Have you recently bought, are buying, or have built a home in the Southern US or are you planning on it? When doing your research, have you considered the weather conditions when choosing a home insurance policy? You should, the weather down here is unpredictable and can be quite erratic. The fluctuations in temperature and overall conditions can wreak havoc on your home, your ROOF especially. Being sure your insurance covers everything it can may save you many headaches in the future.
Here in the the Metro Atlanta area, we generally don’t have to worry about things like blizzards and hurricanes (although there have been years where we have been hit by or affected by these types of storms), but we do have extreme weather that does affect your roof adversely. Hail, tornadoes, blistering heat, humidity, wind, rain, thunderstorms, lightning, and quick temperature changes can wreak havoc on shingles and other roofing materials. Strong hurricanes in the Atlantic can cause major storms throughout the region causing high winds and dangerous flying debris. We even get the occasional blizzard. Every decade or so we get hit pretty hard, if your not prepared, that one instance can be all that’s needed to cost you a small fortune.
Luckily, for the most part, weather here in the South is quite mild, despite the extremes we experience. It usually stays nice often enough, that some people will take their chances and reduce their insurance or even drop it altogether only to lose everything they have when a tornado or other strong storm hits. With beautiful southern days and warm southern nights, it’s easy to forget that the next major storm is just around the corner. Years can go by between devastating storms, but it will come, it always comes.
When shopping for home insurance for your Metro Atlanta home, take into consideration not the storms that will happen in the next 5 years, but that big storm that is coming sooner or later, it could be tomorrow, could be 10 years from now, we never know. Don’t go for the cheap policy that only covers the basics, read your policy thoroughly and consider the worst-case scenario and plan for it. In the case of your home, it is definitely better to be safe than sorry and the few bucks you can save on a cheaper policy may not be worth it in the long run.
Southern weather is beautiful but it can be unforgiving. Preparing ahead of time and being insured for most scenarios can give you the peace of mind that no matter what happens, you will be covered.