What do you do to your house?
We have been snowbirds for about 10 years. The wife worked so we were limited to 6-8 weeks. We are both now retired and plan to be on the road 5-6 months at a time. Previously we just had someone k...
Forum Discussion
djgarcia wrote:
Snowbirds----
1. Make sure your home insurance is up to date and paid.
2. Sign up for a Volunteer Police watch program to keep tabs on your home when you are gone.
3. Turn water off to your refrigerator ice maker
4. Purchase a commercial alarm system for your complete home. The alarm system should be throughout your home and connected to a 24hr. alarm security call center and your local police/fire dept. It is cheap insurance and gives you peace of mind.
5. make sure a reliable friend in town has a complete set of keys for your house. Be sure this friend has the correct pass word for you alarm system if they have to talk to the call center.
6. Put all your valuables i.e. jewelry into your safe deposit box.
Good point about the insurance. I'm in snow country so when I'm gone there is no getting in the driveway. No, I'm not paying someone to plow it and know that I'm not there. I'll take my chances with not having it accessible for the locals to empty it out or squat in it. SO.......I went around and around with the insurance co because of it being snowed in. They would verbally say it's ok but they wouldn't give it to me in writing. One agent told me that properties that are vacant need a special pricey insurance or it's considered abandoned. I cant even remember all the stuff that they said but I think there are a lot of people around me who are not actually insured. It seems to be one of those things that no one wants to talk about but if something happened like a fire they may be surprised at the outcome. I finally got it insured with Citizens and have it in writing that it is ok for the property to be snowed in and no access to the house.
