Start a home inventory for insurance in 30 minutes

If you had to file an insurance claim tomorrow, could you list everything you own? Most people can't. They remember the TV, the laptop, maybe the couch. The kitchen appliances, the tools in the garage and the winter coats in the hall closet slip through.

People with a written inventory tend to claim more completely. They don't inflate anything. They just don't forget things.

And it doesn't take a whole weekend. Going room by room, you can get a decent first pass done in about 30 minutes.

Why insurers recommend it

Insurers want you to have an inventory because it makes a claim easier on both sides. With a list of photos, descriptions and rough values in hand, you can describe a loss clearly instead of from memory, at a moment when your memory is at its worst. Ask your insurer what documentation they want.

An inventory also tells you whether your coverage is enough. Plenty of people are underinsured just because they never added up what their things are worth.

Go room by room

Trying to do the whole house at once is overwhelming. Pick one room, finish it, then move on. Start with the room that has the most valuable things in it, usually the living room or a home office.

Give yourself about five minutes a room. You'll miss things on the first pass, but you'll get most of it, and "mostly done" beats "not started" by a mile.

What to record for each item

You don't have to be thorough about everything. For anything worth more than about $50, try to get:

• a photo (one clear one is enough, more angles for expensive things)
• what it is, with the brand and model if it has one
• the serial number for electronics and appliances, usually on the back or the bottom
• what it would cost to replace today, which is often different from what you paid
• roughly when you bought it
• the receipt or other proof of purchase, if you have it (don't worry if you don't)

For cheaper things, a photo of a shelf or a drawer with a general note ("kitchen utensil drawer, about $150 of utensils") is often a reasonable start. Check with your insurer.

Room-by-room checklist

Living room

Furniture, the TV and anything plugged into it, game consoles, speakers, art, rugs, lamps, books and decorations. Don't forget whatever is mounted on the walls.

Kitchen

Large and small appliances, cookware, dishes, cutlery, the food processor and the stand mixer. Open every cabinet and drawer. There's more in there than you think.

Bedrooms

The bed frame and mattress, dressers, jewelry, electronics and bedding. Estimate clothing by category ("winter jackets, about $800"), and check the nightstand drawers.

Bathroom

Easy to skip, but electric toothbrushes, hair dryers, styling tools and a cabinet full of skincare add up faster than you'd expect.

Home office

The computer, monitors, keyboard and the rest, the printer, the desk and chair, software licenses and books. Serial numbers matter most here.

Garage and storage

Power tools and hand tools, sports gear, seasonal decorations, bikes and lawn equipment. People forget the garage more than any other room, and it can hold thousands of dollars of stuff.

Outside

Patio furniture, the grill, garden tools, planters and outdoor lights. Walk all the way around the house.

Tips

Open everything: drawers, cabinets, closets and bins. What you can't see from the doorway is what you'll forget during a claim.

Don't skip the boring stuff. Curtains, towels, sheets and kitchenware are cheap one at a time and worth thousands together.

Photograph the back of your electronics, where the serial and model numbers are printed. It makes warranty and insurance claims much easier.

If you have a shoebox of receipts, take photos of them. They don't need sorting yet, just capturing.

Once the inventory is done, walk slowly through each room filming a video. It catches things single photos miss, like how full a bookshelf is or what's on the walls.

Use an app

An inventory app is a lot faster than a spreadsheet or a notes file when you're walking around the house. With HomeHero you take a photo, fill in the details and move to the next thing, all on your phone and without an internet connection. Everything saves to the device as you go, so the basement and the garage are fine even if the Wi-Fi doesn't reach. With Premium, one photo of a shelf can turn into several items at once.

The bigger win over a spreadsheet is structure. Item types give each kind of thing the same set of fields, so six months later you can actually find what you wrote down.

Keep a copy outside your home

An inventory on a phone that burns with the house won't help much. Keep a copy somewhere else. With HomeHero Sync, your inventory, photos and files are also stored on our servers. Without it, copy the important photos and receipts to somewhere you can reach from another device. HomeHero's inventory report helps here too: it makes a PDF of every item with its photo and details, which you can keep in your email or cloud storage and send straight to an adjuster.

Keep it current

An inventory is only useful if it matches what you own now. Make a recurring task (HomeHero has those) to review it every six months, and add big purchases like furniture, a laptop or an appliance the day you bring them home. It takes half a minute.

A pass in spring and another in fall works well. You'll also catch the things you've sold, given away or thrown out.

Start today

Starting is the hard part. Pick one room, give it five minutes, and write down what you see. It comes together faster than you'd think.

If you want a tool for it, HomeHero is free, works offline, and doesn't need an account, and your data stays on your device. You can add sync or AI later. The free plan has no item limit and no time limit, and it runs on the web, Android and Linux. More on how HomeHero helps with an insurance inventory.

The next time you're dealing with a claim, a move, or just trying to remember when you bought the dishwasher, you'll be glad it's there.