How often does someone claim on buildings insurance?

[boxesboxes]

It's time to purchase buildings insurance, and I'm not sure what level to set the excess at. How often do people actually claim buildings insurance? I've never done it in the ten years I've owned properties, but that's not to say it doesn't happen all the time and I've just been lucky? It's an Edwardian semi detached house.

Thank you!

@boxesboxes

This might be a naive question, but what do burglars tend to steal? It's a £1.4m period house in London (not stealth brag, honestly, just setting the scene) but we're frugal people and don't have fancy tech or jewellery. Do they steal TVs? Furniture?

Whatever they want, depending on how desperate they are. Meantime they may take a dump on your sofa and smash up furniture and other items. I saw a report where someone had paint thrown all over their furniture and walls.

Fires aren't just caused by cooking. An appliance on its way out or faulty electrics can start fires.

If your house is flooded, everything in it could be damaged. Even if it doesn't get wet, it could go mouldy.

It's incredibly naive to think it could never happen to you.

@User4378645

We claimed once about 20 years ago when TV aerial blew off the roof in high winds as we had to get a new one put on the roof.

When our TV aerial blew down, it cost £70 to replace. Was yours a special one?

I do yes, I realise I missed that part out🙈.

Whilst the likelihood of a claim is low the cost doesn’t always dwarf £250/£500 depends on what you’re claiming for.

My car insurance for example was £20 extra pa to have £0 voluntary. I think that’s worth it. I our house insurance was I think £40 more for contents and buildings, covering accidents and all sorts of good stuff like outside the house. So in reality we have all our gadgets covered too, jewellery, bikes, blah blah and if anything happens to them it’s just £100. It’s worth it imo if there’s a wide coverage.

I've never claimed on house insurance or car insurance. Still pisses me off the price though. I have very low excess though.

I've only claimed once in 20 years due to a fire. My primary concern when buying insurance now is what is the limit on alternative accommodation costs. I was very lucky that when I made a claim with Virgin their limit was something like a million pounds. I'm amazed how many policies only cover up to £20k or even less! If the worst happens and you have to move out for a few months, that £20k will be eaten up very quickly by hotel costs for a couple of weeks, then rental costs thereafter. Most insurers have deals which mean you can only stay short term in specific pricey hotels and then rent via a specific estate agent. It's never the cheaper ones ime - I ended up having to rent a house for months that i could only dream of owning if I won the lottery, as it was the cheapest one with two bedrooms on "their" agent's books. Which was lovely, but cost the insurers a fortune in rent and the difference in council tax, gas bills etc compared to my poky terrace.

Whenever I've mentioned this to people, they always say they'd never even thought about that part of the policy. So I just thought I'd mention it - for me it's worth paying a couple of pounds more a month to know I won't be stranded after a few weeks in event of a disaster.

My aunt made 4 or 5 fairly minor (less than £5k each) claims over a 5/6 year period. Then when it came to renewal time her insurer refused to renew, and she really struggled to find anyone else who would insure her. So there's definitely a limit in how often they will have you claim.

Everything costs more than you imagine to replace, repair or clean after a flood or fire. My insurer insisted that all our clothing must be specialist dry cleaned to remove soot which contains toxic chemicals. The quote for a wardrobe and two chests of drawers worth of clothes, towels, bedding etc was £5 - 7k depending on weight! Which apparently was cheaper than replacing the whole lot.
A fairly minor house fire (no major structural damage other than one room's floorboards needed replacing and kitchen units had to be replaced, rewiring and redecorating needed) ended up costing just under £76k in between contents and building insurance all told.

My husband had his bag stolen which had his laptop in, it was insured under the contents insurance. I have my rings insured, laptops, bikes, other jewellery. So if I was mugged I would have to pay £250 excess not thousands to replace those items. My insurance is only £136 a year buildings and contents.

Katienana whoa who's your insurer?? That's super cheap

I've claimed twice in the past 2 years! One on the building side for a burst pipe and one for contents to cover my phone screen breaking when my daughter threw it down the stairs.

@boxesboxes

Thanks Maggie - when have you used the legal support, if you don't mind me asking? I honestly can't think when I'd need this urgently!

Personally I've used it to ask about where I stand with a neighbour's over growing hedges, very dull and I could have just asked mn!

A good friend however has used it to fund her legal case vs her employer for a case of constructive dismissal. It's been amazing. They've obviously made their own assessment that it's a case worth pursuing in the expectation that they will recover their costs, but it's been going on for 18months so far. She never would have dared take it on if she was going to risk having to foot the legal bill herself.

B&C insurance can sometimes cover surprising things. I was called for jury service and my employers refused to cover my salary. I didn’t have enough leave to take but my insurers made up the difference between the jury service day rate and my salary.

I claimed on both B&C when I had a big escape of water. Buildings paid for the drying out, stripping and skimming the walls and repairs to the fabric of the building. Contents paid for the new sofa, carpets and other bits and pieces ruined by the water. One of them (not sure which) paid for the cat to stay in cattery for an extra week while the big fans and dehumidifiers were in.

Over the years, I've claimed on contents for a stolen bike, a damaged carpet and a water damaged smart phone.

Re: legal cover - yes, get it. When it was most valuable for me was for a motor claim (the third part that hit me and wrote off my car) didn't give accurate details to the police, and the legal cover paid for a private detective to track her (and her insurers) down. Saved me a hell of a lot of money in recovered no claims and excesses.

For B&C claims, it is useful if the damage to your property is caused by a third party - a negligent tradesperson, someone driving a vehicle into your wall/garden, building work to an adjoining house that damages yours somehow. With legal cover, you stand a better chance of being able to recover your excess and no claims losses directly from them/their insurers, at no cost/risk to you other than the minimal policy cost.

In the 22 years we've been in this property, I've claimed for storm damage to greenhouses (lots of broken glass) a broken water main which was replaced, both in the first 2 years of living here, and then early 2020, the felt was ripped off a large shed roof which they paid for.