☕ DrinkCoffeeAndProfit
Smart money moves before breakfast
Inspiration Quote for the Day
“The safest way to double your money is to fold it over and put it in your pocket.”
Kin Hubbard
The Morning Ritual
Lenny Filed a $1,500 Roof Claim. His Premium Remembered It Longer Than He Did.
“They paid me five hundred bucks,” my cousin Lenny said last weekend, “and then they raised my rate.” A spring hailstorm had chewed up part of his roof. The repair came to $1,500, his deductible was $1,000, and the insurer sent a check for the difference.
Here is what caught my eye. Lenny’s renewal notice arrived this month. Over two renewals, the increase will cost him more than the check paid. Home insurance has a quiet rule about small claims, and the deductible you pick decides whether it bites.
In One Sip
► Home insurance premiums rose 24% from early 2023 to early 2026, a median increase of $496. Source: NerdWallet 2026 Home Insurance Rates Report.
► The national median premium is about $2,564 a year. Source: NerdWallet.
► Filing one claim can raise a premium by as much as 36%. The typical surcharge in the analysis was about 10.2%, or roughly $261 a year. Source: NerdWallet.
► Raising a deductible from $1,000 to $2,500 saved about 11.4%, roughly $292 a year at the median. Source: NerdWallet.
► The buried part: a small claim can cost more in higher premiums than the insurer pays you for it.
Lenny’s premium is one bill that keeps climbing. Our partner below writes about another one: the gas pump.
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Why It Matters for Your Money
Run Lenny’s numbers. His insurer paid $500 on a $1,500 repair.
If his renewal carries a typical 10.2% claims surcharge, that is about $261 more a year on a median policy.
Two renewals at that surcharge, and he has paid back the $500 check and then some.
Now the other path. A $2,500 deductible cuts about $292 a year at the median. He takes on $1,500 more risk per claim, so the switch pays for itself in a bit over five claim-free years.
Sound familiar? A higher deductible mostly formalizes a habit many people should already have: paying small repairs out of pocket.
If your renewal notice made you wince, it may be worth seeing what other insurers would charge for the same coverage.
· · · Partner Message · · ·
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The Wealth Angle
Here is where it gets interesting. Insurers price your risk partly by your claims history, and even a small claim goes on that record.
That makes home insurance work best for losses you truly cannot cover. Think of a fire, or a tree through the roof.
Think about that for a second. A low deductible feels safe, but it nudges you to file the small claims that raise your price.
I think the right deductible is the largest one your emergency fund can cover without strain. For many households that is $2,500. For some it is still $1,000, and that is fine.
☕ Key Insight:
A $2,500 deductible saves about $292 a year at the median. A small claim can add about $261 a year. Pick the deductible your savings can cover, and save claims for big losses.
Utility and fuel costs land on every household budget. Our partner below looks at who supplies the power behind AI.
· · · Partner Message · · ·
Every gold rush hides a second fortune behind the first.
In 1849, most of the men who raced to California for gold went home broke. The ones who got rich sold them the shovels, the blue jeans, and the whiskey. The miners were the story. The suppliers kept the money.
Here’s what the headlines miss…
Artificial intelligence doesn’t really run on chips.
It runs on electricity… oceans of it, around the clock, more than the grid can supply. So when Big Tech can’t wait years for the grid, it does the only thing left: it builds its own power plant, on-site, next to the data center. And overwhelmingly, it burns natural gas to do it.
This is already happening at a scale that’s hard to believe. On June 22, one of the largest energy companies in the world signed a 20-year deal to power a single data-center project, 2.67 gigawatts, enough for a mid-sized city. Analysts are now tracking roughly 100 gigawatts of new “behind-the-meter” gas generation lining up behind the AI buildout.
That’s a New OPEC.
Not a cartel in the desert, a handful of American companies that control the gas, the pipelines, and the turbines the entire AI economy now depends on. Ken Griffin, one of the sharpest investors alive, has reportedly put more than a billion dollars into exactly this corner.
And, that’s the move: in a gold rush, you don’t pay gold-rush prices for the miners. You buy the shovels.
There are two companies I’d call the picks-and-shovels of AI’s power supply. I’m not naming them in an email… this is precisely the kind of edge that evaporates the moment it’s in print.
I put the whole case in a brand-new documentary… the New OPEC, the two power-broker plays, and the crowded “AI winners” I’d sell to fund them.
That’s 6 stocks to buy. 10 to sell. The three moves that could put your family on the right side of the only fuel that matters now.
Click here to watch the documentary now.
Good investing,
Porter Stansberry
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Coffee Break Move
Before your second cup, find your policy declarations page and check two numbers: your deductible and your annual premium.
If you have savings to spare: ask your insurer to quote the same policy at $2,500 and at $5,000. Compare the yearly savings to the extra amount you would pay on a claim.
If money is tight: keep the lower deductible. Still, think twice before filing a claim only a few hundred dollars over it.
Lenny raised his deductible on Monday. He also opened a savings account labeled “Roof.”

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