Wood Stove and Insurance

[john61ct]

And in that scenario, they would likely only try to stiff you if the stove was itself contributory to the mishap.

[Drew Bru]

Right on, thanks. South Dakota might be different than Florida.....I suppose I'll find out in the coming weeks!

[Sp6saz]

Great to hear... we just titled ours as a motorhome in our state we first did it through vermont I honestly don't think it would have been possible in our home state if we hadn't got vt. To call it a motorhome first. Then we just transferred the registration. Our insurance is through travelers but because of my points cuz i'm a speeder it was expensive

[skidfrog]

My own broker was giving me an impossible time because she refused to consider any policy other than passenger bus....even though seats were removed and the MTO removed the bus designation and called it commercial cargo . Then a friend talked to a friend at a hockey game and I had cheap insurance with a few days .....no photos necessary .

I think it’s just the local cult philosophy at whichever insurance office .

[dgorila1]

Originally Posted by Beeb

Seems to me that if we ever needed insurance to cover something (hoping we won't), then we have a pretty good case to say that we made no attempt to hide any information, and we were never asked about a wood stove (or any heating source for that matter), we weren't asked to provide pictures, and we weren't told that it had to meet any particular standards.

Truth is the insurance companies will deny if even an inkling of the contract being “void”, and they have the lawyers and money to win against most people. Common saying for insurance “ Deny, Delay, Die”. They drag it out until you give up, settle or die.

[Ghrasshopper]

After dealing with an insurance claim on my VW I’ve realized how futile the attempt to protect your investment with insurance is. You would have to fight them tooth and nail just to get them to acknowledge your bus is worth more than the hundred unconverted busses they can find for $1500.

[BillieJo1]

I can't get insurance with a wood stove either. I finally got to talk to 'underwriting' about this and was told that "insurance companies do NOT like wood stoves, not in homes, not in garages, and certainly not in RVs or boats". I was also told that "it is up to the policy holder to know the exclusions of the policy". That means that just because no questions were asked about a wood stove when taking out the policy, if a wood stove exclusion is somewhere in the policy (like in small print on pg 17) and you have a loss, your claim will be denied with no mediation. Just an excuse to not pay out!

[firebuild]

Every now and then I get the urge to search "bus conversion insurance Massachusetts" just to see if anything new has appeared. The other day I came across this, on the website of a Worcester MA agent:



So I figured "what the hell" and filled out the quote request form, saying I was looking for liability coverage for my bus conversion. Here's the response I got:

"Taking the seats out of a bus and then pretending it's something else that's not a bus? No we won't give you liability coverage for that."

So of course I said, "Then why the hell do you list it on your website?" and sent him this screen shot. He said it wasn't his website. So I sent him the link, and he said, "Oh. Sorry for the misunderstanding. No, we don't cover bus conversions in MA. I'm an agent and the main company does in a few states, but there's no market for it here so they don't offer it."

Well of course I pointed out that there absolutely is a market and if he would just offer it, he'd be the only one in the state, and would get all the bus business.

Never heard from him again.