Insurance for Realtors & Real Estate Agents

Realtors and real estate agents who perform duties outside of the norm, such as property management, may have additional risk exposure. Property managers, for example, may take on risks within the properties they manage and within their own physical business office. General Liability Insurance or a Business Owners Policy helps cover the risk of personal or bodily injuries that can occur when customers come through your properties.

Realtors who have extended their business operations into construction and construction management will find General Liability policies and Workers Compensation uniquely important as well. In those cases, the risk of injuries for both customers and workers increases, making those policies far more necessary.

Standardized forms are an easy fix to reduce your risk. As many errors and omissions in the industry arise from improper paperwork, utilizing standardized forms will help lower the risk that a form may not meet the proper legal requirements or that any information may be missing.

• Providing Compliance Manuals to Agents: Compliance manuals are easy to locate, with many realtor and real estate organizations providing these documents for free.
• Offering Home Warranties: Offering home warranties can place some of the risks onto the warranty company. Helping clients purchase a home warranty will help put some undiscovered issues with the home into the hands of the home warranty company, not the real estate agent or realtor. Unfortunately, some homeowners will hold the real estate agent or realtor accountable for undiscovered issues. A home warranty will help mitigate that risk by providing the homeowner with another place to turn when those issues arise.

A Contract Liability Insurance Policy (CLIP) provides additional insurance over and beyond the Commercial General Liability insurance. This is often required when you are in a contractual agreement with another business. This policy protects your business against any liability that may arise as a result of the contract.

The greatest negative impact that could affect your earnings is getting out there without insurance. Getting sued even just once can threaten everything you've worked so hard to create. Having insurance for your real estate business keeps your business protected from lawsuits and keeps from spending your business assets on legal fees and fines.

Although most realtors and real estate agents shoot for precision when conducting business, there are times when either oversights or mistakes can occur. Typically, these are not purposeful. In many cases, an agent may simply make an error due to misinformation or miscommunication. Nevertheless, once the error is made, if there is any damage or fallout to the client, the realtor or real estate agent may be held at fault.

Many common real estate agents and realtors mistakes occur during the document filing and drafting of paperwork. Some of this relates to many real estate agencies expanding their businesses into new fields. This includes construction management, an area where many agents have less experience. As a result, agents and realtors may find themselves making errors due to a lack of proper procedures.

A sale went wrong, or a purchase that just does not get through for a client may also result in a lawsuit. This is particularly true if a realtor or an agent’s promise to buy or sell a property does not occur as planned. If the promise is in writing, the agent or realtor may likely find themselves on the receiving end of a lawsuit from the client, particularly if the lack of success was due to some mistake or delay from the agent in the process.

Realtors who perform property management also face errors and omissions liability risks. While other forms of insurance are also common for property managers, E&O will cover the type of risks involved with the service-side of property management, such as proper filings, or even when it comes to taking care of known or unknown safety issues on the property. A home that needed new roofing, for example, may develop a leak that becomes costly to the owner. If the property manager failed to take care of the issue because of a lack of proper record keeping, this would be considered an issue that can fall under E&O liability coverage.