How necessary is it to do a home inventory?

[mezzona]

Is it necessary to do a home inventory?

If I only knew.. I would have done it from the beginning of my marriage! It's kinda overwhelming.

How do you do it?
What gets recorded, what doesnt?
What information do you record?
Where do you keep it?
What's the best way to keep it up-to-date?

[August Mom]

What are you trying to accomplish? Is it for insurance purposes?

[mezzona]

Yup! For insurance purposes. I'm pretty sure I'll do it, but I just want to know the best way to go about doing it and recording it.

[Melanie]

We just go through each room and take a video. Generally only when it's the last minute for fire evacuation and the place is an embarrasing shambles. But at least we have it. Then we keep the video in our small/moveable fireproof safe.

[wellyes]

A home inventory isn't a bad idea, but I don't think it's absolutely necessary.

When my apartment was robbed a few years ago, we lost bikes, computers, a TV and - oddly - about 1/2 of my husband's clothes (the man is not fashionable, he basically only shops at Kohl's for crying out loud, so why they wanted his boxers and sweaters is a mystery). Anyway, we got reimbursed by our renters insurance. I think we had receipts for a few items, which we gave to the insurance co. But our claims for items without receipts were approved too.

I do remember the police saying that we'd only be able to recover items we lost if we could provide serial numbers. So it's probably a good idea to have a record of serial numbers stashed away somewhere (not on your PC, obviously, since that's likely to be stolen!) Just keep in mind that hte the odds that your stuff being found by the police is pretty slim.

[ThreeofUs]

To be prepared for a big loss like fire or water on your house, it's a really good idea to go around with a video camera describing everything in your rooms (including serial numbers) and closets. Doing this as a team with a spouse or family member is usually easiest, as they can read off numbers and act as "tour guide".

And, of course, keep the material off-site or in a fire/water safe box....

I mean, who knows how many brooms you have? ;)

[August Mom]

I don't think it needs to be intricate. We took still photos of items in rooms/closets and then closeups of valuable items, although a video would be good too. We have appraisals/receipts for the most valuable stuff and that is scheduleds, so the insurance agency already has those anyway. We did not do an elaborate spreadsheet and do not have each possession broken out. We just estimated a value of the total contents, breaking out the most valuable with specifics.

Good luck.

[Jenn98]

Our insurance agent highly rec a detailed inventory with TONS of pics and video casue he said it's a lot more expensive to replace things that you think it is and they do not usually give you full value. He said things like open the closet door and get a good shot of the amount of clothes you ahev hanging in there and the amount of shoes you have, etc. I just started going room by room and making a list of everything I saw. I sat on the floor and started in one corner and worked my way around the room and basiclaly made a shopping list of everything I'd have to buy if my house burned to the ground. I didn't go so far as to get the titles of all the books, for example, but I quickly counted all DD's books and listed the number of books in my document. (we have over 300 children's books and it would be a small fortune to replace all that!).