When was the last time you did a home inventory? What about updating any policy riders? If you’re like me, it’s been a while. We keep our home inventory up to date when it comes to the big items (mostly because we don’t buy that many big items) but I haven’t updated our jewelry riders since we got them four years ago.
Normally, this isn’t that big of an issue but the price of precious metals have skyrocketed in recent years because of a variety of economic factors.
Ten years ago, gold was $300 an ounce. It’s over five times that today (and it was even more a year ago). If you have an insurance rider on your jewelry, like we do on my lovely wife’s engagement ring, the stated value of that jewelry is probably out of date. Compared to ten years ago, any piece of gold jewelry is worth at least five times more now than ten years ago because the price of the yellow stuff has gone up. As for diamonds, they’re forever and they too have gotten pricier (unless you believe this story about Russia finding a huge diamond deposit).
If you haven’t updated it in a few years, take the piece to an appraiser to find out its exact value today. Getting jewelry appraised will cost you a few bucks but it’s a part of the insurance process. Few insurers will issue a rider without one (the ones who are willing to… you probably don’t want to work with them). It’s not good to have outdated insurance policies… it’s about as good as not having the policies at all.
source: bargaineering.com
