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Types of Insurance: Protect Your Family

While no one would deny that insurance is important, all too often the media runs stories of accident victims or victims of crime who are endure additional suffering or financial woes due to inadequate or non-existent insurance coverage.

Confusion over insurance plans and policies often results in people not being sufficiently covered. People may falsely believe their health insurance includes a dental plan or underestimate the amount of homeowners insurance they need. Others may not have considered their insurance policy's high deductibles or fully understand the exclusions in their insurance policies. If you aren't familiar with the various types of policies you can hold or are among those who aren't covered, read on to learn about the importance of coverage.

Types of Insurance
There are many types of insurance policies that are designed to protect you and your family from unforeseen events. Although not every family needs every possible type of insurance, most families need at least some insurance coverage.

• Life Insurance: At its most basic, life insurance covers the costs of a person's burial and funeral. However, most people opt for more extensive life insurance that is bequeathed to a family member or other beneficiary. Ideally, a person's life insurance allows his or her family to continue living without financial hardship.
  
  
• Homeowners Insurance: Homeowners' insurance protects your home and its contents, against damage and theft. Most home insurance also includes liability insurance that protects you in the event that someone is injured while on your property.
  
  Property insurance often exempts specific risks, such as flooding, earthquakes, hurricanes and war. If the insurance policy holder lives in an area where flooding or natural disasters are risks, (s)he can opt for additional insurance to cover those risks. While such specialized insurance comes with higher premiums, it can be a lifesaver, as evidenced by the 2005 Hurricane Katrina disaster in New Orleans.
  
  
• Health Insurance and Dental Plans: The importance of health insurance and a good dental plan varies, depending on your county of residence. Because the US doesn't have a government health insurance program for its citizens, personal health insurance is vital for each citizen to maintain on his or her own.
  
  Keep in mind that most U.S health insurance is provided by employers, a much less expensive option than purchasing family health insurance as an individual. Health insurance provided by employers usually (but not invariably) provides some form of dental plan for the employee and family. The quality of health insurance policies and dental coverage varies depending on the health plan offered by the employer.
  
  
• Automobile Insurance: Automobile insurance varies in its purpose and specifics. It generally covers the cost of damage repairs or loss of the vehicle. Auto insurance (or motor insurance as it's known in the U.K) also covers liability costs if the insured vehicle damages another's personal properly or causes someone else injury. Throughout most of the American states, it is illegal to drive an uninsured vehicle.

Other Types of Insurance
While the above mentioned insurance policies are the most important types for a family, you can supplement and extend your coverage by adding additional types of insurance. Depending on your personal preferences and lifestyle needs, individual or family insurance may also include:

• Credit Insurance: Credit Insurance covers all or part of a policyholder's debt in the event of unemployment, injury or death. In most cases, credit insurance applies to one specific loan.
  
  
• Permanent Disability Insurance: Permanent disability insurance is often taken out at the same time as life insurance. If permanent disability prevents the insured party from working, the insurance policy pays benefits to offset the loss of pay.
  
  
• Pet Insurance (Dog Insurance): Dog insurance, or the more general pet insurance, covers the costs of medication and veterinary treatment for the family pet. Some pet insurance covers routine vet visits and burial expenses.
  
  
• Renters' Insurance: Similar to homeowners' insurance, renters' insurance covers damage or loss of personal properly in a rented residence. Like homeowners' insurance, renters' insurance may exclude damage caused by flooding or natural disasters.
  
  
• Travel Insurance: Travel insurance protects people traveling abroad by covering unexpected medical expenses, lost or stolen properly, personal liability and costs associated with travel delays.

Nationwide Insurance Companies
Americans have nationwide insurance companies to choose from when starting a new policy. The following nationwide insurance companies are considered some of the most reliable:

• Aetna
• Allstate
• Blue Cross
• Geico
• Kaiser Permanente
• Liberty Mutual
• Prudential Financial
• State Farm
• Zurich North America.

This is only a small sampling of nationwide insurance companies: there are many more available.

How Much Insurance is Right for Me?
Choosing insurance policies depends on your life circumstances. A young, single individual generally doesn't need the amount of life insurance required by an adult with a family. Similarly, a college student with makeshift furniture probably doesn't need a lot of renters' insurance. However, (s)he may want to seriously think about getting personal liability insurance.

If you're unsure of the type of insurance you need, insurance brokers and financial advisers can help you assess your needs and give you good advice.

Maintaining and Reviewing Insurance
Insurance policies are usually sold in one-year renewable terms. Maintaining regular payments is essential. An interruption in payments can leave you uninsured at a vital time, raise your premiums or alter the amount of coverage you have.

Regularly reviewing life insurance and homeowner's insurance is vital. People often need to increase their insurance after significant life events. The birth of a child, buying a new house and even changing cars can necessitate changes to insurance policies.

Regularly updating home or renter's insurance is also very important, as property tends to grow over time. While evaluating the need for more homeowner's insurance, create an insurance claims portfolio by taking pictures of possessions. Store the photos in a safely deposit box or at a family members house so that they aren't destroyed if anything happens to your house. In the event of an insurance claim, photos prove that you owned the items you're claiming.