4 ms·

> would nullify my homeowners insurance What is up with this common refrain? One of the main functions of insurance is to indemnify you against your own neglig

> would nullify my homeowners insurance What is up with this common refrain? One of the main functions of insurance is to indemnify you against your own negligence. Let's say you turn a small stovetop fire into a house fire by trying to put it out with water - the insurance company doesn't just get to stiff you because you were responsible for causing the problem. Are there actually prevalent and enforceable weasel clauses about DIY work in some areas, or is this a scare story popularized by oversocialized redditors fantasizing about what might happen, or what?

reanimus 3y ago
Homeowner's insurance assumes you're doing your due diligence to not do things that unnecessarily destroy your home. Negligence is specifically not covered when it's something that you should have reasonably been able to prevent. There's a difference between a panic-induced response that makes an accidental fire worse and you making the explicit decision to install something unsafe.
- mindslight 3y ago
  I see the distinction you're making with my specific example, but I'm aware of no such distinction for the policies I've had. Are you referencing any concrete laws or contractual terms? Also then, a different example: You plug in a non-NRTL-tested appliance from Amazon, and it burns down your house. Clearly outside the bounds of what is prudent, but also something many people commonly do. You're telling me that insurance is set up to stiff all of them, and yet we're not seeing endless news articles about that happening?
  - bigfudge 3y ago
    Ianal but the law often seems to work on the basis of terms like reasonable or expected. Buying junk electronics from Amazon is so common and risks so little publicised that it doesn’t seem reasonable to exclude them. Building a diy power supply is very uncommon and almost certainly requires knowledge to do so that would also tell you it’s a dumb idea. As an aside- do cheap electronics actually burn a lot of houses down, or is that scare mongering? I half remember reading that it was large white goods like dishwashers and washing machines that actually started most fires, and they are not typically bought on Amazon or only on price.
    - mindslight 3y ago
      If you can find some laws or contractual terms where some homeowners insurance is disclaiming homeowners doing things that are not "reasonable", I'm all ears. I'd love to find out where this meme started, or a list of jurisdictions where this can actually happen. I just think this tendency to assert that DIY causes all these scary things, especially on the pan-jurisdiction Web, is terribly harmful FUD. It appears to be from the same vein as that "voiding your warranty" nonsense (which has thankfully started to go away).
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
sitharus 3y ago
I don't live in the US (in New Zealand), but this made me check my policies. I'm no longer a home owner but I checked my policy from a couple of years ago, and I checked the contents insurance I currently have (which has indemnity for the rented property as well). An intentional or reckless act wouldn't be insured if it directly causes a loss, but anything else is. There's no exclusion for doing things that are illegal other than illegal substance manufacturing, and I'm pretty sure I didn't miss anything because the whole policy is 12 pages, including the cover and table of contents. Electricity regulations wise, it's legal for me to do anything that plugs in to a socket. If I owned and occupied the property it's legal to do anything that doesn't require moving or adding a fixed cable to the consumer unit. Adding new fixed cable runs required a licensed electrician to sign them off before energising. It's illegal to do DIY electrical work on a property if it's let to anyone other than family, unless it's certified by a licensed electrician.
- bluGill 3y ago
  There is more than the policy, there is also the law and court caselaw (at least in common law countries). The policy is where they detail things not covered by the others in some way. So you need to check with a lawyer.
tw04 3y ago
>What is up with this common refrain? It's reality? Installing an L2 charger requires a permit. You don't technically have to get one, there's no county police that goes door to door checking for improper/horrible EV charging installations. However, if your house burns down, and they see you decided to jury rig your own charger from piece parts, I can guarantee you with 100% confidence they're going to tell you to pound sand when you make an insurance claim. On the off chance your home-made charger didn't start the fire, you can spend a decade fighting them in court. But you'll probably lose.
- myself248 3y ago
  How's that? Does plugging in a fridge require a permit? As long as the EVSE is plugged into an outlet like any other appliance, it's just an appliance. Your jurisdiction may require a permit for installing the outlet in the first place, but I've never heard of one where plugging an appliance into the outlet does. Anyway, how many DIY EVSEs start fires? It's a glorified extension cord, not exactly rocket science, and as long as the builder applies a modicum of sense to choosing the components and wire gauges inside, and torques the connectors and stuff, there's really not much going on in there that should produce heat in the first place. Also, this isn't a charger. It's an EVSE, there's no power electronics inside. There's a contactor, that's it, no silicon in the power path. It's really hard to screw it up. Perhaps I'm just accustomed to the Hackaday comment section, but HN commenters are weirdly terrified of anything involving AC. It's just electricity. Not even very much of it, like, normal household levels of 240v AC. My clothes dryer uses more power, and it pulls it over wiring installed in the 1970's. Heck, when I moved, I even replaced the cord on my own dryer with one that matches the outlet in this house, an action explicitly allowed and encouraged by the access plate on the back of the appliance. The bare cords are sold at Home Depot and they come with a little slip of paper explaining how any homeowner can install them. It's fine. It's just wire. Pick one that's thick enough, torque the screws, it's fine.
repiret 3y ago
That refrain is common enough that I even ended up reading my homeowners policy, and I didn't find anything in there that excluded unpermitted work, even if I did the work myself, even if I failed to follow code. And if you think about it, such an exclusion would be crazy. The average homeowner is in no position to judge whether the work someone they hired does exceeds the scope of their license, or whether all the details of the work that need a permit get one, or whether work any work that doesn't get inspected is in fact done to code. Furthermore, the average homeowner isn't the original owner of their house, and is in no position to know what tomfoolery the prior owner might have done. For those of you out there that are certain that DIY electrical work voids your homeowners insurance, can you prove any evidence to support your claim? A local news story about a guy whose homeowners insurance denied him because he DIY'ed something in good faith? A FAQ page from an insurer that says that DIY'ing something voids the insurance? Anything other than a vague reference to there being a lot of words in your policy and it gets interpreted through the lens of an enormous body of caselaw and the insurance company can afford more lawyers than you? Insurance regularly pays out when people do stupid stuff and cause a loss to their own insured property, as long as they weren't trying to do damage. Doing stupid stuff that happens to involve electricity doesn't seem any different to me. And frankly, building your own L2 charger after much research and thinking about the safety aspects seems like a far cry from a "here hold my beer" moment.

reanimus 3y ago

Homeowner's insurance assumes you're doing your due diligence to not do things that unnecessarily destroy your home. Negligence is specifically not covered when it's something that you should have reasonably been able to prevent. There's a difference between a panic-induced response that makes an accidental fire worse and you making the explicit decision to install something unsafe.

mindslight 3y ago
I see the distinction you're making with my specific example, but I'm aware of no such distinction for the policies I've had. Are you referencing any concrete laws or contractual terms? Also then, a different example: You plug in a non-NRTL-tested appliance from Amazon, and it burns down your house. Clearly outside the bounds of what is prudent, but also something many people commonly do. You're telling me that insurance is set up to stiff all of them, and yet we're not seeing endless news articles about that happening?
- bigfudge 3y ago
  Ianal but the law often seems to work on the basis of terms like reasonable or expected. Buying junk electronics from Amazon is so common and risks so little publicised that it doesn’t seem reasonable to exclude them. Building a diy power supply is very uncommon and almost certainly requires knowledge to do so that would also tell you it’s a dumb idea. As an aside- do cheap electronics actually burn a lot of houses down, or is that scare mongering? I half remember reading that it was large white goods like dishwashers and washing machines that actually started most fires, and they are not typically bought on Amazon or only on price.
  - mindslight 3y ago
    If you can find some laws or contractual terms where some homeowners insurance is disclaiming homeowners doing things that are not "reasonable", I'm all ears. I'd love to find out where this meme started, or a list of jurisdictions where this can actually happen. I just think this tendency to assert that DIY causes all these scary things, especially on the pan-jurisdiction Web, is terribly harmful FUD. It appears to be from the same vein as that "voiding your warranty" nonsense (which has thankfully started to go away).
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]

sitharus 3y ago

I don't live in the US (in New Zealand), but this made me check my policies. I'm no longer a home owner but I checked my policy from a couple of years ago, and I checked the contents insurance I currently have (which has indemnity for the rented property as well). An intentional or reckless act wouldn't be insured if it directly causes a loss, but anything else is. There's no exclusion for doing things that are illegal other than illegal substance manufacturing, and I'm pretty sure I didn't miss anything because the whole policy is 12 pages, including the cover and table of contents. Electricity regulations wise, it's legal for me to do anything that plugs in to a socket. If I owned and occupied the property it's legal to do anything that doesn't require moving or adding a fixed cable to the consumer unit. Adding new fixed cable runs required a licensed electrician to sign them off before energising. It's illegal to do DIY electrical work on a property if it's let to anyone other than family, unless it's certified by a licensed electrician.

bluGill 3y ago
There is more than the policy, there is also the law and court caselaw (at least in common law countries). The policy is where they detail things not covered by the others in some way. So you need to check with a lawyer.

tw04 3y ago

>What is up with this common refrain? It's reality? Installing an L2 charger requires a permit. You don't technically have to get one, there's no county police that goes door to door checking for improper/horrible EV charging installations. However, if your house burns down, and they see you decided to jury rig your own charger from piece parts, I can guarantee you with 100% confidence they're going to tell you to pound sand when you make an insurance claim. On the off chance your home-made charger didn't start the fire, you can spend a decade fighting them in court. But you'll probably lose.

myself248 3y ago
How's that? Does plugging in a fridge require a permit? As long as the EVSE is plugged into an outlet like any other appliance, it's just an appliance. Your jurisdiction may require a permit for installing the outlet in the first place, but I've never heard of one where plugging an appliance into the outlet does. Anyway, how many DIY EVSEs start fires? It's a glorified extension cord, not exactly rocket science, and as long as the builder applies a modicum of sense to choosing the components and wire gauges inside, and torques the connectors and stuff, there's really not much going on in there that should produce heat in the first place. Also, this isn't a charger. It's an EVSE, there's no power electronics inside. There's a contactor, that's it, no silicon in the power path. It's really hard to screw it up. Perhaps I'm just accustomed to the Hackaday comment section, but HN commenters are weirdly terrified of anything involving AC. It's just electricity. Not even very much of it, like, normal household levels of 240v AC. My clothes dryer uses more power, and it pulls it over wiring installed in the 1970's. Heck, when I moved, I even replaced the cord on my own dryer with one that matches the outlet in this house, an action explicitly allowed and encouraged by the access plate on the back of the appliance. The bare cords are sold at Home Depot and they come with a little slip of paper explaining how any homeowner can install them. It's fine. It's just wire. Pick one that's thick enough, torque the screws, it's fine.

repiret 3y ago

That refrain is common enough that I even ended up reading my homeowners policy, and I didn't find anything in there that excluded unpermitted work, even if I did the work myself, even if I failed to follow code. And if you think about it, such an exclusion would be crazy. The average homeowner is in no position to judge whether the work someone they hired does exceeds the scope of their license, or whether all the details of the work that need a permit get one, or whether work any work that doesn't get inspected is in fact done to code. Furthermore, the average homeowner isn't the original owner of their house, and is in no position to know what tomfoolery the prior owner might have done. For those of you out there that are certain that DIY electrical work voids your homeowners insurance, can you prove any evidence to support your claim? A local news story about a guy whose homeowners insurance denied him because he DIY'ed something in good faith? A FAQ page from an insurer that says that DIY'ing something voids the insurance? Anything other than a vague reference to there being a lot of words in your policy and it gets interpreted through the lens of an enormous body of caselaw and the insurance company can afford more lawyers than you? Insurance regularly pays out when people do stupid stuff and cause a loss to their own insured property, as long as they weren't trying to do damage. Doing stupid stuff that happens to involve electricity doesn't seem any different to me. And frankly, building your own L2 charger after much research and thinking about the safety aspects seems like a far cry from a "here hold my beer" moment.