I live in unincorporated Harris County, TX (outside houston city limits). We just bought a house built in 2001 but there appears to be some existing water damage (corrosion) on all the breakers in the panel - likely from Hurricane Ike. Recently (last week) a lizard somehow got behind the breakers and fried a couple of them, and caused some pretty heavy corrosion on the two hot bus bars in the center of the panel.

Since this is a Siemens panel and parts are hard to come by, I'd like to simply replace the panel and all breakers. It's a 125A main breaker, and I intend to just replace with another 125A panel. Since I'm in the county and it's not new construction, I don't need any permits. The power company (Centerpoint) says they'll come pull the smart meter for me for $6 with a few hours notice on a weekday, and they also verified that I didn't need any permits or anything to replace the panel.

I'm not worried about the work itself - The hardest part will probably be physically ripping the old box out of the wall and fitting the new box. No big deal. As long as I label everything before it comes apart, wiring up the new stuff will be a piece of cake. The wiring itself all looks in great shape except for mild corrosion on the ends, which I'll clean up during the panel replacement. I'll also add anti-ox paste to the aluminum mains coming from the meter box.

My only concerns come from homeowner's insurance. If, God forbid, 5 years from now the house burns down and it's traced to faulty wiring at the box and they find out I did the work vs. Having a licensed person do it, can they deny the claim?

About me: I installed every fan and light fixture in this house, and have done plenty of other home electrical work over the years including outlet/switch upgrades, adding new circuits, and even had to re-do some wiring in my mother-in-law's house where the builder got cheap and used the ground conductor as a common neutral for the ceiling fan in order to have two separate switches for fan/light. I'm also ASE certified (yes, automotive) and one of my ASEs is for Electrical. Granted, cars use DC, not AC, but the basic theory is the same, as are the safety rules. As long as I make sure the main feed coming from the meter is cold, what's to worry about?

Then my only other question would be... GE or Square D? :)

Having spent 30 years in the insurance industry, primarily engineering and chemical plant claims, unless you had double wired the breakers or done something really outrageous, like pennies in a fusebox or a 30 AMP breaker with 14AWG they won't deny the claim. All you need to do is make sure it meets code. If you have a friend that is a licensed electrician, have him/her look at it. You will probably need some additional grounding and the new box will have a separate ground and neutral bar-you may already have it that way. The utility may require you to have a separate disconnect outside in the meter box, we need it that way in GA. One question, if the utility will run a new service for nothing, why not go to 150 or 200 AMP, the panel cost is negligeable? 125 doesn't give you a lot of extra capacity. You mention the difficulty with Siemans for parts, etc. I have 2 houses, one GE 150 and 1 Siemans 150. Breakers cost the same, Home Depot has loads of them and I've never had any issue. Admittedly the Siemans is a 2008 box.

Document, somehow, that your local area does not require a permit.

First call may be to the state electrical inspector, having their permission would be good to have on hand.

If the local utility is the Authority Having Jurisdiction, get something in writing from them.

Consulting with your insurance carrier may be good to do also.