For a broker already handling a client's construction or commercial insurance, asking about the paintings on their wall or the watch in their safe can feel like an awkward pivot - as though it risks sounding like a broker fishing for extra business. Felicity Sheppard (pictured), underwriter and head of specie for Melbourne-headquartered Keystone Underwriting in Australia, says that's rarely how it actually plays out.
"That's right," she said. "That's certainly how I often hear of it - it's the client that mentions something." In Sheppard's experience, the trigger is usually mundane and client-led: a business owner she's covering for a construction risk mentions, almost in passing, that they'd like their Rolex insured too. It's a stray comment attached to an existing relationship, not a cold pitch from the broker.
The reason is less about salesmanship and more about proximity. Brokers handling a wealthy client's core insurance - home, business, professional indemnity - are already in the room when personal wealth comes up naturally. Clients tend to default to the adviser they already trust rather than shop around for a specialist they've never met, particularly for something as personal as a watch or an heirloom.
That dynamic suits brokers who want to be, in Sheppard's words, "a one-stop shop for their clients, so all things to their client from that [insurance] aspect." Sheppard said Keystone deliberately supports that instinct in the Australian market, offering a broad enough product range that a broker whose core business is construction risk can still bring back a workable answer when a client asks about a piece of jewellery or a small art collection - without needing to hand the client off elsewhere.
The same dynamic is visible in New Zealand's private client market, even without an identical underwriting structure. Chubb's Masterpiece policy in New Zealand is built around exactly this bundling logic - home, contents, jewellery, fine art and personal liability sitting under one high-net-worth policy rather than being split across separate specialists. NZ private client brokers such as Rothbury and Howden similarly package valuables cover - art, wine, bullion, sports memorabilia - alongside a client's broader personal asset insurance, reflecting the same expectation Sheppard describes: clients want one adviser across all of it, not a referral chain.
The size of these placements is often modest - "one or two pieces," as Sheppard describes it, rather than a sprawling collection. But the conversation matters disproportionately for client retention: a broker who can say yes to a stray, personal request reinforces exactly the kind of relationship wealthy clients want from their adviser - someone who handles everything, not just the core commercial risk.
For brokers hesitant to raise the subject unprompted, the more useful posture may be one of simple availability rather than active pitching: making it clear, in the normal course of an annual review, that personal valuables cover sits within scope. Whether the client is in Melbourne or Auckland, Sheppard's experience suggests the client will often do the rest - brokers just need to be ready with an answer when they do.
