contact at a LBS who I called and said he’d get me a good price on a new stuff to help me and help my case with the insurance company.
Luckily my deductible is only $250. I just changed that about 2 months back.
I’m getting everything into Excel to be as organized as possible when I call All State.
Why am I only covered to 10% of my personal property coverage amount? I just grabbed my policy and I was wrong, I’m covered to $50,000, not $70,000 as I originally thought. Does that mean I am only covered to $5,000 of belongings? And if so, what’s the other 90% cover?
From what you said in one of your later posts, it sounded like it was a community garage, not your own. The reason that is pertinent is that once your personal property is no longer is the “owned or rented premises”, (read under your own roof), the 10% rule applies. If this had been stolen out of your own garage, it would not be subject to the 10% limit and your $50,000 would apply. Make sense?
The building itself isn’t owned by you so the 10% rule would apply. You may get lucky and get an adjuster who waives that but it’s probably unlikely. The reason is that if it’s your own garage, you can control who comes in and out as well as the locking mechanism. As a co-owned unit, you have little to no control over it. The insurer underwrites it’s policy based on your information, not everyone who has an interest in the garage in this instance. If they did that, you would pay even more than you do now due to the high number of variables that would accompany all those extra risks. Go ahead and say it, insurance sucks. I’m with you on that but it may pay off for you in this instance. Good Luck!
I believe the insurance company problem is not specifically with “racing”, but it’s with any business equipment that’s used professionaly. The idea is that anything used to make money needs to be covered under a separate business ins. policy. Still, it’s unnecessary to muddy the water by using the word “racing”.
I had three bikes & related gear stolen, homeowner’s ins. covered replacement value, no hassle at all dealing with insurance co (State Farm). I provided receipts from original purchases & for replacements, got check right away for almost $10k (replacement value + tax - deductible).
