Citizens’ Residential Component Technology (RCT) Express new cost estimator is now live in the Property Insurance Clearinghouse and PolicyCenter® for all Personal Lines pending quotes, applicable submissions and policy changes.
RCT Express currently is used by many insurance companies. It has many helpful features to calculate valuations by providing specific and detailed descriptions and characteristics of a dwelling and mobile home/manufactured home interior and exterior features.
Some advantages of RCT Express:
It provides prefilled address-specific home characteristics in an easily editable interface. All prefilled fields must be verified for accuracy.
Information about the risk is collected from the industry’s most reliable data sources.
It provides replacement cost estimates for residential dwellings using current and local labor and material costs. Exceptions:
Mobile home dwellings (see below)
Citizens Homeowners 8 – Modified Coverage Form (CIT HO-8) risks that have the actual cash value (ACV) endorsement: Agents must select Calculated based on Effective Age in the Markup and Adjustments pop-up window. (Select Options > Markup and Adjustments > Calculated based on Effective Age.)
It is important that all the features are recorded accurately. The following building and construction features are key when calculating an accurate replacement cost and, when combined, make up 91% of the returned value:
Finished living area
Number of bathrooms
Kitchen quality grade
Bathroom quality grade
Foundation type
Garage type
Exterior wall type
Mobile Homes
To begin the cost estimate for a mobile home, agents must manually enter property information on the cost estimator’s Building Information panel. Once the agent completes the Year Built and Finished Living Area fields on this panel, prefilled mobile home information will generate in the other panels of the cost estimator.
Notes
Mobile home setup fees are not automatically included and must be added in the RCT Express.
RCT Express will automatically depreciate mobile home values using the historical depreciation. If extensive renovations and updates have been made to the mobile home, the agent can select Effective Age in the Markup and Adjustments pop-up window. (Select Options > Markup and Adjustments > Effective Age.) Underwriting may request additional photos and supporting documentation to substantiate effective age.
A validation message is displayed in PolicyCenter when ACV is not selected in the cost estimate.
Resources
All resources are on the Agents website:
Citizens’ Cost Estimator Reference Guide (Training > Personal Job Aids > RCT Express Cost Estimator Reference Guide under the General heading in the center column)
CoreLogic RCT Express Cost Estimate Tool Overview online module, which is in the Citizens Learning Center
Citizens conducted live webinars last month about RCT Express. Recordings of the following webinars are available in the Training section under Webinar Recordings:
Transitioning to Citizens’ New Cost Estimator: RCT Express
Citizens’ New Cost Estimator Tool for Mobile Homes: RCT Express
Use our frequently asked questions for more information about the new cost estimator. Select FAQs from our website’s top menu and enter the following in the search field:
Citizens provides agent communications online for historical purposes only, and the communications have not been updated to include any changes that may have been made after publication. Agents can find the latest information by reviewing the applicable underwriting manuals, and by logging in and accessing our FAQs, which are available from the top of any page on our website.
