Inventorying

I feel like January was a small little blip on my radar. I know most people dislike the month and find it long and monotonous but boy does it sure seem to zoom by for me!

One of the goals I forgot to mention in my last post is my desire to clean house literally and get rid of lot of excess. My initial goal was 101 items but I'm already at 96, not counting the full box of stuff I'd like to sell. I definitely want to push forward past the 101 because I haven't finished tackling our bedroom and office yet and haven't even touched the attic, garage or storage. I know that there will be plenty to get rid of in there!

This goal combines quite nicely with the home inventory I'm working on. Three people I know or know of have had house fires and lost everything in the last few months. And do you know all the crazy loop-holes that insurance companies make you jump through in order to be able to replace things? It's not easy, regardless of the fact that you may have paid for $X00,000 insurance for 20 years with no claims!

I called our insurance company and made them walk me through the exact process of filing a claim and what all it would entail. It took several tries to get them to believe that I wasn't actually interested in filing a real claim, just wanted to know EXACTLY what they would require if I had to file one.

Did you know most insurance companies require receipts? Not just of receipts for big ticket items like a large flatscreen, appliances or furniture. Smaller items too. Our insurance company's response when I asked about wedding presents was that I could try and have the gifter sign a statement as to the value that they gifted... Riiiiiiiight, like I'm going to backtrack through all 400 of our guests and ask them to remember what they gave us and how much it cost a few years ago.

To be reimbursed for clothes, you have to know name brand, year purchased, any other distinguishing characteristics or have pictures/video along with receipts. Don't have all that? Well then you need to attach an approximate value to the clothing/shoes and put a rider in your policy. For example of the X amount coverage I have, Y is the specific amount assigned to clothing. This has to be done BEFORE you ever need to file a claim. But if you do ever have to file a claim due to theft or destruction, you get a check without requiring all the "proof."

I've been working on our spreadsheet for the past month and it's a slow work in progress. I've finished the kitchen, living room and hallway/entranceway, some of the closets and started the bathroom, office and master bedroom. We have way too much stuff though so it takes a while to assemble the list of items, receipts/value, year purchased etc.

I've discovered we were definitely way under insured. I was completely caught off guard by this as I thought I had us way over insured. I've already upped our insurance once and I have a feeling by the time I'm done the home inventory process, I'll be upping it again. Who knew that in such a small house, you could have so much stuff and how much it would all add up! Perhaps its because our coverage is replacement value and the cost of most everything has gone way up in the last few years? Looking up a number of items that I didn't have receipts for (wedding gifts) I was shocked at the difference in price from when we registered for them a few years ago! Many prices had gone up around 25%!

I'm going to upload pictures, videos and scans of receipts along with the documentation to a file storage service online. We're investing in a receipt scanner and a fire safe. Most people when they suffer a loss, lose the documentation right along with their possessions. The last thing I would want to have to do when dealing with something horrendous like a fire or flooding or any other sort of damage or loss would be having to deal with the hassle that can be the insurance company.

Has anyone else done a home inventory? Any tips to make the process easier? Any advice for things you think I might be missing?