By Madelaine B. Miraflor

Pag-IBIG Fund has cut insurance premiums by 58 percent after securing a new Non-Life Insurance Coverage (Fire and Other Allied Perils Insurance) broker for its housing loan borrowers.

With the new non-life insurance policy, Pag-IBIG home loan borrowers can now enjoy more and better benefits at a low premium rate.

Pag-IBIG bid out the new insurance broker for the non-life insurance as early as last year and was able to award the contract in January this year.

With the new non-life insurance broker, the basic premium rates for fire and other allied perils have been reduced to 0.1686 percent of the appraised value of the building from the previous rate of 0.40 percent resulting in savings of about 58 percent.

For home loans of P1 million, this means that the premium payment has been reduced to only P117 from the previous P415.

And for a home loan of P450,000, the premium has been reduced to P79 from P186.

“With the new broker, we were able to reduce the rate by almost 60 percent. We also introduced value-added services which were not offered by the previous insurance provider,” said Pag-IBIG CEO Acmad Rizaldy P. Moti.

Moti said that added benefits include: burial benefit of P5,000; rental allowance of up to P15,000 if the mortgaged home is damaged and becomes uninhabitable; family personal accident insurance coverage with an aggregate amount of P500,000; and sabotage or terrorism coverage of up to P150,000.

Processing of claims will now also be more efficient and completed within seven days from the day of submission of complete documents, down from the previous 30 day-processing.

“With the more affordable insurance premium, borrowers can save on their monthly amortization which greatly helps the housing sector’s BALAI Filipino (Building Adequate, Livable, Affordable, and Inclusive Filipino Communities) program in ensuring that Filipinos will have access to affordable homes,” said Secretary Eduardo D. Del Rosario, Chairperson of the Housing and Urban Development Coordinating Council (HUDCC) and Pag-IBIG Fund Board of Trustees.