Fall is officially underway, which means cooler temperatures are right around the corner—alongside a smorgasbord of weather possibilities and serious potential for property damage. Are your homeowner clients ready?
With the official beginning of the fall season last week, cooler temperatures are already on their way—bringing a smorgasbord of weather possibilities with the potential for property damage.
Jim Gustin, senior property specialist in risk control at Travelers, spoke with IA about the importance of home maintenance before the winter weather hits. Although most claims involve roof damage, Gustin shared tips to protect homes from approaching winter storms and preventative measures your homeowners clients can take to reduce claims.
IA: What makes home maintenance a top concern for independent agents and their clients in the fall?
Gustin: Homeowners claims we see include structural damage—in particular, roofing damage driven primarily by wind with 48% of claims and hail with 45%. Those are the perils we want to encourage our agents to be talking to their insureds about. Fall is a great time to do that, because we want to get them inspecting the roof and making any repairs that may be necessary in advance of winter weather with snow and ice and wind.
Why should the roof be a big concern for homeowners?
It’s the largest single surface and the first line of defense in protecting your home. We tend to see a lot of damage to roofs in those instances where we have structural claims. Obviously certain portions of the country get very different climate and different winter weather. The northern states will have heavier snow and ice, where the south may get more rain.
What are your top 5 recommendations to homeowners to prepare for winter?
- Do a visual inspection of your roof to look for maintenance issues or things that could make it more susceptible to hail or wind or other damage—like missing or damaged shingles or tiles on sloped roofs. Or if it’s a flat roof, look for surface bubbles in the membrane material or missing gravel.
- Look at flashing along the roof to make sure it’s in place and in good condition. The flashing is where you transition between vertical places and the horizontal roof—things like around skylights, vents or chimneys. Anywhere where you have a change in roof elevation, you’ve got flashing there and that’s a typical source or place for water to penetrate into the roof covering.
- Take a walk around the home and look for overhanging trees and branches. Trim trees back and remove dead branches—things that have the potential to fall when you get high winds or heavy snowfall to keep from damaging your roof.
- Check downspouts and gutters to make sure that after the leaves fall the gutters get cleaned out—anything with the potential to freeze and exacerbate the problem with ice damage. Keep the drainage of the water off the roof and not clogged in the gutters.
- Consider impact-rated roofing in parts of the country more susceptible to hail storms. If agents have customers already in the market for or considering replacing their roof, in certain areas of the country, we would suggest they at least consider it.
Why is it essential for independent agents to share this information with their clients?
It‘s the old adage: an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. We see these types of claims every winter—we’re trying to get the message out to try to get ahead of some of that and make sure it’s an uneventful winter season. We talked about the roof and the exterior of the house, but I think there are a lot of other things agents should encourage their customers to pay attention to. Things like having their furnaces cleaned and inspected annually, checking smoke detectors, insulating water pipes for the cold weather, having chimneys cleaned and maintained, cleaning out dryer vents for clothes dryers. These are all steps agents should have discussions with their customers about.
Morgan Smith is IA assistant editor.
