Interesting, I have the pool listed as an endorsement but don't recall an equipment breakdown endorsement option. I will have to check in to that, though it may be too late now.
People were relying on freeze protection and no one expected a sustained power loss. By the time that occurred, families were focused on other life safety and definitely prioritized the home. People didn't see this coming and most don't know how to drain the system. The amount of damage was unreal ... people drip pipes or drain lines in the home, but the pool became a different story and covers and plugs were frozen shut. It's simply not the same as protecting interior pipes when the pool equipment was iced shut from the outside preventing draining.
We have Nationwide and they called yesterday to say they will cover no freezing of concrete or the pool - we have two house and two auto policies with them 7000 a year in premiums and have been with them about 15 years. I specifically mentioned covering pool when we took this coverage 6 years ago. Very disappointing. On the positive side we knew very early what pump part broke and ordered within days of the freeze - repaired ourselves for 600 and pump is working - pool deck etc sustained about 10000 worth of damage snd is completely connected to our home in Ft Worth so will have to be repaired. I would like to move to new carrier to avoid issue in the future - suggestion on carriers that actually cover pool damage caused by freezing? Thanks.
For AllState, I had all my equipment covered, including pool light. Here is AllState's stance on this: https://www.allstate.com/tr/home-insurance/swimming-pool-insurance.aspx
This comes off as arm chair quarterbacking. Easy to say, in reality, situation for everyone isn't this cut 'n dry. I could easy say, Texas knew this was a problem since 2011,What Texas failed to learn from the 2011 freeze, and the state did nothing, how do you expect owners to do somethin? In my situation, I was out of town, all flights cancelled and no way to get back to do any house or pool freeze mitigation. Calling someone and asking them to drive through snow and ice in central texas isn't a reality either. It was 30f in the house, everything froze. Mitigating this when all heaters are sold out, all generators are sold out, out of town, I couldn't even drip the line as the city shut down water pressure. Now I'm dealing with supply chain issues, it's May, and the pool it still empty.
I lived down there for a couple of years and had to protect my house pipes from freezing a couple of times. I’ll also say that as a homeowner I took the initiative to protect my house. Maybe it’s because I’m from the NorthEast and have had to deal with freezing weather all my life. I know that if you leave the garden hose hooked up outside the house you can freeze the pipe inside the house and spray water everywhere. If a storm is coming in, we fill the tub with water so we can flush the toilet when the power goes out. Notice I didn’t say IF the power went out, I said WHEN the power went out.
Hi SpongeBob, I also have Allstate and recently my pool came back to life after February 2021 TX Winter/Ice storm. It took a while to get on pool builders schedule to re-plaster the pool and install new equipments. Allstate approved my other filtering equipments (filter, pump, plumbing etc) but recently they denied pool and spa lights from contractor's supplemental work estimate. I had back and forth with the adjuster and I provided pictures since he asked for the proof. He claims they are not damaged to light since there is no visible broken glass or any other damage and he claimed that they may have not worked before. I explained it to him that my pool was covered with thick 9" ice sheet for a week and ice sheet created a pressure and water may have leaked inside lights. I live in north TX so it was very cold and below freezing for 5 days and we lost electricity for two days. The pool technician told me that there is a black film inside the pool light glass and that mean dirty water got inside due to lot of pressure from ice sheet weight and damaged it.
