Your CLUE report is an invaluable source of information, both to you and your insurers. It lets you know what claims have been filed over the last seven years for your home by its previous owners. Claims that are seen year after year (water damage from the snow, for example) are probably a chronic problem and guaranteed to give you a headache in the coming years.

Your CLUE report also shows any claims that you as a homeowner have filed over the last seven years for this or any other property, giving you an idea of what your insurance providers are saying about you and your homeowners insurance provider an idea about what kind of homeowner you are. Do you often have kitchen accidents? Are you careless with your bathroom pipes? All of this information helps your homeowners insurance provider decide how risky (and expensive!) insuring your property is going ot be and whether or not it's worth the investment.

Anyone looking at your CLUE report will see:

• The date of the claim.

• The insurance company involved.

• The policy number at the time of the claim.

• The address of the property (if it was a claim you filed for a previous home or rental before packing your bags and hitting the highway).

• The cause of the loss.

• The amount(s) paid.

• The status of the claim.

• The name of the person who filed the claim (if previous owners were involved).

• Anyone who has received a copy of your CLUE report over the last two years.

You might be surprised to find out that your phone calls to your insurance agent about problems with your home, even if you didn't file a claim, are logged on your CLUE report. These reports are much more comprehensive than most reporting agencies, letting your new insurance provider know (literally!) everything that's gone on in the past couple of the years in your homeowners history. The good news is, information more than seven years old usually isn't included. So if you had one of those properties that bled money out of your pocket faster than you can stop the leak you're going to be able to leave it behind-eventually.

If you think there's been a mistake on your CLUE report you can always touch base with ChoiceTrust, the company responsible for gathering information from homeowners insurance providers from coast to coast (much like Equifax, Experian and TransUnion do for credit providers) and challenge the claim. The company will investigate your challenge, speaking with the insurance agency that reported the claim to begin with; however, if they can produce paperwork confirming that the claim was filed in the first place it's unlikely to be removed, so check your paperwork first!

To get your annual CLUE report, contact ChoiceTrust or their parent company, ChoicePoint.