The most frequent questions asked by clients when they initially consult with my offices is, “Does my policy cover this loss? or Does my policy provide for__?” The answer almost exclusively is, “let’s look at your policy.” It’s usually at this point that an insured may tell me that the insured has never read the policy, or attempted to read the policy after its initial receipt but gave up because it was so confusing. Although I have been reading and deciphering policies for quite a while, I cannot disagree with any insured when they tell me the language of the policy is muddled or nonsensical. However, despite being a poor read, looking at the policy is absolutely necessary to see if a loss is covered.

In California, as with other states, there are many exclusions added onto a general homeowner’s policy, and losses caused by floods, earthquakes, termites, insects, rats or mice, water seepage, mold, wear and tear, etc., may not be covered unless additional coverage is purchased by the insured.

Generally, homeowner’s policies should all read about the same. It is my intention to provide a roadmap for insureds on how to read their policy and what sections to look for to see if specifics are covered. In most

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This weeks experts are DAVID HOLLINGWORTH of mortgage broker London & Country in Bath, Somerset; CHRIS HOLLOWAY, a chartered financial planner with Dennehy Weller & Co in Chislehurst, Kent; and HELEN KANOLIK, who runs HelenK Financial Advice in Wimborne, Dorset. Do you have a personal finance query? Write to: Ask the Experts, Room 301, Northcliffe House, 2 Derry Street, London W8 5TS. Sorry, no personal replies. Please do not send original documents.

J.R.writes: My wife and I are retired and own two buy-to-let properties plus our current home mortgage free. Together they are worth about 430,000. We want to buy a new home, financed with a buy-to-let loan on the three existing properties. How much can we borrow and is one mortgage better than three separate ones?

D.H.replies: The amount you can borrow on a buy-to-let loan will depend on the rent the properties produce. Lenders will require rent to more than cover the mortgage interest, usually by 25 per cent.   

Most buy-to-let lenders will also require at least 25 per cent equity. T

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I have always enjoyed reading personal finance and investing books. My favorite investing book is The Four Pillars of Investing: Lessons for Building a Winning Portfolio by William J. Berstein. After reading it, I have felt that most other investing books didnt quite measure up as the topics were better covered in Bernsteins book. Most of my investing strategy is designed around what I learned in this book.

The four pillars according to Dr. Bernstein are theory, history, psychology and business. He strongly suggests being an A+ student of all four if you hope to be a successful investor in the modern day marketplace.

The first pillar, Theory, is a fundamental concept that adds to your scientific awareness of investing when you understand the correlation between risk and return. The higher your exposure to the risk of loss, the greater your earnings. He ascertains that investing is a social science that must keep up with the behavior of society as well as movements of the overall market place. Under the same heading of “Theory” is diversifying, which investors traditionally do very poorly. If

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The house across the street has sat empty for the better part of a year. According the neighborhood gossip, the owners—a young couple with no kids—walked away from the underwater mortgage. Apparently, the husband, who worked as a manager for a national restaurant chain, was transferred to another part of the country, and the couple figured it would be easier for them to simply mail the keys to the bank rather than deal with the financial headache.

There has certainly been a great deal of tut-tutting in the neighborhood over this (alleged) decision. But it got me wondering what this couple will deal with (other than our neighbors’ scorn) because they decided to default on their loan. If you are in a similar situation—where you can’t afford to continue paying your underwater mortgage—please know that walking away can seriously affect your financial future. Not to mention your standing in a neighborhood:

1. Your credit

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Section 542.058 of the Texas Insurance Code states that “if an insurer, after receiving all items, statements, and forms reasonably requested and required … delays payment of the claim for a period exceeding the period specified by other applicable statutes or, if other statutes do not specify a period, for more than 60 days, the insurer shall pay damages and other items as provided by Section 542.060.” This typically means that if an insurer – after the insured has submitted everything the insurer has reasonably requested – agrees to pay a claim and delays doing so, it could be subject to penalty interest and attorney’s fees. However, what happens when an insurer – after having received all reasonably requested information from the insured – initially denies a claim, but later realizes it was wrong and provides coverage? Does the Prompt Payment statute apply?

In Encompass Office Solutions, Inc. v. Ingenix, Inc., et al., 775 F.Supp.2d 938 (E.D. Texas 2011), the insurer submitted payment to the insured, but only after first denying the claim. The insurer i

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I consider the switches to and from Daylight Savings Time to be largely useless in the modern era. It disrupts sleep patterns, causes people who forget to adjust clocks to miss appointments, and adds something else to worry about to our hectic lives.

I understood the need for it in the past, but as the economy changes, the case for the switch gets worse and worse. I look forward to the day when the time change completely goes away.

(Of course, I may be grumpy because it really threw off the sleep cycle of our children, causing a few long nights with overly tired children and bad dreams.)

Recapturing Wasted Time We all waste time. The question is how can we still get value out of that waste.

The Cost of Living off the Grid This article matches up well with most of my calculations. Living off the grid ends up more or less paying for itself over the long run and it can be very psychically envigorating.

What Losing Weight Taught Me About Saving Money They actually function in the same way: small sacrifices lead to a life change.

Most people would choose to have a lesser reward today than a greater reward tomorrow. Marketers know this and exploit it all the time.

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Rate shock: Bank of Ireland borrowers have been hit with a 1.5 per cent hike on their mortgage rate that could add nearly 200 to monthly repayments

Bank of Ireland and Bristol & West borrowers are the latest to have been delivered a mortgage rate shock with a huge hike from 2.99 per cent to 4.49 per cent, despite believing they had escaped a hike by not being sold to Nationwide.

It is the latest in a round of rises that has shocked those sat on lenders’ standard variable rates and believed they would not rise independently of base rate – more homeowners will now be worried their lender could follow suit.

The 100,000 Bank of Ireland and Bristol & West borrowers who avoided being moved on to Nationwides subsidiary The Mortgage Works have begun to receive letters from the Irish bank telling them that their mortgage payments could go up by 50 per cent from next September.

A borrower with a 150,000 interest-only mortgage would see their monthly payments shoot up from 374 to 561.

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A decent finish to 2011. Our net worth grew $52,769.10 this year. It wasnt as good as we did in 2010, but it was just the brutal August and September months that set us back. Im happy with what we accomplished in 2011, and well reach for even more in 2012.

My wife and I recently had our second child it has been, and will continue to be, an adjustment! I guess after two years you kinda forget the sleepless nights the first few weeks and months. Even though the lack of sleep is difficult, we were a little more prepared this time around. We have the experience of already having raised one infant, so in many ways we knew what to expect. We also live closer to immediate family this time around, which is a big help (my in-laws have been awesome, as have members of our church, who have brought us several meals thanks everyone!!).

There is a financial benefit of having another baby, as compared to having a first child, and no, Im not just referring to the child tax credit*! Since we already had one child, we are saving a ton of money by not having to buy a lot of things like clothes, toys, baby accessories, and other items that we had to buy the first time around. It helps that both our children are the same sex, otherwise, we would had to buy some more clothing items.

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