Student renters insurance
Renters insurance provides coverage for:
- Personal possessions
- Liability for bodily injury
- Additional living expenses
Personal possessions are protected from:
- Fire
- Smoke
- Lightning
- Vandalism
- Theft
- Other disasters
Source: bsu.edu
- For off-campus living, not all landlords have policies that will reimburse tenants for damage from natural disasters like floods.
- Standard homeowner’s or renters insurance does not cover flooding.
- On campus, Ball State is not liable for damaged personal property.
Editor’s note: The managing editor of the Daily News lives with Kirsten Mesch and Jack Smith.
A couple inches of rain last week called attention to gaps in insurance coverage when property was damaged from flooding.
Junior marketing major Kirsten Mesch and junior telecommunications major Jack Smith experienced a close call Thursday when their North Ball Avenue house flooded.
Smith said drains were clogged in front of his house, causing water to drain into their basement. It rose from an inch to between two and three feet.
“The flood was absolutely ridiculous,” he said. “I got home that morning and had to park uphill and take my shoes off just to get up to my house — it was out of control.”
Smith said they cut the power to the washer and dryer, which were located in the flooded basement. Luckily, they said, only a “Scrabble” board was ruined.
For previous flooding that caused more damage, their landlord reimbursed them, Mesch said. But not every renter is as lucky. Standard homeowner’s or renters insurance does not cover flood damage, according to the National Flood Insurance Program.
Jon Nagy, attorney for Beasley and Gilkskin in Muncie, formerly worked for American Family Insurance and said landlords often have a policy that protects their own investment against forces like hail, fires and floods.
This policy is often just for the landlords’ individual coverages and does not include tenants.
“A tenant who suffers a loss like personal property, typically that is not something that is generally covered under landlord policy,” Nagy said.
He recommends students purchase renters insurance to protect their belongings and because it includes provisions of bodily injury liability, if someone were to be injured in their residence, which could get expensive otherwise.
He said students can get a fair policy including decent coverage for $40 to $50 a month if they buy insurance to only cover what they actually need. He said students probably only need a policy that covers $5,000, the lowest available.
For students in residence halls who may assume that their property is insured by Ball State, this isn’t necessarily true. According to the Residence Hall Policy, Ball State does not carry insurance for students or their property.
However, students who rent from the university must purchase renters insurance.
Still, the university would reimburse students if damage occurred due to flooding, said George Edwards, associate director of Residence Hall Facilities and Housing.
LaFollette Complex is currently undergoing some repairs for small leaks from the winter that were found last week.
Edwards said he walks campus twice a year to specifically check that drains are open and there are no leaks in joints on the roofs.
He said he hopes to find small leaks before they become larger problems.
“[Walking on the roof], that’s the only way to know [if there is damage],” Edwards said.” [I use] binoculars and look up sides and on the roof. We look down to see tops of windows to see if there are any openings that need to be caulked and taken care of.”
Smith said he wished he knew more about his responsibility for property before the flood, even though he didn’t lose anything from the basement flood last week.
“I would like to know more about how old houses are,” Smith said. “When we moved in, the house looked like every house, but there are cracks in the foundation where all the flooding went in. I know nothing about renters insurance, and I would want to know about that if I had more stuff in the basement.”
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