Can anyone advise on house insurance please?

[bobsgirl]

Our house is in an established urban area, backs on to a railway line and a deep culvert with a small brook in it. This has definitely not flooded in the time the house has been there (around 30 years) and never to our knowledge. On the Environment Agency Flood Maps it is in Zone 2 which is 'medium risk of flooding', as is much of London (in fact a lot of London is higher risk than that)

Do we need to get any special insurance or would a normal insurer flag up any concerns? We can answer all the questions honestly on comparison sites for normal insurance and can't imagine that most Londoners pay extra for specialist flooding policies but the solicitor, who handled the purchase, told us we should check this out and we're not sure how. Our concern is that if we ask insurers directly we may raise concerns needlessly. A normal building and contents policy is £200-300 but a specialist flood risk policy is £600-700 so it's a big difference for us to manage

Any thoughts or advice would be appreciated

Normal insurance is fine. Just fill out the form honestly on the price comparison site: yes, it is within x metres of water, no it has never flooded.

There is no danger of "needlessly raising concerns" of an insurer. Much better to be upfront now rather than find you're not covered in the event of a claim.

Agree with the previous poster. Use a price comparison site and answer the water and flooding questions accurately. You won't get as many quotes back as a few insurers won't insure within a certain distance of water but lots will. Oh and when you find the cheapest check quidco and topcashback for extra money back.

Thank you for the help.

We had a look on one of the comparison sites but it didn't ask about distance from water which was the big difference between that and the specialist insurer. We didn't know if the normal insurers would just rely on flood maps related to the postcode as they didn't ask

Hopefully as long as all the questions are answered honestly it should be fine and, as I said, this applies to many others around London who possibly aren't even aware of it

Some of the insurance companies will have it in the small print. Check the assumptions on the policy you are buying before you buy if you use a comparison site.