Homesharing and Homeowner’s Insurance

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Homesharing and Homeowner’s Insurance

Homeowner’s Insurance is now more important than ever. Homesharing and ridesharing have become major players in our evolving economy. However, the terms can be confusing and have more than one meaning. By now, you are probably familiar with AirBnB. Love it or hate it, it’s here to stay. Its purpose is to match supply and demand for housing related to traveling or, sometimes, special events. It allows a resident of a home, condo or apartment in one location to provide short-term housing to someone traveling through or vacationing in their city. The arrangement is facilitated through an online platform that provides the obligations of both parties to the transaction. Therefore, this discussion does not involve situations involving short-term trading or swapping of property in exchange for either similar residential space or in exchange for providing skills or services.

A wide variety of situations fall under homesharing:

  • Rental of seasonally used property
  • Rental of entire premises for vacationers
  • Rental or part or entire premises for persons attending a local event
  • Providing space for a special event
  • Renting a portion of a residence while the property owner or regular renter still occupies other parts of the residence

While insurance policies issued for homes do take into account some situations involving other people staying in a residence, those situations are allowable when they don’t involve financial transactions. Renting for income turns a residential situation into a business. Business activity creates a coverage problem which could result in policies being cancelled or claims being denied. Renting all or part of a residence also results in types of losses that are uncovered because they haven’t been taken as insurable, residential activities.

Policy wording may exclude coverage for losses when they are directly related to a business. So, protection may be lost for the residence, residential property as well as for liability for damage or injury to others and their property.

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Melinda Martin

Account Executive

Melinda began her insurance career in 1985 with Alexander & Alexander where she received her Property & Casualty and Life & Health license. Since then she has worked at various agencies in the New Orleans area and in California as a senior account manager for Employee Benefit Plans.  While in California, she was also the Membership Director for the Burbank Chamber of Commerce. Melinda joined the AWS team in July of 2015.

Michael A. Seeling

Vice President

Graduated from the University of Louisiana at Lafayette with a B.A. in Insurance Risk Management and is a graduate of Archbishop Rummel High School in New Orleans. He joined AWS in October of 2008 and has been awarded the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act Certification (PPACA). Additionally, he is working towards his Certified Insurance Counselor (CIC), Registered Health Underwriter (RHU), and Registered Employee Benefits Consultant (REBC) designations. He is also a member of the National Association of Health Underwriters (NAHU), National Association of Insurance Financial Advisors (NAIFA), and is an active member of the Fore!Kids foundation.

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