Camera Insurance, Do you have it?

If you don't have insurance for your camera gear, why not?  Yes, it costs money but your gear cost a lot more money and would cost even more to replace out of your own pocket.  If you are a professional photographer you probably have insurance and if you don't you need to consider it.  If you are an amateur, you should have insurance for your gear.

So after buying a Nikon D800 and several lenses along with a Nikon D90, I have several thousand dollars invested in this gear, to lose it, have it stolen or even broken would cost me even more.  I thought my home owners insurance would cover the gear and it did to a point, stolen or lost in a fire or tornado.  My home owners insurance did not cover the gear if it was in my car or if I dropped the gear in a lake.  Also, with my home owners insurance I have a $1,000 deductible and for some items the money would come out of my own pocket.

So I called my insurance company +USAA and talked to a person about insuring my gear. It was pretty simple, I provided an inventory of gear and what it cost me with tax included.  I had receipts and serial numbers already in a file so that made life very easy (Take a look at +Evernote, as I had note with everything in it.)  So for about $100 a year, I can insure about $10,000 of gear or for about $50 a year I can insure about $5,000 of gear.  Depending on the gear and coverage the amount will vary. Each quarter I evaluate what gear I have and pretty much anything over $100 gets insured.  If the gear is stolen, dropped, lost in a lake or the ocean, etc, I am covered.  Yes, I'll have the loss to deal with and the hassle of buying new gear and dealing with the insurance company but I'll get gear at least.

So are you insured?  If not consider it.  You may loss the gear you have and the pictures on that gear but the cost won't be as bad as it would have been without insurance.

Note: I have a love/hate relationship with insurance companies.  My house was hit with a tornado in 2008 and the insurance company was there and made life easy.  Last year my truck was t-boned by a semi and having to deal with auto insurance (two of them at that) was a pain I don't want to go through again.  So choose the company you deal with wisely.