Do we need buildings insurance? (freehold/cash edition)

[JamaicanFlowers]

I've just purchased a semi-detached house (freehold, not leasehold); and I've done it with cash (no mortgage or financing from 3rd parties). I'm not swimming in millions: prices in the North are low; but if I still have £50+k left for a rainy day, and I prefer to bear that risk myself vs selling it to the insurer, why should I get it?

i.e: Do I (legally) need buildings insurance? (the deed says so)
Why is Acme Insurers any better than the savings of my parents for example?

thanks :)

I don't want to encourage/promote/defend recklessness, just to disassociate the legal from the financial (bayesian) decision.

In that case you definitely need a lawyer to tell you what you can/can't do legally - until you know that there is no financial (bayesian) decision to make.

Funny how two posters out of many are the ones you are siding with! I think the insurance requirement is likely to be covenant and who has the benefit of the covenant is key. If that person or company is around and asks you to prove you have insurance, then you'll have to prove it. That's the kind of covenant that often goes with a rentcharge. Whoever collects the rentcharge may also have the benefit of the covenant.

And I'm not offended Suki - I think not having buildings insurance is stupid and reckless, plus the OP's attitude was off.

Just to be clear, I wasn't suggesting the op shouldn't get buildings insurance if she's legally obliged to.

But if she isn't then it's her prerogative to take a calculated risk. And I dont think it's necessarily "stupid" or "reckless".

It is indeed her prerogative. Bug the somewhat smug assertion that her £50K will sort out 2 houses is wrong. Her calculation is based on no information, a false belief - no Bayesian inferences at all, it would seem

Why wouldn't anyone who knows that the OP as her sums wrong go to some pains to point it out, even to repeat it in the face of her determination to be right? As in, her £50Kish would barely get a site cleared let alone get 1 or 2 houses rebuilt!