Winter Freeze Safety Tips

Posted on by Ashley Ellis

Are you ready for the big chill? Please follow these guidelines to ensure you keep your family, your home, and your animals safe!

Here are some DO’s and DONT’s to help keep you safe this winter:

DO:

  • Make sure you have enough food, water, and prescription medication to last 3-4 days.
  • Bring all outdoor pets inside.
  • Use cat litter or salt for icy driveways if you must leave.
  • Remove debris from your gutters to prevent stagnant water that could freeze.
  • Have battery powered flashlights available.
  • Wear a tightly woven, preferably wind-resistant coat or jacket; inner layers of light, warm clothing; mittens; hats; scarves; and waterproof boots.
  • Bring potted plants inside or clump together; cover outdoor plants.

DON’T:

  • Don’t use an oven or stove to heat your home.
  • Don’t leave pets outside.
  • Don’t overexert yourself – stay hydrated if you are working outside.
  • Don’t place a space heater on top of furniture.

We all hope you stay safe and find these winter safety tips helpful!

Why Motorcycle Insurance Is Beneficial

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Ellis Insurance Agency serves the San Antonio, TX community. We are committed to helping our clients find the coverage they need to protect their assets. For over 30 years, we have provided quality service to the local community. Our success was built on treating our clients with respect and integrity. We hope to build trust with you so that we can provide your coverage needs as you deal with life’s challenges.

Why Motorcycle Insurance Is Beneficial

Many San Antonio, TX residents enjoy riding their motorcycles during warm summer days. While motorcycles are fun and exciting, they are relatively high risk assets. It only takes a split second for you to lose control of your motorcycle. Motorcycle insurance covers you if an incident happens. There are multiple benefits to insuring your motorcycle.

Liability Protection

Perhaps you are operating your motorcycle on a wet road, and you lose control. Maybe you see something in your peripheral vision, which causes you to crash. If you accidentally crash your motorcycle and injure someone or damage an object, liability coverage protects you. Liability coverage protects your assets by covering the damages and offering a safety net if the injured party pursues legal action.

Personal Injury Coverage

Personal injury coverage protects you if you are injured while riding your motorcycle. Motorcycle accidents often cause severe injuries. You are covered while you receive medical treatment. Your rehabilitation is also covered so that you can focus on getting healthy.

Comprehensive Coverage

Comprehensive coverage is beneficial because it protects your motorcycle in unique ways. You are covered if your motorcycle is stolen. You are also covered if your motorcycle breaks down while you are on the road. You can add urgent roadside assistance.

Ellis Insurance Agency Will Help You Protect Your Assets

Visit our website to learn more information about motorcycle insurance.   

Boat Insurance Basics

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San Antonio, TX, is a delight for boat owners. Following the San Antonio River, this city offers many opportunities for watercraft enthusiasts to enjoy themselves. But before you hitch up your boat, make sure that you have the right boat insurance for your needs by speaking to the friendly insurance agents at Ellis Insurance Agency serving San Antonio TX.

Breaking Down the Basics

To some extent, your homeowner’s policy will provide financial cover for your boat, but this is only for physical damage or loss, subject to the way the policy is structured. Comprehensive boat insurance should provide financial cover in two ways.

Physical Damage or Loss

Does your policy afford you financial protection against the possibility of accidental loss, damage, or theft of your boat? You will structure this area of your boat insurance policy in one of three ways.

Replacement Cost

Pay to repair or replace your boat.

Actual Cash Value

This type of insurance also pays to replace or repair your boat against accidental damage or loss but at a depreciated value.

Agreed Amount Value

You insure your boat for a set maximum value.

The type of policy you select depends on your financial obligations and your needs and should be reviewed at the time of renewal annually.

Liability

Liability is always a big one. Boats are fun, and good fun is often shared with friends and family. A boat insurance policy with liability cover provides financial assistance, depending on your policy wording, with injuries, disability, and death if you are legally responsible.

Don’t let this one sail by you; contact the Ellis Insurance Agency serving San Antonio, TX, today! And make sure you are covered adequately with insurance for your boating assets.

Why Umbrella Insurance Is An Asset

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Ellis Insurance Agency serves the San Antonio, TX community. For over 30 years, we have strived to help our clients protect what matters most. Every person has unique risks and potential exposures that they have to deal with. We want to simplify the process of searching for coverage.

Why Umbrella Insurance Is An Asset

Sometimes life throws an unexpected curve ball your way. While dealing with emergency situations are always uncomfortable, having protection in place can help things go a little smoother. Umbrella insurance is a safety net that you can lean on during tough times. Umbrella insurance is a supplemental policy that you can add to your home and auto liability coverage. This protects you from a potential lawsuit if you cause damages to someone’s property, or you are responsible for someone suffering a serious injury.

If you have a child who is learning how to drive, umbrella insurance is a potential safety net. Research shows that high rates of teen drivers are involved in auto accidents. If your teen driver causes substantial property damage, umbrella insurance will protect you. Perhaps you have a pool or trampoline at your San Antonio, TX home. While these are fun accessories, they are also very dangerous. One mistake could lead to someone suffering a serious injury. If you are held liable involving a pool or trampoline accident, umbrella insurance helps protect you. Maybe you enjoy hosting parties at your residence. If you are serving alcohol at the party, you may be held liable if someone damages property or gets into a fight, causing a bodily injury. If the allegations are serious, umbrella insurance can protect you.

Ellis Insurance Agency Will Help You Protect Your Assets

Visit our website to learn more information about umbrella insurance.

How Escrow Works With Homeowners Insurance

Posted on by Ashley Ellis

What is Escrow?

Escrow is money, property or a written document delivered or held by a third party pending the fulfillment of an agreement. Banks and lenders use escrow accounts to make sure borrowers have homeowners insurance and the means to pay for it.

How does it work with my insurance?

Your bank or lender creates the escrow account at the time that you sign your mortgage agreement and manages the account thereafter.

You pay a lump sum each month to the escrow account and your mortgage lender puts the money toward your mortgage payment and pays your insurance premiums directly to your insurer. The components of this payment are mortgage principal, interest, property taxes and insurance.

The data to determine your total payment usually comes from the tax authority in your state, your homeowners insurance company and the bank itself through the mortgage it provides. This way, the banks and lenders know the premium is paid and that the home is insured. Since rates change, at the end of the year, if you paid too much toward any amount owed, your bank or lender will refund your money.*

If you have any questions about following this video, please reach out to us at 210.979.9000 or www.ellisinsure.com

*information derived from valuepenguin.com

What is the current state of the San Antonio Real Estate market?

Posted on by Ashley Ellis

If you’re here, then you know that the San Antonio Real Estate market has been crazy!

We were curious ourselves, so we asked our friend, business partner, and client, Tadd Chapman, to provide some analytics on the current Real Estate market in San Antonio. Please watch the 2-minute video below for some updates and the latest statistics below:

Keep in mind that increasing home market values, often times DOES NOT equal the rebuild value of the home. For more on that, please contact us at EIA. We’ll be happy to educate you on the difference between the market value and rebuild value… and how that could impact your homeowners insurance.

If you would like to reach out to Tadd directly, here is his information below:

Momentum Group I Keller Williams Heritage
o: 210-920-0447 I c: 210-823-5568
7701 Broadway, Ste 104 I San Antonio, TX 78209
Tadd@MomentumGrouptx.com I www.MomentumGrouptx.com

Thank you, Tadd, for this incredible information!

Why Should I Invest in Flood Insurance?

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Is there anything worse than undergoing a natural disaster? Perhaps there is, but dealing with the aftermath of a natural calamity is never child play. Floods are one of the most common disasters in the US. And boy, when floods strike, most residents are left counting losses upon losses. 

Given that floods are ubiquitous in the US, you might wonder how you can protect yourself. While arming yourself with precautionary tips during floods is superb, flood insurance coverage ensures that your home is livable even after floods damage.

Still not convinced why you should invest in flood insurance? Ellis Insurance Agency of San Antonio, TX, shares more reasons.

It may be required

While Texas doesn’t require residents to purchase flood insurance, your lender may insist you purchase coverage if you live in a flood plain area. And even if your property is in a low flood-risk area, your lender may still require you to invest in flood insurance. But whether flood insurance is compulsory or not, you need it. 

Home insurance doesn’t cover floods

Home insurance is an excellent investment to protect your home. Unfortunately, typical home insurance doesn’t cover flood damage. As a result, you require flood insurance from private insurers or the National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP) to protect your home against floods.

Floods can strike anywhere

According to FEMA, there is a 26% chance that you will experience floods at some point during a 30-year mortgage period! Floods can strike anywhere, and sometimes without warning. The only way you can be safe is by purchasing flood insurance.

Flood insurance in San Antonio, TX

If it rains, floods can strike anytime and anywhere. And even if you live in a low-risk area, you are not entirely safe. About 20% of flood insurance claims come from residents living outside high-risk areas! Are you ready to get started with flood insurance? Contact Ellis Insurance Agency today.

What Is Covered By Your Condo HOA’s Insurance?

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Condo owners have the luxury of having the outside of their home and community areas covered under their condo association’s insurance policy. However, not everything in a condo community is covered by the master HOA insurance plan. As a condo owner in San Antonio, TX, you need to purchase additional insurance to cover things your condo association does not cover. 

So what exactly does my condo association’s master insurance policy cover? Would you please continue reading to learn more and then call our agents at Ellis Insurance Agency to discuss your condo insurance coverage options? 

Condo Insurance vs. Condo Association Insurance

Your condo insurance covers your needs and what directly impacts you as an owner of a condo unit. The condo association insurance typically covers all common areas of the building and property and some protection of the interior structure, depending on their policy and building design. 

What is Covered by Your Condo’s Master Insurance Policy? 

Regardless of the policy your condo association carries, you can expect most HOA’s insurance to cover the following: 

  • The exterior of the condominium building
  • Common areas, including exercise rooms, swimming pools, lobbies, outdoor pavilions, etc. 
  • The land around the building

What is Not Covered by Your Condo Association’s Master Insurance Policy? 

When purchasing your condo insurance, check with your HOA to learn more about the condo association’s level of structural insurance protection. In most cases, the master insurance policy protects the outside walls up to the inside border of your unit. Additionally, your condo association’s master insurance policy does not cover your personal belongings, anything damaged inside your unit and does not protect you against liability claims in your unit. 

With questions about their condo association’s master insurance policy, condo owners in San Antonio, TX, should reach out to the experts at Ellis Insurance Agency for assistance. 

EIA Insider: Playing Catch-Up

Posted on by Ashley Ellis

We wanted to take this moment to catch you up on what’s been happening around EIA since we launched our new website. We want to make sure you’ve checked out the Client Center and our new Live Chat feature. We have a couple of new team members, so be sure to introduce yourself by checking out their bios. We are wrapping up our latest community fundraiser for CISSA’s Stuff the Bus and are blown away by your support. Keep reading on for more!

New Website

How are you enjoying the new website? Have you checked it out yet? We are very excited about the Client Center. You can view your insurance policies, print your insurance ID cards, update your information, and download documents. If you haven’t checked it out yet, please click HERE to login and find all of your information.

We just launched our Live Chat feature that will be available for a few hours a day every week. When the chat is offline, you can still submit your question(s) for a quick response! You can find that feature located on the bottom right corner of our website on every page.

New Faces

We are happy to welcome Michael McGruder and Pam Guillen to the EIA Family. Please take a moment to get to know them by clicking on their picture.

Stuff the Bus

Thank you to everyone who helped support our Stuff the Bus Fundraiser. We exceeded our goal by over $250! There is still time to donate. The fundraiser closes on August 31, 2021. CISSA’s goal was to raise $225,000 this year and we are so happy to help that happen. Click on the image below to still donate today!

Referral Winners – May/June

Don’t forget: For every referral you send to us, your name is entered in to win a $100 Amazon Gift Card for that month! You can catch up on our last 2 winners below! Thank you for trusting Ellis Insurance Agency – We love our clients! Stay tuned for July’s winner!

May Referral Winner!
June Referral Winner!

Labor Day Hours

We will be closed on Monday, September 6th in observance of Labor Day. We will reopen on Tuesday, September 7th at 9 a.m. We hope you all have a wonderful weekend!

Thank you for choosing Ellis Insurance Agency – We love our clients!

Do I Have Enough Accident Coverage?

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There are many types of auto insurance coverage options available, which leave many wondering if they have enough accident coverage. The experts at Ellis Insurance Agency understand the need for accident insurance and do not want San Antonio, TX, residents wishing they had more coverage after an accident. When shopping for an insurance policy, make sure to discuss your options with your insurance agent and ensure you have enough coverage in the event of an accident. 

Below are the different coverage options you will benefit from having when in an accident:

Bodily Injury Liability

This coverage pays for the damage caused to someone else’s property and injuries when you are at fault. For example, if you caused an accident and are sued for the damage, this policy covers your court costs and legal defense. Additionally, liability coverage pays for the other person’s medical bills, lost wages, and compensates for pain and suffering. 

Collision Insurance

This coverage pays for the damages caused to your vehicle after being in an accident with another car or object or in the event of a rollover. 

Medical Payments

This coverage, often called personal injury protection, pays for medical bills and funeral expenses when the policyholder is injured in an accident. This policy may also provide coverage for lost wages and other related costs associated with the accident. 

Uninsured Motorist

This policy covers you if you are hit by a driver who does not have insurance coverage or enough insurance coverage to pay for your damages. 

Do not wait to discover you do not have enough San Antonio, TX, accident insurance coverage. Instead, call the experts at Ellis Insurance Agency today to learn about the different coverage options and which one is best for your needs.