Researchers Submit Patent Application, “Property Inspection Using Aerial Imagery”, for Approval (USPTO 20200104941)

2020 APR 16 (NewsRx) -- By a News Reporter-Staff News Editor at Insurance Daily News -- From Washington, D.C., NewsRx journalists report that a patent application by the inventor Lekas, Stephen Nicholas (San Francisco, CA), filed on December 3, 2019, was made available online on April 2, 2020.

The patent’s assignee is Esurance Insurance Services Inc. (San Francisco, California, United States).

News editors obtained the following quote from the background information supplied by the inventors: “Field

“The present disclosure generally relates to insurance services, and more particularly to property inspection for property insurance.

“Description of the Related Art

“The homeowner’s insurance industry uses certified property inspectors to provide property inspection data. The property inspection data provides risk characteristic information to an insurance carrier to be used by the insurance carrier in rating and underwriting a property’s insurance policy. The cost of having the certified property inspector sent to the property is often, however, passed along to the consumer purchasing the insurance policy.”

As a supplement to the background information on this patent application, NewsRx correspondents also obtained the inventor’s summary information for this patent application: “The disclosed system and method describe performing a property inspection using aerial images.

“In certain embodiments, a method is provided for performing a property inspection using aerial images. The method includes the steps of receiving an indication of a request from a user to receive a quote regarding a property, identifying the property, retrieving one or more aerial images associated with the property, extracting information regarding the property from the one or more aerial images and providing an insurance decision for the property to the user according to the extracted information from the one or more aerial images in response to the request from the user.

“In certain embodiments, a system is provided for performing a property inspection using aerial images. The system may include one or more processors and a machine-readable medium including instructions stored therein, which when executed by the processors, cause the processors to perform operations including receiving an indication of a request from a user to receive a quote regarding a property, identifying an address associated with the property, retrieving one or more aerial images associated with the address, extracting information regarding the property from the one or more aerial images, applying the extracted information from the one or more aerial images to one or more rules or criteria for determining an insurance decision regarding the property and providing the insurance decision to the user in response to the request in real time, wherein the insurance decision is at least in part based on the extracted information.

“In certain embodiments, a non-transitory computer-readable medium having computer-executable instructions stored thereon for execution by a processor to perform a method for performing, a property inspection using aerial images is provided. The method may include the steps of receiving an indication of a request from a user to receive a quote regarding a property, retrieving one or more aerial images associated, with an address of the property, the aerial images including one or more images of the exterior of the property or surrounding areas, extracting information regarding the property from the one or more aerial images and providing an insurance decision for the property to the user at least in part based on applying the extracted information from the one or more aerial images to one or more rules or criteria for determining an insurance decision regarding the property.

“It is understood that other configurations of the subject technology will become readily apparent from the following detailed description, where various configurations of the subject technology are shown and described by way of illustration. As will be realized, the subject technology is capable of other and different configurations and its several details are capable of modification in various other respects, all without departing from the scope of the subject technology. Accordingly, the drawings and detailed description are to be regarded as illustrative in nature and not as restrictive.”

The claims supplied by the inventors are:

“1. A method for performing a property inspection using aerial images, the method including the steps of: receiving an indication of a request from a user to receive a quote regarding a property; identifying the property; retrieving one or more aerial images associated with the property; extracting information regarding the property from the one or more aerial images; and providing an insurance decision for the property to the user according to the extracted information from the one or more aerial images in response to the request from the user.

“2. The method of claim 1, wherein providing the insurance decision comprises: applying the extracted information to one or more rules or criteria for determining the insurance decision regarding the property.

“3. The method of claim 1, wherein the aerial images include images of an exterior of the property.

“4. The method of claim 1, wherein the aerial images include images of surrounding areas of the property.

“5. The method of claim 1, wherein identifying the property comprises determining an address associated with the property.

“6. The method of claim 1, wherein identifying the property comprises determining a latitude and longitude of the property.

“7. The method of claim 1, wherein retrieving one or more aerial images associated with the property comprises: sending a request to one or more remote services storing aerial imagery, the request including an identification of the property; and receiving the one more aerial images in response to the request.

“8. The method of claim 1, wherein the aerial imagery includes one or more 2D or 3D satellite images.

“9. The method of claim 1, wherein the aerial imagery includes hyperspectral imagery.

“10. The method of claim 1, wherein the aerial imagery includes thermal imagery.

“11. The method of claim 1, wherein the information includes size information regarding the property.

“12. The method of claim 1, wherein the information includes feature information regarding the property.

“13. The method of claim 1, wherein the extracted information includes composition information regarding one or more elements of the property.

“14. The method of claim 1, wherein the extracted information includes energy leakage information.

“15. The method of claim 1, wherein the extracted information includes wear and tear information.

“16. The method of claim 1, wherein the property includes an improvement on real property.

“17. The method of claim 1, wherein the property includes one or more of a main structure, one or more detached structures, one or more fixtures, or land housing the one or more of the main structure, the one or more detached structures or the one or more fixtures.

“18. The method of claim 1, wherein the insurance decision is provided to the user in real time.

“19. A system for performing a property inspection using aerial images, the system including: one or more processors; and a machine-readable medium including instructions stored herein, which when executed by the processors, cause the processors to perform operations including: receiving an indication of a request from a user to receive a quote regarding a property; identifying an address associated with the property; retrieving one or more aerial images associated with the address; extracting information regarding the property from the one or more aerial images; applying the extracted information from the one or more aerial images to one or more rules or criteria for determining an insurance decision regarding the property; and providing the insurance decision to the user in response to the request in real time, wherein the insurance decision is at least part based on the extracted information.

“20. A non-transitory computer-readable medium having computer-executable instructions stored thereon for execution by a processor to perform a method for performing a property inspection using aerial images, the method including the steps of: receiving an indication of a request from a user to receive a quote regarding a property; retrieving one or more aerial images associated with an address of the property, the aerial images including one or more images of the exterior of the property or surrounding areas; extracting information regarding the property from the one or more aerial images; providing an insurance decision for the property to the user at least in part based on applying the extracted information from the one or more aerial images to one or more rules of criteria for determining an insurance decision regarding the property.”

For additional information on this patent application, see: Lekas, Stephen Nicholas. Property Inspection Using Aerial Imagery. Filed December 3, 2019 and posted April 2, 2020. Patent URL: http://appft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO1&Sect2=HITOFF&d=PG01&p=1&u=%2Fnetahtml%2FPTO%2Fsrchnum.html&r=1&f=G&l=50&s1=%2220200104941%22.PGNR.&OS=DN/20200104941&RS=DN/20200104941

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