So, here’s the question I’m getting today. Will homeowners insurance pay for tree removal? Well, tree removal, just from a healthy tree that’s in your yard. The answer is no. The tree look like it may fall on my house. The answer is no. It’s not going to pay for it. Or the tree’s leaning and it may fall on my fence. There’s no coverage for that under your homeowners insurance. Homeowners insurance is not a maintenance policy, so it won’t do preventative repairs or preventative tree removal to prevent something from happening.
When is the tree covered? Well, it depends on the policy, but wind damage to a tree that falls on a covered property, like your house, there’s typically coverage to cut that tree off your house so we can fix your house or to cut that tree off the fence so we can fix your fence, or we, meaning the insurance company. So, there’s coverage there.
Now, lightning is treated a little bit differently. Some policies will actually pay for the tree itself if it’s struck by lightning, fire also. So, those are a couple of ways to pay for a tree.
Now, one thing that you might want to keep in mind is let’s say you got a rotten tree in your yard, and that tree is leaning over the neighbor’s house and it’s about to fall on the neighbor’s house.
Well, the neighbor notices that tree and sends you a letter and says, “Hey. Your dead tree is about to fall on my house.” That letter that the neighbor sends you puts you on notice of a situation that needs to be addressed. And that tree falls and you never made changes or you never cut that tree. Well, then, now you can have a liability situation.
Does homeowners insurance cover liability? Most policies do have liability coverage. The challenge is you don’t want that on your insurance record and you don’t want to be sued. So cut that dead tree before it falls on the neighbor’s house.
Keep those questions coming and I appreciate it. I’m Bobby Thomas, BTJ Insurance. Thank you and have a great day.

Call BTJ Insurance Inc. in Nashville TN at (615) 333-0232