CASE STUDIESElite AgentOPINION

Three examples of why to consider business insurance

Whether you’re selling luxury condos in the Gold Coast or helping a family sell their home in the suburbs for a great price, business insurance is something every real estate business needs to think about.

As a real estate you interact with people everyday, increasing the risk of an accident to happen.

While there is plenty you can do to deal with these risks, unwanted situations can occur even to the most safety conscious real estate business owners.

But it’s not going to happen to you, right? In all your years of experience, no one has made a claim against you nor against any other real estate business owner that you know.

But what the following three examples will show is that it can happen to small Australian businesses like yours, and it’s crucial to have business insurance in place if you want to remain in the real estate game.

1. Unpaid rent

A claim was made against an Australian real estate agency when one of the property managers accidentally renewed a client’s Building insurance instead of their Landlord insurance policy.

The tenants of that particular address vacated that property whilst in rental arrears and left the home in poor condition.

The agent was unable to recover the unpaid rent and the owners were left out of pocket. In addition, they were unable to undertake repairs on the building which in-turn resulted in the property remaining vacant.

Luckily, the small business was covered by Professional Indemnity (PI) insurance.

This type of cover is designed to respond to claims against your business for losses as a result of actual or alleged negligent acts or omissions in the provision of your professional service or advice.

The insurer paid $4262.46 under the PI policy*.

2. Five-finger discount

A different real estate business had an employee property manager steal money from the business’s trust account for eight months and make unauthorised payments to their own personal account.

Thankfully, the business was covered under a Management Liability policy, which is designed to cover the risks that arise from running your business such as OH&S situations, unfair dismissal, defamation, and sexual harassment among other things.

In this case, the policy’s Crime clause was triggered, which covers you against direct financial loss as a result of theft or attempted theft from your business premises.

The real estate business was only able to prove the entire amount of the loss with the help of a forensic accountant provided by the insurer, which reimbursed the amount of $75,000 less their deductible.*

3. No, you hang up first

An Australian business had the unfortunate situation where a hacker gained access to their phone system. The talkative cyber criminal racked up $30,000 of unauthorised calls to a premium number – billed to the small business.*

Imagine where they’d be if they didn’t have a Cyber Liability policy* in place to cover the bill.

This cover helps protect you from claims and support your profitability in the event of a cyber breach or attack. Costs associated with defending a cyber claim are also covered.  

At the end of the day, these are good news stories.

An adverse situation happened and they remained in business due to having the right safeguards in place. But imagine how the story might’ve ended if they hadn’t sorted out their business insurance?

Don’t wait any longer. There are plenty of options when it comes to insurance for real estate businesses.

While there are many perks to being your own boss, overseeing everything can get quite dramatic. Luckily with BizCover, business insurance doesn’t have to be.  

Visit bizcover.com.au to compare quotes or give us a call today – no dramas!  

*This information is general only and does not take into account your objectives, financial situation or needs. It should not be relied upon as advice. As with any insurance, cover will be subject to the terms, conditions and exclusions contained in the policy wording.  

The provision of the claims examples are for illustrative purposes only and should not be seen as an indication as to how any potential claim will be assessed or accepted. Cover for a claim will depend on the specific circumstances around the loss and would be subject to the terms and conditions of the policy concerned. Coverage for claims on the policy will be determined by the insurer, not BizCover. © 2022 BizCover Pty Limited, all rights reserved. ABN 68 127 707 975; AFSL 501769 

Show More

Sharon Kenny

Sharon Kenny is the Head of Marketing at BizCover, a leading SME InsureTech player. BizCover offers the only business insurance platform for SMEs to instantly compare leading insurers & buy their insurance online and has over 200,000 active clients insured through the platform in Australia and New Zealand.

Partner Content

This post is promoted by Elite Agent on behalf of one of our commercial partners (advertisers). For all partnership enquiries email advertise@eliteagent.com