Property Insurance: Redemption Period.

[Lauren Goetz]

Hey BP!

I recently secured the contract on my first auction/foreclosure property as the highest bidder! Super excited, and I'm now in the process of getting all my ducks in a row for closing. The property is located in MI, and as a state law, the owner who was foreclosed upon has 1 year from date of sheriffs sale to redeem property (ending sept 2020). Without going into too many details of redemption period, basically what I'm looking at is not being able to take over "occupying," or in this case renting, the property until September. Therefore, my insurance agency is considering the property to be "vacant" until that time (even tho we have some inclination that it is currently still occupied by owners family). That means they quoted us more than double what we originally planned on for insurance, and really made our holding costs skyrocket. 

My question is: How should I go about insuring this property from now until September (8 months), that won't be overly expensive? Does anyone have any experience with this? Any tips on how best to insure this asset during redemption (policy type, agency recommendations, etc.)?

Thanks BP, you guys rock!