General Insurance Company (25 February 2025), VLC-S-171963 (BCSC), serves as a warning to the insureds that they need to build a replacement property sufficiently similar to the old one to be entitled to replacement cost coverage. In this case, the construction of a bigger rental property after the old building was damaged by fire made business sense, however, the insurer was not required to compensate for the construction of the new building.
Olga Shaporenko discusses the case, which provides a useful summary of the law on replacement cost insurance and the principle of relief from forfeiture under s. 13 of the Insurance Act, R.S.B.C. 2012, c. 1.