Empty house insurance

[TheMerryAquaBird]

DF recently moved in to a care home, leaving his house empty, ready to be sold. I'm there a couple of times a week to check on it, and have removed everything valuable. I spoke to the current insurers (contents and buildings) and they said they would continue to provide cover, excluding: Vandalism
Leaking or freezing water and leaking oil
Theft
Accidental Damage
Damage to glass, toilets and other fittings
Accidental damage to home entertainment equipment
Loss of metered water or oil
Protection for tenants
Accidental damage to your contents

I'm not sure what that leaves - fire?

But anyway, has anyone had experience of this situation? Is that fairly standard, or is it worth looking at specialist insurers?

Are they providing fire, flood, theft needs to be included and unlawful entry. Is the house secure, I'd be shopping around for other quotes. Is there anything left in the house. Are the gas , waterand electrics still on.

The gas, electric and water are still on as DB stays there when he's visiting DF, a couple of times a month (insurance says that doesn't count as occupied).

It worries me that while there's nothing valuable in the house, a burglar could still make terrible damage and that doesn't seem to be covered.

Just blatantly place-marking for later as I’m about to encounter this issue

We had to use a specialist insurer. I think we were okay for a few months.

https://www.moneysavingexpert.com/insurance/home-insurance/unoccupied-home-insurance/

Money saving expert article about it.

We had to move to direct line when we moved out for building works getting done as insurance wouldn’t cover us. Even then there was a timeline.

We had the sane when my dad died. We had to go through a specialist.

You'll need to turn the water off on between visits. I'm going to have to do this in a few months, so spoke to a broker about it. He said that the biggest risk from the insurers point of view, is escape of water. Because there's no-one there to notice, so by the time anyone knows it's happened, it's caused massive damage.

It's water escape risk that is the reason for unoccupied property insurance being so expensive.

@TheMerryAquaBird it's called flea cover
It gives you cover for fire lightning earthquake explosion and collision.
It's quite standard for many insurance companies because you need specialist cover for unoccupied properties
I'll send you details by private message

Can you stay a night once a month? That means it's not unoccupied for many policies

Really?

I would be very wary of this. Because unoccupied means that no one is living there on a permanent basis. For insurance purposes.

But no one's saying you can't visit there if you want to.

If they find it's unoccupied and You've told them it's not because you stay one night a month then they might turn round and say it's invalid or decline a potential claim. I wouldn't risk it personally.

There is a specialist insurer we used whose name escapes me. It costs a bloody fortune and when we sold, they totally messed up refunding the balance. But better insured than not.

We also used a specialist insurer, but it wasn't as expensive as expected. We paid about £450 for the year (this was in October 24). We didn't have to turn the water off, but it did have to be heated to at least 10 or 12 degrees. I'm sorry I forget the name of the insurer and a quick scan of my email hasn't turned it up.

We are currently in this situation too (death rather than care home sadly). My DMs house is a couple of hours away so I'm staying there every 6-8 weeks to do sorting. We've just had to change her insurance provider and the new company (Home protect) said that because we were staying there every few weeks, the best type of policy was actually holiday home insurance rather than unoccupied home insurance. This works better for us as with the last (unoccupied) policy we had to get a neighbour to check on the house weekly, but we don't have to do that now. It's more expensive (£65 p/m) but it won't be forever as we will also have to sell once probate is granted.

I'm an executor and have been shopping around for empty house insurance over the past week or so. When the house first became vacant in February this year the current insurers agreed to remain on cover until the renewal date (next week).

While the quotes I've obtained have varied wildly (£366 to £1660 per annum), all insurers have stipulated the property must be visited on a weekly basis and the visits evidenced. I live over a hundred miles away, but fortunately the neighbours are very obliging and have agreed to help out until the property is sold by going in to check then sign and date a book I've left in the house. I'm also going ask the estate agents if they'll do a check whenever they undertake a viewing.

The lowest quote I had was from Adrian Flux.

I used to make a landline phone call from the empty house to prove I'd been there once a week.

If there is a landline that is.

I've used Towergate in the past. It was very expensive, but needs must.

I’ve used Towergate for this. Expensive but seemed like the only option at the time.

Someone still has to visit the house weekly but we put it onto a management contract with the estate agent who was selling it as we lived several hours away. It meant they charged a slightly higher % to sell the house to cover this, but meant we weren’t paying for it upfront. The agent kept a visitor book record of their weekly visits plus any viewings they’d undertaken.

It is standard. If. It is in an area that likely to be vandalised then Iwould for extra locks. Try to Maintain the outside areas so that ir does not look unoccupied. Keep the garden tidy and leave a light in the hall and one other room.

I frequently arrange empty property insurance without a requirement to visit as part of my work. We use specialist providers eg Guardcover. Iirc they don't require the CH system to be drained but do check T&C regarding switching off water etc

That sounds very similar conditions to my mother's property.....we insured with Gallagher insurance brokers.
So that might be the company you're thinking of.

It could well be Gallagher actually - the name rings enough bells that I am sure we've used them for something, so this could be it.

We got cover through Howdens. About £450, heating has to be on a minimum 10-12 degrees. They only consider it occupied if someone stays overnight at least twice a week, so us visiting every day to do some work didn’t count.

Our insurer either wanted a minimum temperature all of the time or the water system to be completely drained.

Similar situation but DH deals with house insurance. He has to provide evidence of checking the house every 28 days and does so by taking a photo of the house on his phone.
The mains water is turned off. Central heating is now on frost free setting. These measures are preventative.
Insurance was sourced through a broker face to face and I believe covers vandalism and theft. I think you can get cover for most things but the premium will obviously reflect what the insurers believe the risk is.