I had an experience last week that I thought was worth sharing with our readers.

We received the annual renewal notice for our home and contents policy and noticed it was up about $150 on the previous year. Nothing unusual there but when I looked at the suggested value of our home, it was around $150,000 more than what I thought it would cost to replace our existing home, and that’s being generous.

My wife, as wives often do, doesn’t like spending money she doesn’t have to, and she urged me to ring the company and check it out. Me on the other hand, as husbands often do, although not that bothered, reluctantly did what I was told and rang.

Fortunately, our Insurer is one that when you ring, you press one or to buttons and get to talk to a human within a minute or so. What a refreshing experience!

Anyway, the chap I spoke to was very helpful and when he did a few checks and balances he agreed that the replacement value for our home, even if it was 12 months away, would still be at least $150,000 less than they quoted.

The long and short of it was he quickly revised the rate down by $150, said he’d resend the notice and job was right. How easy was that I thought?

The only pain I suffered, and it wasn’t much, was admitting to my wife that she was right…..again!

$150 less is a serous saving so the morale of this story is, don’t just accept the replacement value an insurance company sends you, if you think it’s over the top, call them and talk it over, you too might save some real money like we did.