How Do I Make a Condo Insurance Claim?
Document the damage, call your insurer to start the claim, and tell the HOA if shared areas were also hit.
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What decides your part of the claim is where the damage sits. Your HO-6 policy pays for your unit's interior, like floors, cabinets, built-in appliances, and your belongings. It also covers upgrades you made beyond what the building originally had. Damage to shared structure, like the roof or exterior walls, goes through the HOA's master policy instead. If a pipe in the unit above yours floods your ceiling, file with your own insurer first. Check your declarations page for your dwelling and loss assessment limits before you call.
A claim often exposes gaps nobody checked for until the water was already through the ceiling. If the HOA's master policy carries a high deductible, the loss assessment charged to every owner can run into thousands, and only a loss assessment limit on your own policy covers your share. Comparing coverage now, before a claim forces the question, is how you find out if yours is enough.
What happens after you file, and who pays for what
Once a claim is open, the process usually runs through a few set stages. An adjuster assigned by your insurer looks at the damage to your unit, interior finishes, built-in items, and personal belongings, and puts together an estimate. If the HOA's master policy is also involved because shared structure was hit, their adjuster handles that part separately. These two claims move on their own timelines, and it's common for one to settle before the other. Keep records of every call and email with both the HOA and your insurer, since you may need to show which party covered which piece of the damage.
A loss assessment works differently from a regular claim. When the HOA's master policy doesn't fully cover a shared-area loss, maybe because of a high deductible or a coverage limit that fell short, the HOA board can vote to bill owners directly for the shortfall. That bill is a special assessment. It lands on your mailbox as a bill, not an insurance form. Your HO-6 policy's loss assessment coverage is what pays it, up to whatever limit is listed on your declarations page. If that limit is too low, you pay the difference yourself.
Water damage from a neighboring unit raises a question people ask often. Whose insurance pays. In most cases, you file with your own insurer first, regardless of whose pipe burst. Your HO-6 policy covers your unit's damage, and your insurer may later seek reimbursement from the neighbor's insurer if negligence was involved. That process happens between insurers and doesn't require your involvement. The exception is if the HOA's master policy covers interior unit damage as part of a broader structure definition, which some do and some don't. Your governing documents, usually the CC&Rs, spell out exactly where the building's responsibility ends and yours begins.
Townhome owners sometimes assume their situation is simpler because the structure feels more like a standalone house. It depends entirely on how the property is organized. If an HOA holds a master policy covering the exterior walls and roof, the claim process matches a condo's, split between your HO-6 and the association's policy. If there's no HOA or master policy, as happens with some townhomes, you're insured more like a single-family home, and a standard homeowners policy rather than an HO-6 is likely the right fit. Checking which structure applies before a loss happens is worth the few minutes it takes to read the HOA's governing documents or ask the association directly.
What should you do if the claim gets denied or underpaid
A denial usually comes down to one of a few reasons. The damage might fall under an exclusion, like flood or earthquake, which a standard HO-6 policy doesn't cover. It might be that the insurer decided the loss falls under the HOA's master policy instead of yours, or the other way around. Read the denial letter closely. It has to state the specific reason, and that reason tells you what to check next on your own declarations page or the HOA's governing documents.
If you think the denial is wrong, you can ask for a reconsideration. Send anything that supports your case. Photos timestamped before repairs started help, as does the adjuster's own notes if you have access to them, along with any plumber or contractor report that explains the cause of the damage. An insurer has to respond to new evidence, and sometimes the first decision was made without complete information.
Underpayment is a separate problem from denial. The claim gets approved but the check doesn't match the repair estimates you're getting from contractors. You can ask your insurer to explain the gap. If the estimate still seems too low, most states let you hire a public adjuster to reassess the damage independently. That adjuster works for you, not the insurer, and usually takes a percentage of the final settlement as payment.
If none of that resolves it, your state's department of insurance handles complaints against insurers operating there. Filing a complaint is free, and it puts your case in front of someone outside the two parties disputing it. For disputes specifically between you and the HOA, like disagreement over where the master policy's responsibility ends, the HOA's governing documents often outline a mediation step before anything goes further. Checking those documents early saves time if a disagreement like this comes up.
Before anything happens
Pull your declarations page and find your dwelling limit and your loss assessment limit. Compare both against the HOA's governing documents so you know what each one is actually meant to cover.
