On this episode of the Invest Four More Real Estate Podcast, I interview Darrin Gross. Darrin is a commercial insurance broker, rental property owner and podcaster as well. Darrin started out as a traditional insurance agent, but saw the potential with real estate investing after working with several real estate investors. Darrin started investing in properties himself and then moved his focus from traditional insurance to real estate investor insurance.

Darrin talks about why it can be tough for some real estate investors to get insurance. Usually it is not tough to get insurance on a couple of rental properties, but most insurance companies do not like to insure more than four properties and many do not like to insure flips at all. Traditional insurance agents are no trained to deal in investment properties, because most consumers will never flip a house or own a rental property. It is not surprising that many insurance agents do not have great insurance options for real estate investors.

It may be tough to get insurance on real estate investments, but not impossible. Darrin tells us that getting insurance on a few rentals is usually not very difficult. When you need insurance on many rental properties it can be much tougher. You may have to look for commercial insurance polices. With a commercial insurance property you can put multiple rental properties on the same policy. Not only can putting multiple properties on the same policy make the accounting easier, but it may also be cheaper than having individual policies.

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If you can find insurance on fix and flips, Darrin says that many times you will be getting a builders policy. With a builders policy you will get asset coverage, but in some cases you may not have any liability insurance. So if someone gets hurt in your property you may not have any coverage from your insurance! You need to make sure you know exactly what your policy does and does not cover. With one of my recent flips we had the copper stolen out of the home. This was not covered because my policy did not cover theft! If you have a policy that does not cover liability you may want to consider getting a general liability insurance policy to cover your personal or company's liability.

Darrin Gross can help you get insurance on your fix and flips and make sure you have the right coverage in place. I can tell you that I am going to look in depth at my costs for insurance on my flips and make sure that I have the proper coverage in place. Darrin also has a great program for investors who are doing ten or more flips a year.

Darrin stresses that you need to make sure the people you hire to work on your property are insured. It is even better if the contractors will add you or your company as an additionally insured on to their policy. That means if the contractor does something wrong and someone decides to sue the contractor and the home owner. The contractors insurance policy would defend the home owner as well as the contractor.

When you own rental properties or flips you have to make sure you have the proper insurance in place and you are not paying too much. If you are interested in talking with Darrin about your business you can sign up for his free flipping insurance report here. If you listen to the episode he even gives out his cell phone!

Reminder: I am having a live rental property webinar today (Wednesday)! Be sure to sign up here.

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