Most condo owners in Greater Boston find out their master policy changed the same way: a line buried in the annual meeting minutes, or a renewal summary that quietly moves the deductible from $10,000 to $50,000. Nobody sends a letter explaining what it means for you.
It means your personal exposure just went up, and your HO-6 policy probably has not caught up.
The master policy is not your policy
Massachusetts law (M.G.L. c. 183A) requires your association to insure the building. That master policy covers the structure, the common areas, and the association’s liability. It does not cover your belongings, your personal liability, or, in a lot of buildings, the finishes inside your unit.
How much of your unit it does cover depends on which of three structures your association bought:
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Bare walls. The association insures the structure only. Cabinets, flooring, fixtures, and appliances are on you.
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Single entity. Original fixtures and finishes are covered. Your upgrades are not.
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All-in. The building plus fixtures and improvements inside units, including upgrades.
Two buildings on the same block can be written completely differently. Yours is spelled out in the declaration and bylaws, not on your monthly statement.
The deductible is the part that bites
Master policy deductibles have climbed hard. A $5,000 or $10,000 deductible used to be routine. Deductibles of $25,000 and $50,000 are now common in Greater Boston, and many master policies carry a separate, higher deductible for water damage or wind, which happen to be the two things most likely to hit a New England building.
Here is the problem. A pipe lets go in a six-unit building in South Boston. The repair runs $60,000 against a $25,000 deductible. The association has to find that $25,000 somewhere, and in most buildings the bylaws let the board assess it to the owners. Sometimes it is split by percentage interest across everyone. Sometimes it lands entirely on the unit where the loss started.
You can get a four-figure bill for a claim you did not cause.
Loss assessment coverage is the fix, and yours is probably too small
Loss assessment coverage is the piece of your HO-6 that pays your share of an association assessment after a covered loss. Nearly every HO-6 includes some. Most include an amount that was set as a default years ago, often $1,000 or $2,000.
Set against a $25,000 or $50,000 master deductible, that is not real protection.
Raising it is one of the cheapest moves in insurance. Going from $1,000 to $25,000 or $50,000 of loss assessment coverage usually costs a few dollars a month. Most owners we review are carrying the default and have no idea.
One trap worth knowing: many policies apply your own HO-6 deductible to a loss assessment claim, and some carriers cap what they will pay toward a master policy deductible specifically. Read the endorsement, not the summary on the declarations page.
What to do this month
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Get the current master policy certificate and deductible from your property manager. Ask specifically whether there are separate water and wind deductibles.
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Pull up your bylaws and find the assessment allocation language. Percentage interest versus the unit at fault changes your exposure a lot.
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Check your HO-6 loss assessment limit. If it starts with a 1 or a 2 and has three zeros after it, it needs to go up.
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Check your dwelling coverage against the master policy type. Bare walls buildings need real dwelling limits, not a token amount.
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Make sure your improvements are insured. If you gut renovated the kitchen, a single entity master policy is not going to rebuild it.
If you sit on the board
You do your owners a real favor by telling them plainly: here is our deductible, here is how our documents allocate it, here is the loss assessment limit you should be carrying. A one page notice after renewal prevents a lot of angry emails after a claim.
Have us look at it
Send us your master policy certificate and a copy of your current HO-6 declarations page. We will tell you where the gaps are and what it costs to close them. If your coverage is already right, we will tell you that too.
