Additional Insured Requirements for Property Managers

What "additional insured" actually means

An additional insured is a person or entity—other than the policyholder—who is extended coverage under a vendor's liability insurance policy. For a property manager, being named as an additional insured on a vendor's general liability policy means that if that vendor causes injury or damage on your property, the vendor's insurer defends and indemnifies you too, not just the vendor.

Without additional insured status, a vendor can carry perfectly valid insurance that does nothing for you when a claim names the owner or management company.

Why it matters more than the coverage limit

Property managers often focus on the dollar amount of coverage—$1M, $2M—and overlook whether they are actually covered by it. A $5M policy that does not name your entity as additional insured offers you no direct protection. The additional insured endorsement is what connects the vendor's coverage to your risk.

• It shifts the defense and indemnity for covered claims to the vendor's insurer.
• It is typically required contractually before a vendor is allowed on site.
• It should be "primary and non-contributory" so the vendor's policy pays first, before yours.
• A waiver of subrogation is often required alongside it, preventing the insurer from later coming after you.

How to read it on the certificate

On an ACORD certificate of insurance, additional insured status usually appears in the "Description of Operations" box or is indicated by a checkbox, and is backed by an endorsement form (commonly CG 20 10 and/or CG 20 37). Best practice is to require a copy of the actual endorsement, not just a mention on the certificate, because the certificate itself is informational and does not amend the policy.

• Confirm your exact legal entity name is listed—not a trade name or a typo.
• Look for "primary and non-contributory" wording.
• Request the endorsement form number to confirm the coverage is real.
• Check that the additional insured status applies to both ongoing and completed operations where relevant.

Set the requirement before the vendor starts

Additional insured status has to be contractually required up front—retrofitting it after an incident is impossible. Bake it into your vendor agreement and your insurance requirements, and make submitting a compliant certificate a condition of being approved to work.

How VendorSuite verifies it automatically

VendorSuite lets you encode "must name [your entity] as additional insured, primary and non-contributory" as a requirement, then checks every incoming certificate against it. The AI extraction reads the named insured, coverage, and endorsement details; anything that does not meet the requirement is flagged before the vendor is marked compliant—so you never discover a missing endorsement at claim time.