No one ever wants to think about the possibility that their business might have to face a crisis. Yet it’s a reality of being involved in the commercial space. Eventually, every business owner will have to confront a problem of some sort.
Maybe someone suffers an injury while at one of your properties, and you’re found liable. Maybe a fire causes severe damage to one of your properties. Maybe someone robs your business, making off with a ton of valuable inventory. Maybe a natural disaster devastates several of your offices.
You need to be prepared for any of the incidents above, and then some. Part of that involves having the right processes and policies in place for crisis management. But a larger part involves insurance, specifically property and casualty insurance.
You need to make sure your business’s property is protected against both damage and theft. Without proper coverage, you’re on the hook to replace and repair things out-of-pocket in the event of a crisis. That includes real estate, equipment, and even company vehicles.
That sort of thing can easily ruin a business, especially a smaller one - and even if it doesn’t ruin you, the amount of money you’ll need to pay out will ultimately be less than you’d pay for insurance.
Property Insurance Considerations
It isn’t just your bottom line you’re protecting here, either. By combining well-structured property insurance with proper crisis management, you can get your business up-and-running again much faster than if you had to cover damages out-of-pocket. Moreover, if your business is taken offline for an extended period due to a disaster, insurance can help to mitigate lost income.
As for casualty insurance, few things can ruin a business faster than a lawsuit stemming from personal injury or damage to someone else’s property. Safeguarding yourself against such a thing is essential, particularly if you’re managing rental properties. No matter how conscientious you are as a business owner, there’s always a chance that one of your employees will be negligent.
There’s always a chance that said negligence will result in damages for which your business is liable. Again, insurance exists to protect you from this. It provides a safeguard against everything from medical expenses to legal fees.
Protecting Your Business
Protecting yourself is far from the only reason your business should look into property and casualty insurance, however. In many states, property and casualty insurance is required by law. In Illinois, you’re only required to purchase it if you’re an auto dealer, a trucking company, a tow truck business, a taxi service, an establishment that sells alcohol, or an establishment that hosts certain special events. You’re also required to purchase liability insurance for a commercial lease.
Ultimately, we’d advise purchasing full property and casualty coverage no matter what state you live in. Regardless of whether or not it’s required by law, it’s still a sound investment, protecting you from a wide range of otherwise-expensive disasters. Granted, that doesn’t make the cost of insurance any more palatable, especially if you perform frequent acquisitions and dispositions.
Is Insurance Worth It?
For businesses with many property assets under management like real estate firms, insurance is an extremely costly line item - arguably one of their most expensive. And that’s where Obie comes in. We’ve made it our mission to help businesses save on their insurance costs.
Our CRE insurance calculator makes it easy to measure your insurance premiums against the value of your assets. It allows you to directly measure what the insurance plan for each of your assets costs you. To see if your insurance plan is worth what you’re paying.
Through this calculator, we’ve been able to save customers as much as 15 percent on their portfolio’s insurance cost. That, in turn, has allowed them to increase the value of their assets dramatically by optimizing what is arguably their largest line-item expense. Yet our calculator is only the first step.
In the event that your current insurance policy isn’t quite doing it for you, Obie provides an excellent property and casualty insurance program. It’s not only easy to set-up but also simple to understand. With coverage for up to $100 billion in assets under management, we make it easier than ever to protect your investments without sacrificing too much of your revenue in the process.
Applying is incredibly simple. If you already have an Obie Assets account, we’ll use your existing property data to generate a quick, personalized quote. And even if you don’t, we’ll provide it once we have the requisite information. From there, we’ll assign a single, licensed insurance broker in your area - unlike with other carriers, we won’t share your data with multiple brokers.
Instead, we’ll leverage a network of A-Rated carriers to create an insurance policy that not only fits your business like a glove but also saves you money in the long-term. And we’ll do all this with an application process that takes only minutes. From there, we’ll get you set-up with your new policy in as little as a single business day.
Your business needs insurance against property damage, accidents, and injuries. There’s no arguing with that fact. There’s a ton of stuff that can go wrong on a daily basis, most of it entirely beyond your control.
At the same time, you don’t need to pay out the nose for your policy. Through both our insurance calculator and affordable program, we can help you keep yourself protected while also increasing your net operating income.
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