Umbrella Insurance Offers Peace of Mind During Life's Unexpected Storms

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You're a good person. You don't wish anything bad on anyone, and would likely never intentionally do anything to cause harm to someone else. But it can happen, and we live in a litigious society where people can—and will—sue. Fortunately, you can help protect yourself and the life you've worked so hard to build with umbrella insurance.

Imagine these scenarios:

1. Your neighbor's kids come over to play on the trampoline with your kids. One falls off and tragically breaks his back. His parents sue, and the judge awards them $250,000 in damages.
2. You are driving down a street in a neighborhood and a seven-year-old child rides her bike out in front of you. You have no time to stop and you hit her. She hits your bumper and windshield before landing on the pavement. Because she is not wearing a helmet, she suffers serious head injuries. Some witnesses say she did not look before riding her bike into traffic and support the fact that you had no time to stop, but the family is awarded $500,000 in damages.

In some instances, umbrella insurance can help provide coverage above what your underlying liability limits on your auto or homeowners policies provide. In the first scenario, if your liability limit on your homeowners policy is $100,000, you may have to come up with the remaining $150,000. Similarly, in the second scenario, if your auto liability limit for bodily injury is only $250,000 and it provides that coverage, you may still have to pay $250,000. If you purchase umbrella insurance, some, or maybe even all or the remaining amount could be covered. Some umbrella policies will even help cover your legal fees. Of course, as with any kind of insurance, the amount of coverage your umbrella policy provides depends on how much you purchase and the details of your policy.

If you don't want to have face the possibility of having to sell your house and give up some or all your savings to pay a claim like this, consider talking to your local Shelter agent about umbrella coverage. Hopefully nothing like this will ever happen to you, but wouldn't it be good to have the peace of mind umbrella coverage can help provide if it does?