Let This Horror Story Motivate You to Insure Your Ring

Almost the exact look on my friend’s face when she realized her ring was gone. (Shutterstock)

As she was heading out for a night in New York City, my friend Rebecca took off her lovely emerald-cut engagement ring and placed it in her lap to put on some hand lotion.

“It was lotion, lotion, lotion, some conversation with my friends and before you know it we were all jumping out of the car to go into the restaurant,” she tells me. “I was distracted. I didn’t even remember the ring was in my lap until the next morning as I was getting dressed.”

When she didn’t see the ring in its usual spot in her jewelry dish, it only took a few seconds before she realized: It was in her lap, she’d jumped out of the car and, even worse, the streets were covered in snow. She called her friend and together they searched the car, the street and the restaurant, but with no luck.

“Even if it had just fallen out near the curb, the snow plows came through in the morning,” she says. “I eventually just had to give up and realize it was gone for good.”

As Rebecca recounted the story, my jaw dropped – I’d seen her ring and it was a show-stopper. How on earth could she and her hubby even afford to replace it?

Good thing I have some pretty smart friends: Rebecca had just recently insured the ring, adding it to her homeowner’s insurance policy. It took a bit of legwork, she explained, getting it appraised and adding it, but thank god she’d done it. In the end, the insurance policy paid her jeweler to remake the exact ring and it didn’t cost her a penny.

I tell this tale to let it be a warning, engaged ladies: You probably want to get that sparkler on your left hand insured. I didn’t even realize you could insure an individual piece of jewelry, but you totally can and you totally should.

Here, some tips from The Knot on how to go about doing it. Keep in mind some of the questions they suggest you ask your insurer, like how they’ll replace it (through your jeweler or will they write you a check?) and under what circumstances the policy does and does not apply (does it only cover lost rings or only will it apply only if your ring is stolen?).

Worried about the price? “The yearly cost to insure your ring is $1 to $2 for every $100 that it would cost to replace,” according to the article. “In plain English, this means that if your ring would cost $9,000 to replace, you might expect to pay between $90 and $180 per year to insure it — or slightly more in cities where the risk of theft is higher.”

All of which is a paltry sum when you consider the peace of mind you’ll get in return. Now, if only the insurance companies provided advice on breaking the news to hubby …

“I tried to stay calm, but I just totally broke down in hysterical tears after the first few words,” says my friend. “He must really love me, because he forgave me right away.”

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