In need of your words of wisdom and experience on this. I have a little, okay, a lot, of confusion when it comes to insurance matters.

When getting insurance for a rental, what all clauses or endorsements are you wanting and/or needing for insurance coverage?

I am getting quotes now and am trying to determine what I need or don't need.

You need almost everything, when it comes to rental insurance coverage. Let me give you one example. My lease demands my tenants carry "Renters Insurance". Ask most landlords and they are in your same boat. The heard a few fact and read up just a little, not having a grounded first hand knowledge of the facts.

I had a property with 5 homes on one lot. One house, 4 bedrooms with 1-3/4 baths was rented to Connie and Esteban Rhodas--now with their 9 children. When their kids play ball, it often ends up on the roof. I've told everyone they are NOT allowed to climb on the roof. It's dangerous and someone could fall off the roof and die. Still everyday a ball goes on the roof and one son, weighing 200 pound climbs on the roof, jump on the roofing goods and retrieves the balls.

A rain storm began and the roof started to leak. Under the drips was a large screen TV getting wet. Connie called me at 7 pm demanding I go their and fix the roof. I explained I live 1 hour away and the reason the roof is leaking is I've caunght their kids on the roof. Either they can move the tv or cover it with plastic. They refused and the water blow up the electronics. A $700 tv own the drain. My tenants sued me and the judge agreed with my tenants. So I had to school the judge on the lease, performance of the kids and their refusal to maintain renters insurance. You see in California it is illegal for a landlord to insurance tenants items.

You need to decide if you want a 1) cash policy 2) replacement policy 3) functional replacement policies.

After that you need to decide what level of coverage 1) basic (covers fire, most weather issues) 2) extended (basic coverage items plus vandalism, all weather items) 3) preferred (overs terrorism, mold, water damage and other extended cover items)

Then you need to decide level of coverage depending on if you picked a cash policy or not. That property was worth 1.7M so I picked 1.9M to allow for some depreciation.

If you have additional questions on this, feel free to give me a call.

when I owned the old school made into 41 mixed units, I had 1.9 Million cash policy. The do take depreciation out on cash policies so it depends on how old your roof, power, furnace and paint our. The functional replacement was about 7 Million and actual replacement was over 20 million dollars. Does a rental need 6 ft thick walls from a former fall out shelter? Do I really want lath and plaster replaced with lath and plaster or am I alright with drywall?

Listen to Ray, ignore the troll.

For me the coverage involves how you feel about the place. Pretty sure I have replacement on mine with a higher deductible.

I figure if it is a complete loss they will pay for it and I will sell it instead of renting it again (for my SFHs).

With things like roof replacements I see it as they will start pro-rating the roof by age and then end up paying nearly nothing. I have looked into two roof replacements thru insurance and didn't go with either. One was on my PR.

Thank you everyone for the replies thus far.