On Apr 6, 6:45 am, Charlie Morgan wrote:
On 5 Apr 2007 17:21:18 -0700, "dpb" wrote:





On Apr 5, 5:43 pm, Charlie Morgan wrote:
On Thu, 05 Apr 2007 16:12:17 -0500, Richard J Kinch wrote:

Charlie Morgan writes:

This is a unique, Frank Lloyd Wright inspired custom built house that
has been featured many times in major magazines. I didn't like the
idea of screwing with the asthetics of the original design.

Good for you. Keep fighting.

At this point I'm fighting to remain insured. I'm expecting to spend a few
hundred thousand on updates before I'm in compliance. I don't really have much
choice.

For such a house, you need a carrier out of the mainstream, or at
least a policy underwritten for the particular characteristics of the
house. Expecting adequate coverage for such a residence even if they
do underwrite it in case of loss is unreasonable -- average premiums
pay for average structures.

Who said I was paying "average" premiums for an average house?

There are firms who do underwrite these sorts of things. Also, there
should be help from state and/or local agencies for historical
preservation which would be another first place to turn for sources
and other help.

Alternatively, given the money you're talking of spending, there's the
possibility to consider of putting that out and becoming self-insured.

The main issue for me is the liability insurance, which I really have to have.
The insurance companies only care about risk. If they don't feel it's safe to
THEIR standards, they really don't care. If someone gets severely injured on the
property, a few hundred thousand isn't going to cover it.

---

Unless there is something about the structure that is _extremely_
dangerous or a useage that makes risk inordinately high such as large,
frequent gatherings of people unfamiliar with the property at night
with "fall-off-the-deck-in-the-water" incidents likely or commercial-
like activity, it's hard to imagine the liability risk at a residence
being of such magnitude, especially if history of no claims over a
significant period of time with the same occupancy and use.

But, the point is there are specialty companies who deal with the odd
and unique and if the circumstances are as unusual as you describe,
going through the "ordinary" underwriters doesn't surprise me could be
a problem. I'm only suggesting considering alternatives to perhaps
stimulate a thought process of "out-of-the-box" problem-solving...