Floater

What Does Floater Mean?

A floater is an insurance policy that covers property that is easily movable. These policies often provide additional coverage beyond what is offered by standard insurance policies. Floater insurance typically covers various personal belongings, such as jewelry, high-end stereo equipment, surgical tools, agricultural machinery, and more.

Often, floater insurance is also referred to as equipment floater insurance.

Insuranceopedia Explains Floater

Many homeowners take out mortgage loans to purchase a home. To protect their interests in case the house is damaged or destroyed, lenders require homeowners to obtain homeowner’s insurance. This insurance policy typically combines various types of personal protection, including:

• Coverage for the loss of the home
• Coverage for the loss of contents or belongings in the home
• Coverage for additional living expenses (loss of use)
• Coverage for specific personal possessions of the homeowner
• Liability insurance for accidents that occur at the home or due to the homeowner’s actions

It’s important to note that homeowner’s insurance may not cover certain items. In such cases, people often purchase floaters to fully protect these items against loss, damage, or theft. Because homeowner’s insurance often caps payouts on jewelry and similar valuables, the personal property floater is one of the most common ways to fill that gap. Coverage limits on personal property also differ between carriers, so it’s worth comparing the best homeowners insurance companies before deciding whether you need a floater on top of a base policy.

Floater insurance policies generally cover a single item, so homeowners would need to purchase multiple floaters to insure several items. For example, if you have jewelry and expensive equipment in your home, you would need to buy two separate floater policies to cover each set of items. Renters run into the same kind of coverage limits, which is why it helps to check whether renters insurance covers jewelry before assuming a standard policy is enough.