Homeowners Insurance Company Ratings
If you have owned an insured home for a few years, you are probably acquainted with homeowners insurance company ratings. For those of you just getting involved in the home market, you should find out how insurance companies compare to one another.
Ratings provide consumers information about each insurer’s financial strength, the number of years a company has been around, a company’s claims record and other statistics about a company’s overall reputation and service record.
There are many places you can find homeowners insurance company ratings. The Better Business Bureau, A.M. Best Company records, Standard and Poor’s records and J.D. Powers’s company records are the main sources for ratings information.
Most people never give homeowners insurance any thought until it is time to get paid for a claim.
That is the one time that you don’t want to find out that your insurer doesn’t stack up, that it is at the bottom of the insurance heap. Then comes the fateful day, and you find out about the hurdles your company wants you to overcome, and your company’s bureaucracy.
That was a lesson learned only too well by the recent hurricane Katrina victims in New Orleans. Several homeowners insurance companies fought vigorously to avoid paying Katrina victim’s claims.
Don’t be a Katrina victim left out in the cold. You be an informed insured, and find out where your company stands when it comes to homeowners insurance company ratings.
A.M. Best insurer ratings are one of the most accurate depictions there is when it comes to the financial health of insurance companies. When it comes to customer satisfaction, probably the two best sources are the Better Business Bureau and your neighbors. That’s right!
Ask several people in your community who they are insured with, have they heard of anyone being bitten by poor company service from any companies you are interested in and do they know of any insurers who are labeled ‘Buyer Beware’.
Homeowners insurance company ratings start with the strongest rating at the top of ratings’ company charts down to the lowest on the bottom. AAA is an extremely strong company rating, and a company like State Farm Insurance would fall in that category. Down the ratings food chain the ratings appear as AA is very strong, A is strong, BBB is good, BB is marginal.
You might want to reconsider any companies with ratings below this level. They are as follows:
B is weak, CCC is very weak, CC is extremely weak, and an R rating means the company is under regulatory supervision and NR is not regulated. NR might be a newly formed corporation. It is not necessarily a bad rating, but there isn’t enough data available on the company practices for a ratings firm to make an evaluation.
Don’t take the easy way out and rely on ratings information provided in company literature. Do a little research. Since there are five trusted homeowners insurance company ratings providers, utilize their experience and wealth of information to help you make your decision on which insurer, is also going to become your insurer.