This is one of the least understood coverages on a home policy, and one of the most relevant to the housing stock in this region.
What does it do?
If your home is damaged and you have to rebuild, you must rebuild to today's building code — not the code that applied when the house was built. Electrical, plumbing, insulation, egress, structural requirements: all of it has moved.
Ordinance and law coverage pays for the additional cost of complying with current code. Without it, that cost falls on you, at exactly the moment you are least able to absorb it.
How much do policies actually provide?
This varies enormously, and it is a genuine differentiator between carriers.
Many standard policies include ten percent of the dwelling figure. Some include a fixed dollar amount. Some include none at all, and I have reviewed proposals from well-known carriers where the coverage was simply absent. At the other end, some private client contracts provide ordinance and law at one hundred percent of the loss.
On a home in DC, Takoma Park, Alexandria or an older Montgomery County neighborhood, the gap between ten percent and one hundred percent is not academic. Bringing a pre-war house up to current code during a major rebuild can be a very large number.
Who needs the higher limit?
Anyone with an older home, and anyone with a home that has been renovated in stages over decades — the two categories that describe most of the properties I insure inside the Beltway.
What I recommend
- Find the ordinance and law line on your declarations page and read the limit.
- If it is ten percent or absent, ask what it would cost to increase it. It is usually modest.
- On a home built before 1945, treat this as a priority rather than a refinement.
- Revisit it after a renovation, because the improved value raises the rebuild figure it is calculated from.
The short version
If your home is damaged you must rebuild to current code, and ordinance and law coverage pays that additional cost. Standard policies commonly include ten percent of the dwelling figure or nothing at all, while some private client contracts provide it at one hundred percent of the loss.
Let me know if you would like me to check what your policy actually provides.
