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 If you own a home in Norman, the way your insurance gets priced and written depends a lot on which part of town you are in. That catches people off guard. Two friends can both own homes in Norman, both keep them in good shape, and still end up with very different policies and very different bills. I have been writing coverage for Cleveland County homeowners for a long time, and I have come to think of Norman as two towns stacked into one. There is the older part near OU and the core of town, and there is the newer growth out in south Norman. Same city limits, two very different insurance pictures. Here is how I walk through it with the families I work with. Norman is really two markets in oneThe short version is that the age of your house drives a lot of what your carrier worries about. Older homes near campus and in central Norman carry one set of questions. Newer builds in south Norman carry another. Both are perfectly insurable. They just are not the same conversation. Knowing which side of that line your house falls on tells you most of what you need to check before your next renewal. So that is where I always start. If you own an older home near campus or central NormanThe homes around Campus Corner and the older central neighborhoods have a lot of character, and they also have age on the roof, the wiring, and the plumbing. Carriers price all three. An older roof can change your rate or change how a claim gets paid, and electrical or plumbing that has not been updated can affect whether a carrier wants to write the home at all. The other thing I see with older Norman homes is a gap between what you paid for the house and what it would actually cost to rebuild it. Those are not the same number. Insurance covers the rebuild cost, and on an older home with finishes that are hard to match, that figure can run higher than people expect. It is worth making sure your dwelling limit reflects a real rebuild, not the sale price from a few years back. Have you ever actually checked what it would cost to rebuild your house from the studs? Most folks have not, and on an older home that is the number that matters most. One more piece worth knowing is ordinance or law coverage. If an older home takes a major loss, the city can require you to rebuild to current code, which can cost more than putting it back the way it was. That coverage helps close that gap, and a lot of older policies are light on it. If you own a newer home in south NormanSouth Norman has grown fast, and a lot of that housing stock is newer and on the larger side. The good news is newer homes usually come with fewer underwriting headaches around roof and systems age. The thing to watch instead is whether your coverage limits are keeping up. Rebuild costs have climbed with the price of materials and labor over the last few years. I see south Norman homeowners who set their dwelling limit when they bought and have not touched it since, and the cost to rebuild has moved since then. If your limit has not moved with it, you can end up underinsured without ever doing anything wrong. Bigger and newer also means a bigger rebuild number overall, which is something to keep an eye on at every renewal rather than once a decade. The wind and hail deductible is the Norman-wide trapNo matter which part of Norman you are in, you are in Cleveland County, and Cleveland County takes its share of storms. That shows up in one place a lot of people miss until it is too late, which is the wind and hail deductible. Many Oklahoma policies use a percentage deductible for wind and hail instead of a flat dollar amount. So instead of a set deductible, you are looking at a percentage of your dwelling coverage. On a real storm claim, that can be a much bigger out of pocket number than people are expecting. I would rather you know that figure before storm season than discover it after the roof is gone. It is a quick thing to check on your declarations page, and it is one of the most important numbers on the whole policy here. Don't assume your homeowner policy covers everythingA homeowner policy is built for the home you live in, and there are two gaps Norman owners should keep in mind. The first is flooding. Standard home insurance does not cover flood, and parts of east Norman sit closer to Lake Thunderbird and low-lying ground where that is worth a real look. If that is you, flood insurance is a separate policy worth pricing out. The second one trips up Norman owners more than anywhere else in the metro. If you live in your Norman home, you carry a homeowner policy. But if you own a place near OU and rent it out to students, that is a landlord policy, not a homeowner policy, and the two are not interchangeable. I wrote a separate piece on what Norman landlords renting near OU should know if that describes your situation. What to actually do before your renewalIf you take nothing else from this, take three things. Know whether your house reads as an older home or a newer one to a carrier, because that shapes everything else. Make sure your dwelling limit reflects today's rebuild cost, not your purchase price. And find your wind and hail deductible before the next storm, not after. None of that takes long to check, and it is a lot cheaper to fix on a quiet afternoon than during a claim. Norman is a good place to own a home. It is just worth understanding which Norman you are insuring. If you want a straight answer on whether you are carrying the right coverage for where you live in town, that is exactly what I am here for. Get a Norman home insurance quote and we will go through your policy together, no pressure. You can also see how we handle Norman home insurance across the area, or read the bigger picture on why home insurance changes across the OKC metro. Oklahoma Insurance Professionals is an independent insurance agency located in Oklahoma City serving the surrounding area with insurance solutions for personal and business needs.
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