myndcraft

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Just curious if anyone has or had a home warranty and what are your thoughts on it?

I've just had the water main break for the second time in 30 days in my home and about to pay for another emergency plumber visit. I would rather pay every month and work it into the budget than deal with this unexpected crap.
 
We got ours for a year when we bought the house and used the crap out of it.

I then decided to "re-up" as I know with the age of the home and certain items, we have some big ticket problems coming. And I think its something like $35/month (I think our deductable is middle of the road) which I can live with.

Wish I could do the same thing with car repairs lol
 
I have one and use it at least once per year. I pay the cost in full so no monthly on it. For about $500 bucks it can be worth it but you need to make sure what they cover. Good luck on your repair.
 
I have one and use it at least once per year. I pay the cost in full so no monthly on it. For about $500 bucks it can be worth it but you need to make sure what they cover. Good luck on your repair.

We got ours for a year when we bought the house and used the crap out of it.

I then decided to "re-up" as I know with the age of the home and certain items, we have some big ticket problems coming. And I think its something like $35/month (I think our deductable is middle of the road) which I can live with.

Wish I could do the same thing with car repairs lol

Sounds like you both are pretty happy. Who are using? I know a lot of these companies are national.
 
I have an insurance policy for my outside plumbing. The price is like $100 a year. I wouldn’t even be able to get a plumber to my house for that. I haven’t done any of the other policies though.


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I use American Home Shield, they're pretty solid, but they raised the price on me this year, so I might look at a new one.
 
We use Old Republic Home Protection. That's who the plan was with when we bought our house and we re-upped with them again for the 2nd year in the home.

We used it for the cold water heater AND the A/C in the first year. More than worth a year's worth of the plan cost. So far, on our re-up, we've only used it for the starter for our oven.

The trade call fee was $100 the first year and went down to $75 after the renewal.

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Sounds like you both are pretty happy. Who are using? I know a lot of these companies are national.

I have 2-10 home warranty and have not had any issues with them. Landmark is a good one also from what i hear from co-workers and agents. I jsut know the 2-10 rep so it is easy for me.
 
Sounds like you both are pretty happy. Who are using? I know a lot of these companies are national.
HMS home warranty.

Hasn't been too bad. Out of maybe 7 claims I only had to yell once
 
We have one, and at $75 or so deductible very nice to use on home repairs.
 
IMO these things are pretty useless... Sure they provide some piece of mind when you move into a new house, but from my personal experience you are getting what you pay for. The contractors / companies that came to do the work for the home warranty company I had (American Home Shield) always seemed to "patch" and "Band-Aid" whatever issue I had -OR- would tell me I had to pay $XXX to bring the item back up to code before they could complete any work on it.

I had an AC unit that was acting up, so the home warranty company sent someone to take a look and they diagnosed the problem as an electrical circuit board causing the issue. They "replaced" my board with a used circuit board and went on their way. The AC system didn't seem to work that much better and about 3 days later I called the warranty company again...another visit fee applied...and 2 new guys showed up. They said the prior guys missed the real issue, said they could fix it but I need to have a overflow / float valve installed on the return pan in order to meet the current code. As you can guess, this was NOT covered by the warranty call and was at my expense -- so basically I had to pay them to do this work to get the real reason I had called for to be repaired. Needing my AC to work properly in the Texas summer heat, I paid the $100ish to have the valve installed and the contractors then "fixed" the real issue... Long story short, whatever they did didn't last long and about a week later I was still having issues.

I called a local AC repairman (not thru the home warranty this time) to come take a look and he said the prior 2 sets of clowns had no clue what they were looking for. I had 1 (or 2...can't recall...) ducts that weren't sealed properly causing cold air to leak into the attic. This repairman not only fixed that issue but also rebuilt my plenum (google it...it's VERY important for AC systems) to make it work based on the size of my house. The cost for this repair was VERY reasonable and the AC system worked like it was brand new for the 4 years that I lived in that house.

Sure this may seem like a 1-off instance, but after what I went thru I asked friends about their experience with home warranties and ALL of them had similar shady experiences. AC, plumbing, appliances, etc., etc.... So...in my opinion, you are better off on your own and doing a little homework if/when some type of repair is needed.
 
IMO these things are pretty useless... Sure they provide some piece of mind when you move into a new house, but from my personal experience you are getting what you pay for. The contractors / companies that came to do the work for the home warranty company I had (American Home Shield) always seemed to "patch" and "Band-Aid" whatever issue I had -OR- would tell me I had to pay $XXX to bring the item back up to code before they could complete any work on it.

I had an AC unit that was acting up, so the home warranty company sent someone to take a look and they diagnosed the problem as an electrical circuit board causing the issue. They "replaced" my board with a used circuit board and went on their way. The AC system didn't seem to work that much better and about 3 days later I called the warranty company again...another visit fee applied...and 2 new guys showed up. They said the prior guys missed the real issue, said they could fix it but I need to have a overflow / float valve installed on the return pan in order to meet the current code. As you can guess, this was NOT covered by the warranty call and was at my expense -- so basically I had to pay them to do this work to get the real reason I had called for to be repaired. Needing my AC to work properly in the Texas summer heat, I paid the $100ish to have the valve installed and the contractors then "fixed" the real issue... Long story short, whatever they did didn't last long and about a week later I was still having issues.

I called a local AC repairman (not thru the home warranty this time) to come take a look and he said the prior 2 sets of clowns had no clue what they were looking for. I had 1 (or 2...can't recall...) ducts that weren't sealed properly causing cold air to leak into the attic. This repairman not only fixed that issue but also rebuilt my plenum (google it...it's VERY important for AC systems) to make it work based on the size of my house. The cost for this repair was VERY reasonable and the AC system worked like it was brand new for the 4 years that I lived in that house.

Sure this may seem like a 1-off instance, but after what I went thru I asked friends about their experience with home warranties and ALL of them had similar shady experiences. AC, plumbing, appliances, etc., etc.... So...in my opinion, you are better off on your own and doing a little homework if/when some type of repair is needed.

Definitely good feedback, but that's surprising. I had the exact opposite experience with my A/C repair. The guy showed up found what I thought to be the problem and a couple other issues that were semi-related. The warranty covered it all. With my cold water heater, I did have to pay a little out of pocket, but the cost of the heater was like $800+ so the little I had to pay was minimal compared to what I'd have paid otherwise.
 
Had one for a year on my house when we bought it. It's an old house built in 1946 and the upstairs toilet started to slowly leak down into the kitchen ceiling. They sent out their crackpot plumber who claimed the seal was improperly installed and they refused to cover it. I got a 2nd opinion that they were basically full if sh*t. I had to fight with them to at least partially cover the replacement of the entire plumbing running through my kitchen sealing. The drain pipes were old lead and we had to have it all redone with pvc pipe.
 
Definitely good feedback, but that's surprising. I had the exact opposite experience with my A/C repair. The guy showed up found what I thought to be the problem and a couple other issues that were semi-related. The warranty covered it all. With my cold water heater, I did have to pay a little out of pocket, but the cost of the heater was like $800+ so the little I had to pay was minimal compared to what I'd have paid otherwise.
Hope it works out for you...but they are fairly notorious for doing patch jobs, rugging things to work and using refurb items in their repairs.

I agree the cost of going it alone could be more, but nothing pisses me off more than needing the same repair over and over......

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Interesting I've had no issues with the people they have sent out. And on 3 occasions I got to pick my own
 
One of the guys that works for me has a home warranty, 1 year with the purchase of his house. So far he’s used it to get a brand new garage door and also a new hot water heater.
 
Well, my cold water heater and HVAC system are both running fine.

The latest episode has my refrigerator giving up the ghost yesterday. Put in a work order late last night and they, surprisingly, had a tech at the house at 11 this morning. Talked to them just after noon and they said after they get his report, it could be 3-4 days before they even decide if they're gonna try to dispute him and fix it (even though he says it's non-repairable) or authorize a replacement. So, now I get to try to live for 4-5 days without a refrigerator in OK in August. This'll be fun.
 
What's the total monthly/annual rates for those that have these?

I'm curious to look into them, but just keep talking on monthly chunk expenses suuuucks

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What's the total monthly/annual rates for those that have these?

I'm curious to look into them, but just keep talking on monthly chunk expenses suuuucks

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most are around $30-$40 a month depending on what you get covered and what the deductible is. If you want AC and a few of the other big items i found its closer to $40/month but that is pretty full coverage of most items (AC/plumbing etc.).
 
most are around $30-$40 a month depending on what you get covered and what the deductible is. If you want AC and a few of the other big items i found its closer to $40/month but that is pretty full coverage of most items (AC/plumbing etc.).
Oh that's not terrible then.. I'll have to look into them as well, maybe start next year .. thanks!

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Well, my cold water heater and HVAC system are both running fine.

The latest episode has my refrigerator giving up the ghost yesterday. Put in a work order late last night and they, surprisingly, had a tech at the house at 11 this morning. Talked to them just after noon and they said after they get his report, it could be 3-4 days before they even decide if they're gonna try to dispute him and fix it (even though he says it's non-repairable) or authorize a replacement. So, now I get to try to live for 4-5 days without a refrigerator in OK in August. This'll be fun.
Company called Friday afternoon. Looks like they're gonna buy me out instead of fixing or replacing it. Just waiting on a dollar amount now.

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I find home warranties are great when buying or selling a home. The best route IMO for the intervening years when you are in your home is to have an emergency fund, which would cover other non-home emergency items too. Home warranties are subject to all kinds of restrictions or control over what they'll cover who and how the work gets done, how payment is done that you are likely to get something less optimal than if you are in total control.
 
Well, it took well over a month, but they finally paid me out. Got nearly $1700 out of the old fridge and picked up a new one from the Sears Outlet in Wichita, KS back on August 4th for <$1200. Looks like the plan paid off again this year. Debating on switching companies now, though, since they dragged their feet so long with this claim. Considering American Home Shield, but don't wanna overlook any other good companies. Anyone wanna recommend any other company?
 
I ended up switching to American Home Shield and haven't had a claim over the last 11 months. So far, so good. I'm afraid to cancel it because I know I'll have a huge issue right after I cancel it.
 
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