Benefits
All about home insurance
Millions of UK households expose themselves to significant financial losses in the event of damage or destruction of their home, its contents, and/or claims from third parties.
If you have a mortgage, you might be obliged to ensure that you have adequate buildings insurance in place to protect your interests.
Buildings insurance
This cover protects the structure of the building and any fixtures and fittings. This includes the walls, roof, doors and windows, plus fixed items like kitchens and built-in wardrobes.
Contents insurance
Home contents insurance covers all the items within the property, such as furnishings, personal items, TVs and other belongings. Basically, if you turned your home upside down and shook it, all the stuff that fell out would typically be classed as contents, and all those things that don’t fall out are generally classed as part of the buildings.
Additional elements of protection
Alongside the basic buildings and/or contents cover, there are a number of additional cover options that may be available to enhance your protection. The type of policy you buy will dictate what additional options are available.
These could include subsidence insurance (not all policies include this as standard, which may not be an issue if you are not in a high-risk area), accidental damage to fixtures and fittings, and freezer cover to name but a few.
What cover is needed?
There are a number of house insurance policies available to protect your property. Each is designed to meet your own circumstances, whether you are:
- A homeowner.
- Rent a property.
- Or are a landlord.
Separate buildings and contents insurance cover is available, though these can also be bought as a combined policy if required.
Homeowners should have cover for both their building and the contents. However, leaseholders in a block of flats often have a shared buildings insurance policy, which is normally sufficient. Though, you may need to check whether your fixtures and fittings are included as part of the freeholder’s buildings cover because in some cases it may not be.
Tenants are not normally responsible for insuring the structure of the building, so a contents-only policy will usually suffice.
Landlords typically need to have buildings insurance and may also need to consider landlord contents cover. Although the contents element can be limited to just communal contents or fixtures and fittings.
Next steps
Alternatively, if you know what you want, why not use our online quotation system? We offer a comprehensive quote system for buildings and contents insurance. Follow through and answer the quote questions.
Frequently Asked Questions
Getting basic home insurance covers you for the costs if something should happen to your property.
You can insure the buildings itself and you can insure the contents separate.
Buildings insurance typically covers the buildings itself and its fixtures and fitting, however contents insurance is to protect theft or damage of your personal possessions such as electronics and furniture.
It isn’t a legal requirement to insure your home however it is advisable. If you should suffer a loss, your insurance provider will be able to cover your losses.
It gives mortgage lenders peace of mind to know that you are going to be financially stable in the event of a disaster.
Most landlords will cover the buildings insurance, but you will have to get your own contents cover.
You are basically protecting your possessions from yourself. Accidents happen, so you can cover yourself for them.
This can include expensive items such as TV’s and games consoles, depending on your policy you will have different items and a different accumulated cost covered.
Make sure you know what you’re covered for in an event that a youngster knocks the television of the stand, it can be a costly replacement.
Think about anything that you wouldn’t want to lose.
Anything that would effect you financially if it was lost or broken and you could benefit from being covered by insurance.
You should add up the amount of all of your special items and make sure they’re adequately covered.
You don’t want to be choosing between the Television or the Sofa to replace because you were underinsured.
Personal Possessions cover is split into two different categories, Unspecified and Specified personal possessions.
These provide cover for items that you wear or carry outside of the home.
Normally where they are valued at less than £1,000 each, they should be covered under the unspecified option, simply choose a total cover value that adequately suits your needs.
If your items are worth more than £1,000 each, they should be covered under the Specified Personal Possessions option.
Most insurers we use will cover clerical business use of the home, this would be computer use or paperwork and should not include visits by business contacts.
For full business use including visitors to the home, please contact us for a quote.
You have to remember that the excess is in place for you to pay in the event of an emergency.
You don’t want to leave yourself with an unaffordable lump sum to pay if your house burns down, it would make your insurance policy pointless.
The owner of the property is responsible for the building itself, however you are responsible for your own possessions.
It is always best to check your circumstances and be sure that your landlord has adequate home insurance but they are not required to protect your personal belongings.
If you buy a piece of furniture that has significant value, you will want to inform your insurance provider so that they can include it in your contents cover.
The same with if you make any changes to the building itself, if you want an extension, you will have to let the insurance company know so they can protect your for the higher risks while extending the property, but also have the extension covered when it has been finished.
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