House insurance when house left empty

[sleepwouldbenice]

In the spirit of the " get your Power of Attorney done" thread

A little reminder that if a loved one is in hospital or care home for a while, check their home insurance details re notification and cover for empty properties

A friends dad has been in a home for a couple of months and despite regular checks they've had major water damage from a leaking pipe and not covered as property is empty. Think exact T&C vary

Hope this helps someone

Yes. IME 30 days empty is the maximim. All you need to do is get a friend or relative to go and spend one night in the property on or around day 28 or 29 and make sure you have photographic evidence.

We had to pay a higher premium when mums house was empty and also visit it once a week - do not need to sleep there though. During Covid, the need to visit weekly was rescinded as long as we had neighbours who could keep an eye out.

We are now trying to sell mums house after she died and are back to weekly visits which is a pain but fortunately there are three of us siblings living with 15 miles of the house to take turns.

I am shocked though at how many friends did not inform the insurance companies about empty properties - we had a massive leak while we were getting the house ready for tenants and the insurance company paid the £26,000 claim in full.

Also either drain the water system completely or maintain the house at over 15deg.

I have managed to get specific Empty Property insurance at a quite reasonable rate, my mother is now in a nursing home and hopefully we are selling the property in the new year

Our empty property policy requires thermostat set at a minimum of 10 degrees

This is risky though - I discovered the insurance company wouldn't be impressed if there was a claim
and the house had been unlived in for months except for one night every fourth week. Not worth risking not being able to make a claim. It would be different if the owner was in hospital for five weeks but their relative had slept there a night or two as clearly it's still the owner's main residence. If they've gone into a home permanently that becomes their main residence.

Empty house insurance usually specifies heating on at a minimum temp, at least weekly checks, all windows/doors secure or water turned off. They don't tend to ask for it to be slept in though, just that it's secure, weather-proof and water damage proof.

We had to leave the hearing on at a certain temperature and pop around once a week.

I just realised that I should have said that all the heating/ water things were done, lights and TV on timers and neighbour going in every few days anyway. The insurance company said that someone must stay overnight at least once in 30 days, so a relative kindly did that for us. So that was the bit I was focusing on. I guess the insurance companies are all different.

Thanks all for your comments
I think it's all about checking in with the insurance company to ensure they are aware and t &c are met
Annoying though that is

Annoying though that is

I didn’t find it too bad, I made one phone call when it was empty and then another one when it was still empty after x days and that was it. The heating was left on, someone went over once a week and it was empty for nearly a year.

I sold my house but moved in with my partner through the process. It took 6 months. Let my insurance know and I had to have an overnight stay every 30 days and make sure temperatures didn’t go below freezing.

Highly recommend Towergate - not the cheapest by any means but lot of small print making pretty much any claim unpayable from cheaper agencies. Very quick to also refund unused part of year once sold.

Yes we used Towergate as well and found them really helpful. Not the cheapest though!

I suspect the difference was that your insurer was OK about continuing to insure under the normal policy, most want you to switch to an empty house policy