Everyone knows that the place they live is more than just a house – it is a home. Consequently, it’s important to protect your home and its contents to the best of your ability and as comprehensively as possible.
Probably the best way of doing this is by investing in home insurance that covers both the building and contents. This way, if anything were to happen, such as fire damage or a break in, you should be covered by your policy and not have to worry about the aftermath of the event. In order to give you a little more information on the topic, we’ve created this handy guide to home insurance.
Two types
There are generally two main types of home insurance covers, namely building and contents. Building insurance is intended to protect the structure of your house, including the walls, roof and windows. Most policies will also cover permanent fixtures that have been fitted in the home.
While the majority of policies will cover you for such damage to your property as from fires, floods, burst pipes and storms, it is worth checking that the specific policy you are looking into offers this protection. Some insurers won’t insure homes against flooding in flood prone areas, for instance, or will charge an arm and a leg for the privilege.
Contents insurance provides similar cover to Buildings insurance and protects items in your home such as TV’s, entertainment equipment, clothes, furniture and similar items. It can often be difficult to estimate the exact value of your contents, so it’s a good idea to do a full inventory of all the items in your home to arrive at a suitable replacement figure. Additionally, for items of high value that you may take away from your home such as jewellery, specified All Risks cover should be considered.
Things to think about
While your insurer will usually provide a policy that replaces old, damaged items for newer versions, some insurers offer indemnity policies. These policies are cheaper than traditional policies and take into account the age and effect of years of use on the particular item before paying out what they value the item to be worth now. While this may be a good option for some homeowners, most prefer to go for a policy that replaces old items for new.
Working out exactly how much you need to insure your home for can also be difficult. It’s recommended you insure your home for its full rebuilding cost, based on it potentially being totally destroyed. However, don’t assume that the price of rebuilding is the same as the house’s market value. If in doubt, there are plenty of tools online and other professional services that will be able to help you estimate the cost of rebuilding. With this in mind, it’s a good idea to keep track of this valuation and update it regularly in order to get the best insurance price, whilst at same time ensuring you are fully protected.
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