home warrantees

[Kenneth LaVoie]

I know there must be posts about this but I searched and nothing came up. Has anyone used those home warrantees that you pay $400-$500 for and they cover (with deductible) repairs on systems and appliances? I've always toyed with them, but found the one that came with my personal residence when we bought it wasn't very good. They typical problems: deductible was $50 oor $75 for a broken microwave, and it took 3 visits, weeks apart, etc. However, I'm sure with older apartment buildings the price of these might work out to an adavantage. Like to hear any feedback, especially in regards to which company

[Kyle J.]

I buy a home warranty on every new house I buy. I figure it's cheap insurance against the unknown going wrong.

If you go online and do research, you will find complaints about EVERY home warranty company out there. (I guess some people just aren't ever happy.) But I've used Old Republic as well as Fidelity and been happy with both. Yes, they both have $60 service fees for each repair call, but that's no different than any other type of insurance.

On the last house I bought, I purchased a Fidelity home warranty. It cost me $370 and covers everything in the house. I ended up using it in the first week for a ceiling fan that unexpectedly had the motor burn out. The tradesman responded quickly (a day or so) and determined that the fan had to be replaced. He offered to replace the entire fan. However, he said it would be hard to find the same exact fan but he'd try and get close. Unfortunately, I needed an exact match in this case because this fan was near another fan in the same living space and if they were mis-matched it would have looked odd. So I opted not to have him replace it, and I found out that there is also the option to just get paid out for the damaged product.

In the end, I got paid $200 and found the same fan for less than that and just replaced it myself and made a little money.

It is also true that sometimes a repair call can require multiple visits, though I've never had one take more than 2 visits or be more than a week to a week and a half apart. This usually only happens when a repair requires a special part that needs to be ordered. It's kind of an inconvenience, but what else can you do? You can't expect the repairman to carry every possible part with him. Plus, I figure if he has to order it, then I probably would have too if I was doing the repair myself. So either way it's going to take multiple visits. At least they only charge you for the first visit.

I've also had other houses where a home warranty has paid for itself multiple times over. In one house, I had the A/C, the dishwasher, and the built-in microwave all go out on me. All were covered (and fixed) under the home warranty. You can't beat that.