Did You Know – The Very First Home Insurance Quotes May Date Back to 2100 BC?
We tend to consider insurance a fairly modern invention, particularly because the health insurance industry didn’t truly take off until the mid 1800’s. (Most people think of health insurance first when they think of insurance, for obvious reasons. Most doctors charge you $50 or more just to stop in and say hello!) You might be surprised to find out that home insurance actually dates back much farther than that. History suggests the first home insurance quotes in a money-based society may have been given to Chinese and Babylonian traders as early as the 3rd and 2nd millenia BC. The Code of Hammurabi, circa 1750, was developed by the Babylonians and included a system that had been widely used by Mediterranean sailing merchants at the time. If a merchant sailing across dangerous waters took out a loan to fund his shipment, he would pay the lender an extra fee to forgive his debt if the shipment was lost or stolen at sea. Thus began the process of insuring one’s valuables to minimize the r
