Does RV Insurance Cover Roof Leaks?

While RVs can be the ultimate home on wheels long-term or while enjoying your vacation, they still face a number of difficulties. And when you’re thousands of miles from home or in some remote part of the country, those difficulties tend to be compounded. Luckily, if you have RV insurance and your roof starts leaking, you could be covered. Let’s take a look at all the different aspects.

Comprehensive RV insurance covers roof leaks if the damage was caused by a covered incident and deemed to have occurred suddenly and accidentally. So you’d be covered if a tree falls on your RV’s roof or you hit the bottom of an overpass and rainwater leaks in. But you wouldn’t be covered if the roof leak was due to something like a manufacturer error, general wear or tear or lack of maintenance.

As with any insurance policy, including the auto policy you have on your vehicle, the damage must have occurred due to a covered peril. And you must have comprehensive insurance on your RV policy. Regular liability coverage won’t cover the damage because it’s designed to pay for damages to other vehicles and medical bills to other people if you’re at fault in an accident.

If all those factors don’t add up, your insurance will leave you high and dry while your RV gets wet due to the roof leak. Let’s take a look at how comprehensive coverage, and other facets of your policy, may be able to help you deal with roof leaks to your RV.

Comprehensive coverage is designed to pay for damages to your RV that are either out of your control or not caused by another driver. It helps pay for cosmetic or mechanical damages to your RV whether you’re parked on your property, at a local campsite, if you’re driving down the road and everywhere in between.

The most common forms of damage covered by the comprehensive portion of your RV policy are caused by natural disasters, falling objects, fires or getting involved in a one-vehicle accident. Since RVs are larger, less maneuverable and tend to be more expensive than everyday drivers, it’s imperative you strongly consider opting for comprehensive coverage in your policy.

However, if you took out a loan to purchase your RV and you still owe money on that loan, your lender will likely require you to purchase and maintain comprehensive coverage until you’ve paid it off in full. That’s because the RV’s title is still in their possession and they still own a stake in the rig, so they want to protect their investment in case it’s damaged or totaled.

It’s also important to get as much comprehensive coverage as your RV is worth, in case it’s totaled by a covered peril. So a $60,000 RV would need $60,000 in comprehensive coverage to be fully protected. Here are the most common perils covered by comprehensive RV insurance.

Unlike your daily driver, you probably keep personal belongings inside your RV at all times — or at least while you’re on the road. While comprehensive coverage takes care of your RV’s cosmetic and mechanical issues, as well as the items that are built into your rig (like couches, tables and cabinets), personal effects replacement coverage (PERC) is designed to cover the belongings you keep inside your RV that aren’t built into it.

So things like your clothes, cooking materials, TVs and those 1,000-count Egyptian sheets with the memory foam mattress tucked into it would be covered by PERC if your RV sustained a roof leak caused by one of the perils listed above.

Many RV insurance policies cap your coverage at $5,000 worth of PERC per claim. So if you have more than $5,000 worth of personal belongings in your RV while you travel, you’ll need to ask your insurer if you can increase your coverage. You may also be able to add an endorsement to your policy that extends coverage to $100,000 or more, but it will cost you extra.

It’s also imperative to note that full-time RVers (those living in the RV for at least 151 days per year) may need to enroll in a specialized full-time RV insurance that will likely have higher coverage limits.

You may also be surprised to find out that homeowners insurance can also cover your RV in some instances. If one of the previous instances of damage, such as a tree falling on your RV’s roof or a fire that erupts due to a downed powerline, your homeowners insurance can cover your RV as long as it’s parked on your property (or in a storage facility).

Depending on your policy and type of RV, it can either be covered as part of your personal property or other structures coverage within your homeowners insurance. If it’s protected as part of your personal property coverage, you’ll be reimbursed for either its actual cash value or replacement cost, depending on which you opted for when you got your policy.

If it’s protected by your other structures coverage, it will likely only be covered for up to 10% of your policy’s dwelling coverage. So if your house has $300,000 worth of dwelling coverage, you’d have a maximum of $30,000 worth of coverage to pay for the damages.