You need enough home insurance to cover the following:

• The structure of your home.  
• Your personal possessions.  
• The cost of additional living expenses if your home is damaged and you have to live elsewhere during repairs.  
• Your liability to others.  
• The structure  

You need enough home insurance to cover the cost of rebuilding your home at current construction costs. Don't include the cost of the land. And don't base your rebuilding costs on the price you paid for your home. The cost of rebuilding could be more or less than the price you paid or could sell it for today.

Some banks require you to buy home insurance to cover the amount of your mortgage. If the limit of your home insurance policy is based on your mortgage, make sure it's enough to cover the cost of rebuilding. (If your mortgage is paid off, don't cancel your home insurance policy. Home insurance protects your investment in your home.)

For a quick estimate of the amount of home insurance you need, multiply the total square footage of your home by local building costs per square foot. To find out construction costs in your community, call your local real estate agent, builders association or home insurance agent.

Factors that will determine the cost of rebuilding your home:

• Local construction costs  
• The square footage of the structure  
• The type of exterior wall construction -- frame, masonry (brick or stone) or veneer  
• The style of the house (ranch, colonial)  
• The number of bathrooms and other rooms  
• The type of roof and materials used  
• Other structures on the premises such as garages, sheds  
• Fireplaces, exterior trim and other special features like arched windows  
• Whether the house, or parts of it like the kitchen, were custom built  

Improvement to your home – adding a second bathroom, enlarging the kitchen or other additions that have added value to your home.

Standard home insurance policies provide coverage for disasters such as damage due to fire, lightning, hail, explosions and theft. They do not cover floods, earthquakes or damage caused by lack of routine maintenance.

Flood insurance is available from the Federal Insurance Administration ( http://www.fema.gov ) and earthquake coverage is available from private insurance companies or, in California , also through the California Earthquake Authority ( http://www.earthquakeauthority.com )

Replacement cost home insurance policies.

Most home insurance policies cover replacement cost for damage to the structure. A replacement cost home insurance policy pays for the repair or replacement of damaged property with materials of similar kind and quality. There is no deduction for depreciation -- the decrease in value due to age, wear and tear, and other factors.

If you purchase a flood insurance policy, coverage for the structure is available on a replacement cost basis.

Guaranteed or extended replacement cost coverage.

After a major hurricane or a tornado, building materials and construction workers are often in great demand. This can push rebuilding costs above home insurance policy limits, leaving you without enough money to cover the bill. To protect against such a situation, you can buy a policy that pays more than the policy limits.

An extended replacement cost home insurance policy will pay an extra 20 percent or more above the limits, depending on the insurance company. A guaranteed replacement cost policy will pay whatever it costs to rebuild your home as it was before the fire or other disaster.

Building codes.

Building codes are updated periodically and may have changed significantly since your home was built. If your home is badly damaged, you may be required to rebuild your home to meet new building codes. Generally, home insurance policies (even a guaranteed replacement cost policy) won't pay for the extra expense of rebuilding to code. Many insurance companies offer an Ordinance or Law endorsement that pays a specified amount toward these costs. (An endorsement is a form attached to an insurance policy that changes what the policy covers.)

Inflation guard.

Consider adding an inflation guard clause to your policy. This automatically adjusts the dwelling limit when you renew your policy to reflect current construction costs in your area.

Older homes.

If you own an older home, you may not be able to buy a replacement cost policy. Instead, you may have to buy a modified replacement cost home insurance policy. This means that instead of repairing or replacing features typical of older homes, like plaster walls and wooden floors, with similar materials, the policy will pay for repairs using the standard building materials and construction techniques in use today.

Insurance companies differ greatly in how they insure older homes. Some won't insure older homes for the replacement cost because of the expense of re-creating special features like wall and ceiling moldings and carvings. Other companies will insure older homes for the replacement cost as long as the dwelling is in good condition.

If you can't insure your home for the replacement cost or choose not to do so -- in some cases, the cost of replacing a large old home is so high that you might not want to replace it with a house of the same size -- make sure the limits of the policy are high enough to provide you with a house of acceptable size and quality.

Your personal possessions

Most homeowners insurance policies provide coverage for your personal possessions for approximately 50% to 70% of the amount of insurance you have on the structure or “dwelling” of your home. The limits of the policy typically appear on the Declarations Page under Section I, Coverages, A. Dwelling.

To determine if this is enough coverage, you need to conduct a home inventory. This is a detailed list of everything you own and information related to the cost to replace these items if they were stolen or destroyed by a disaster such as a fire. If you think you need more coverage, contact your agent or insurance company representative and ask for higher limits for your personal possessions.

Replacement Cost or Actual Cash Value.  

You can insure your possessions in two ways. You can either insure your belongings for their actual cash value or their replacement cost.

A cash value policy pays the cost to replace your belongings minus depreciation. A replacement cost policy, on the other hand, reimburses you for the cost to replace the item.

Suppose, for example, a fire destroys a 10-year-old TV set in your living room. If you have a replacement cost policy for the contents of your home, the insurance company will pay to replace the TV set with a new one. If you have an actual cash value policy, it will pay only a percentage of the cost of a new TV set because the TV has been used for 10 years and is worth a lot less than its original cost. Some replacement cost policies also replace the item and deliver it to you.

Generally, the price of replacement cost coverage is about 10% more than actual cash value. If you need a flood insurance policy, you can purchase flood insurance for your belongings. It is only available, however, on an actual cash value basis.

Insuring expensive items with floaters/endorsements.  

There may be limits on how much coverage you get for expensive items such as jewelry, silverware and furs.