Easy-To-Understand Home Insurance Terms
AARP® homeowners insurance coverages from The Hartford may feel complicated, but they don’t have to be.
1 You can start learning more by reviewing important home insurance terms and definitions that relate to your policy. This will help you better understand the home insurance contracts you get from your insurance company.
You can also learn more about your policy by calling our representatives at
888-413-8970. They’ll go over each coverage that’s included, as well as other important details, like your policy’s effective date.
Account Credit: We offer this to customers who have both their auto and home insurance from us, and will apply this credit to both of your policies.
Act of God: These are events that you can’t prevent. This often includes natural disasters, like tornados, earthquakes and floods.
Actual Cash Value (ACV): You can use this to measure the value of real and personal property that you’re repairing or replacing after losses or damages. It’s calculated by subtracting depreciation from replacement cost.
Additional Limits in the Event of a Total Loss: If you receive 100% home replacement cost (the money required to rebuild a home at present, with similar materials) then you may be eligible for extra coverage limits.
Disappearing Property Deductible: This benefit reduces your
home insurance deductible by $50 all the way to $0 for each year you are loss free.**
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Home Dwelling Insurance: If a covered loss damages your home or attached structures, this insurance can help pay for repairs up to the limits of your policy.
Earthquake Loss Assessment Coverage: This offers you insurance protection from earthquake damage that’s assessed by a homeowners association (HOA).
Easy Living Upgrade or Replacement Plus Coverage: This gives you extra funds so that, at the time of a loss in a kitchen or bathroom, you can make "ease of living" changes or Universal Design Upgrades, like multi-level kitchen countertops or wider doorways.
Equipment Breakdown Coverage: If you experience electrical or mechanical failure with home systems, like your furnace, air conditioner or appliances, this additional coverage can help pay for repairs or replacement.
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Green Rebuilding: You can add this optional AARP homeowners insurance coverage from The Hartford to help pay for the extra cost of repairing or replacing your home with green alternative materials. For instance, after a covered loss, you can update your home with Energy Star appliances.3
Homeowners Insurance: This helps by covering losses and damages to your home and personal belongings inside it.
Identity Theft Insurance: With this coverage, we’ll reimburse you for costs associated with restoring your identity after an identity fraud loss during your homeowners policy period.
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Indemnification: This is an agreement between us to restore your finances after you experience a covered loss.
Insurance To Value (ITV): ITV is the relationship between the amount of coverage you buy to the estimated replacement value of your home.
Limited Access: We consider a home to have limited access when it’s located within a gated/fenced community or complex and has a locked building. It will also need security guards who patrol 24/7 and monitor all entrances and exits.
Limited Fungi/Rot/Bacteria Coverage: This includes protection on home policies for any type of fungus, mold, mildew, spores, scents or byproducts produced by fungi.
Loss Assessment: This provides protection for damage assessed by a homeowners association (HOA).
Mature Retirees: If you’re 50 or older and are fully retired or working part time while living in a primary residence, then you’re considered a mature retiree.
Medical Payments Coverage for Home: This coverage pays for medical expenses that occur within 3 years from the date of an accident on your property. It only helps pay for treatment for non-residents of your household.5
Named Peril: These policies cover home losses that happen from specific risks mentioned on your policy. This often includes fire, windstorm, flood or theft.
Ordinance or Law Coverage: This optional endorsement provides additional protection for increased construction costs after a covered loss resulting from ordinances, laws, present zoning or required building codes. For example, if your stairs don’t meet code, and you need an architect to redesign them, this can help pay the extra cost.
Other Structures Coverage: If you have structures that aren’t attached to your home but are on your premises, like an unattached garage, this insurance can help cover repairs or rebuilding costs. This coverage is an automatic 10% of your dwelling amount and has no additional premium. Coverage can be increased beyond the 10% for an additional premium, if needed.
Peril: With regard to insurance, perils are the cause of a loss. Examples of covered perils include fire, hail and wind.
Protection Class: This is a number between 1 and 10 that represents the distance from your home to the nearest fire department. The most protected is 1. The least protected is 10. The Insurance Services Office, a national statistical rating organization determines this grading system. It’s also one of the factors used to determine a home insurance rate.
Protective Devices: These are security and/or fire safety monitoring systems that you install and operate in your home, including automatic sprinklers, fire alarms, dead bolt locks and smoke detectors.
Recoverable Depreciation: This is the gap between replacement cost and actual cash value (ACV). You can receive a payment for this by showing proof that your repairs or replacement for an item are either started or complete.
Refrigerated Property Coverage: You can add this protection to your home policy to help reimburse you for your refrigerated foods ruined during any mechanical failures or interruptions in electrical services. You can get this coverage with only a $100 deductible.
Renewal Credit: We offer this incentive credit to our long-standing Hartford policy holders each time you renew with us.
Renters Insurance: This helps protect personal property from fire, theft, windstorms, hail, explosions, vandalism and riots. It also helps cover loss-of-use costs, like additional living expenses, that result from a temporary move while repairs are made to your apartment, condo or house. You’ll also get personal liability coverage.
Replacement Cost for Homes: If a covered loss damages the structure of your home or an item inside it, this helps pay for its replacement. There will be no deduction for depreciation and the full replacement cost will be paid.6
Replacement Plus or Easy Living Upgrade Coverage: This gives you extra funds so that, at the time of a loss in a kitchen or bathroom, you can make "ease of living" changes or Universal Design Upgrades, like multi-level kitchen countertops or wider doorways.
Residence Held in Trust: When a trust includes a house, this endorsement can help extend home insurance to make sure personal property and liability interests of the grantor and beneficiaries receive full coverage.
Roof Value Scheduled (RVS) Settlement: This is an optional home coverage for a roof exposed to weather elements, like wind or hail. The coverage and premium will gradually reduce over a period of time based on the roof’s age and material.
Scheduled Personal Property Coverage: The base policy limits coverage for certain items, such as jewelry, furs, cameras, musical instruments, silverware, golf equipment, fine arts, stamps and coins. This endorsement provides extra coverage for these items and has no deductible. You may need to provide descriptions of each item and an appraisal.
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Subrogation: This allows The Hartford to settle a claim on your behalf. The claim may involve recovering payments, including deductibles.
Umbrella Insurance: We offer this insurance as an additional liability coverage that increases the limits of your home and auto policies, providing an extra layer of security.
Valuable Items Blanket Coverage: We offer this optional home insurance endorsement to help expand your coverage on your valuable items, like jewelry, china and fur. This helps cover causes of loss that aren’t included in your standard property insurance. However, some limits do apply.
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Wind Mitigation: This is a credit we give to homeowners who use wind-resistant features, like shutters or a reinforced roof, to minimize damage from hail, hurricanes or windstorms.
** Responsible homeowners deserve to be rewarded. If you have no homeowners claims in the past three years, The Hartford will lower your property insurance deductible by $50. Then, we’ll lower it another $50 after each year without a claim – until your property deductible reaches zero. This reduction of deductible does not apply to Mine Subsidence and Equipment Breakdown coverage.
2 This coverage is available for an additional fee and pays for the repair or replacement of appliances, electronics and other home systems after a mechanical or electrical breakdown. Equipment breakdown coverage also provides coverage if you want to make “green” upgrades. It pays up to 125 percent of your cost to replace any covered equipment with items that are similar, but more energy efficient or environmentally friendly.
3 If living “green” is important to you, The Hartford can help with our optional Green Rebuilding coverage. This option extends coverage limits by up to 10 percent when you make environmentally-friendly repairs or upgrade to more-efficient systems and appliances after a covered claim.
4 This coverage will reimburse you for out-of-pocket expenses related to identity theft or fraud such as: (1) lost income due to time away from a job to work with credit agencies, or (2) legal expenses needed to remove criminal or civil judgments caused by fraud. ID fraud is a scary fact of life in today’s tech-driven world. But The Hartford’s ID Fraud Expense coverage can help to reduce the financial impact of these crimes. Our coverage will reimburse you for up to $25,000 in out-of-pocket expenses related to identity theft or fraud. This also includes protection against lost income, with a total limit of $7,500 and a limit of $300 per day. You can use lost income coverage as reimbursement for time away from a job to work with credit agencies, or for legal expenses needed to remove criminal or civil judgments caused by fraud.
5 Medical benefits are calculated on the basis of usual, customary and reasonable charges.
6 The Hartford will pay the full cost to rebuild your home, even if it costs up to 125% of your home insurance policy’s coverage.
7 With this benefit, you can have protection against a potential total loss. If such a covered loss occurs, you can receive 100 percent of the insured value for your scheduled personal property.
8 An easy, convenient way to add a higher level of protection for valuable items such as jewelry, silverware, fine art, musical instruments, cameras, and more – without the added paperwork of scheduling or appraisals.