Home and contents insurance, sometimes known as building and contents insurance can help provide financial compensation against theft, broken or damaged content or disasters in your home, such as fires and floods. When you purchase a house, most mortgage lenders insist that you have at least a home insurance policy in place from the date of completion.
In this blog post, our local insurance advisors provide information on various aspects of your home and content insurance, including:
- What is home & content insurance
- What Is The Difference Between Home Insurance & Home & Contents Insurance?
- How To Calculate My Contents Insurance Value?
- Top Home & Contents Insurance Tips From Our Yeovil Advisors
What Is Home & Contents Insurance?
Home and contents insurance, sometimes known as building and contents insurance, is a policy that most homeowners invest in to protect against unforeseen circumstances. Policies will often pay you enough money to repair or replace damaged items when things go wrong, such as:
- Replacing stolen or damaged items after a burglary
- Repairs due to storm or adverse weather condition damage, such as high winds and leaks due to intense rain
- Rebuilding and repairing costs following a fire, flood or other natural disasters
In most cases, the policyholder will need to contact their insurance company to make a claim. The insurance company will then complete various internal checks and calculate how much the policy owner can be compensated.
Depending on the policy, an excess may need to be paid before compensation is received, which could be between £50-£1000 depending on your claim.
The aforementioned coverage is normally included within your home and contents package, however, you may need to pay extra to include other protection, including:
- Items lost or stolen outside of the home
- Emergency repairs such as burst pipes, boiler breakdowns etc
- High-value items, including jewellery, tech or heirlooms
- Accidental damage
What Is The Difference Between Home Insurance & Home & Contents Insurance?
Building and contents insurance doesn’t need to be purchased as a package. In some cases, for example, if you rent, you don’t need to get a home or building insurance policy in your name, but you may want to cover your belongings.
The main difference is what they cover:
Home Insurance – covers the building’s structural elements, walls, windows, and roof, and any permanent fixtures and fittings, bath, toilet, sinks, etc. Some policies may also cover fitted kitchens, cupboards and wardrobes as well.
Outbuildings, such as garages, greenhouses and sheds may only sometimes be covered in a standard home insurance policy and may be an optional extra.
Contents Insurance – these insurance policies will cover most of your personal belongings and garden furniture. Typical items that are included in your insurance policy include:
- Carpets and soft furnishings
- Sofas, beds and large furniture
- Home electronics, computers, televisions and tablets
- Clothes
You may have to take out additional policies to include items that are regularly taken out of the house, are antiques or items of high expense, such as:
- Bikes
- Recreational items such as kayaks, ski equipment or surfboards
- Expensive jewellery
When you’re looking at home and contents insurance, it is important to understand the items which are covered as standard and the items to be covered at an additional cost. For more information, see our blog post: ‘Building and contents insurance and do I need it?’.
How To Calculate My Contents Insurance Value?
When looking into content insurance policies, it’s important to have a rough estimate of how much your belongings are worth. When you take out contents insurance, your provider will ask for an estimate of the total value of your content. The sum you provide will equate to the maximum amount your insurance may pay out if needed.
This is why you mustn’t undervalue your content and risk being underinsured, but it’s equally important not to overestimate and potentially pay more for cover that doesn’t benefit you.
To accurately calculate your home content value, we recommend:
1. Make a thorough list of each room’s content, including, furniture, clothing, bottles and drinks. No matter how small or insignificant.
2. Calculate the value of the individual assets
3. Highlight any high-value items, such as sofas, jewellery and art (you can check the average price online)
4. Any items with a value above £1,500 may need to be included under a specific items section when applying for your insurance policy, so make sure the details for these items are near to hand
5. Add up the total value of your home contents
Top Home & Contents Insurance Tips From Our Yeovil Insurance Advisors
With so many insurance providers on the market, it’s important to find a deal that fits with your requirements. Some of our top tips when searching for home and contents insurance (either as separate policies or together) include:
- Avoid monthly premiums & interest by paying for your policy annually
- Don’t ‘auto-renew’ always shop around each year to see if you can get a better deal elsewhere
- Always compare quotes to see which provider offers you the better deal
- If you need both home and content insurance, it’s best to purchase a combined policy
At The Levels Financial, we know that when you’re purchasing a house, either with a first time buyer mortgage, when you’re moving homes or if you’re extending your buy-to-let property portfolio, getting the right insurance for your needs can be time-consuming.
This is why our team of advisors are on hand to help on weekdays, evenings and Saturdays, to do the research for you. We will work hard to get to know your financial situation and find the right deal to best suit your needs.
For more information, or to see how we can help you, book your free initial consultation with our Yeovil advisors today, contact our team at admin@thelevelsfinancial.co.uk, visit our website or call us on 01458 772 040
Please Note:
- If you stop paying premiums your coverage could cease
- If you cancel your plan you will not receive any money back
- We offer products from a choice of insurers
