It’s a common sight these days. You’re scrolling through auction results when you notice a watch that’s in your collection among the lots – except something is different. The price listed next to what looks like an identical make and model as your watch is far higher than what you paid for it initially. It might be double or triple what you thought your watch was valued at, or even higher in some cases. But the end result is all the same: All of the sudden, you’re not quite as comfortable wearing that watch into the pool or while meeting a friend for a late-night drink.

Here’s where we can help. Hodinkee Insurance offers insurance designed by watch collectors, for watch collectors. We worked with Chubb, our underwriting partner and one of the world leaders in property and valuables insurance, to offer certain coverage features tailor-made for watch lovers.

An intrinsic part of watch collecting these days, for better or worse, is unexpectedly seeing the value of your watch rise on the secondary market, whether at auction or elsewhere. If a watch you own and insure under a valuables policy issued through Hodinkee Insurance has recently gone up in value, your policy may provide additional protection against inflation in the event of a covered loss.

If the market value of a watch insured on your policy has increased before a loss, Chubb will pay the market value before the loss – up to 150 percent of your watch’s insured value, up to the policy limit. In other words, payment will never be more than the total coverage amount for your collection. Say, for example, you have three watches on your policy, each valued at $10,000. If one of those watches is stolen, and the value at the time of a covered loss has increased to $13,000, you will be compensated at that amount. As each watch is unique and values fluctuate over time, we recommend you periodically track the market and adjust the values of your watches so that you’re best protected.

Hodinkee Insurance is all about ease of use and accessibility. After all, you only need to download the Hodinkee app (for iOS and Android) to your phone and you can have your collection covered in minutes. A key part of that convenience is that we typically don’t require appraisals. You decide the value of your watch – we do the rest. The exception to this rule, however, is on any individual watch you want to insure that is valued at $100,000 or more, which includes more and more watches these days.

To make things easier, the Hodinkee team also offers to help with appraisals, for both vintage and modern watches, at no extra cost to you – just reach out! Even better, if you have a recent bill of sale or receipt for your purchase that’s $100,000 or more, you won’t need an appraisal to seek coverage.

As we enter another auction season (it’s time to insure those Royal Oaks, people), make sure your watches are covered and up-to-date – you never know when an auction can unexpectedly impact your watch’s valuation.

Click here to get your quote today, and don’t hesitate to let us know how we can help.