Landlord Insurance
This is referred to as buy to let insurance. Provided you choose an insurance policy specifically for landlords as opposed to a standard household insurance policy, then you should receive the full cover that you require such as property owners liability.
Generally, a standard household insurance policy does not provide the same level of cover, and many insurers exclude cover when a property is let. It is extremely important that you check if your current household policy provides cover for your property once it is let to tenants.
There are many different policies available. These range from landlords building insurance, which usually provides cover for incidents such as fire and flood, landlord contents insurance, which usually covers incidents such as fire, theft or malicious damage, and fully comprehensive landlords insurance, which may include cover for such things as legal expenses and loss of rent. The policies offered usually provide property owners liability to protect the landlord against liability claims made by the tenant.
New legislation brought into effect by the Government from April 2006 means that any landlord which lets a property considered to be in multiple occupation will be required to have a property licence under certain circumstances. A “household” is generally considered to be members of the same family who live together or married couples. A house of multiple occupation is any property housing three or more “households” that share facilities, such as the kitchen, toilet or bathroom. Currently insurers are generally not asking for details of property licences, but it could be a future requirement for your insurance policy.
Landlord Insurance is not legally required but is highly recommended. We recommend that you at least have your buildings insured, as a property can be a valuable investment for the owner and an unexpected incident could wipe out that investment, meaning a loss of a considerable amount of money should the property be uninsured. Furthermore, having valid buildings insurance will be a condition of any mortgage you may have on the property. As a landlord, you will also want property owners liability insurance in place to protect yourself against any potential claims from your tenant holding you responsible for any injury they may have received on your property.
Rental Trader works in partnership with Endsleigh Insurance to offer all our landlords low cost exceptional Insurance offers at great prices. We would like to stress once again the importance of taking buildings and/or contents insurance when letting out your property. It is an inexpensive way to cover yourself against many potential perils.
You can have a policy for just yourself or for everyone in the property. You can even cover yourself against accidental damage or loss of items which you take out of the house!
For an online quote please Click here or call Endsleigh on 0800 783 2526, and please remember to mention Rental Trader.
Landlord building insurance
The cost of building insurance depends on many different factors, such as the property location, rebuild value and tenant type. For example, your insurance premium may be lower if you were to insure a building which has a low rebuild value of, say, £50,000 as opposed to a property with a much higher rebuild value. If your property is located in an area know to be a high crime risk, then you may find that the insurance premium will be much higher than if the property was located in a town with a very low crime rate. Some insurers will apply a load or a discount to your policy based on the type of tenant you have in the property. It may be cheaper to insure a property occupied by a professional person, for example, rather than a property occupied by asylum seekers.
When arranging your buildings insurance, you should insure the let building for the rebuild/re-instatement value and not the sale price. The sale price is usually a much higher figure since it includes the land on which the property is built, although in some cases (e.g. certain listed buildings) the sale price may be lower than the rebuild value. The re-instatement value should take into account costs such as the rebuilding of the property, the clearage of the site, surveyor costs, etc. The Association of British Insurers have an online tool which can give an indication as to the rebuild value of your property, but there is no guarantee as to the accuracy of the results. The only accurate way to obtain the re-instatement value is to have a professional survey carried out.
Rental Trader works in partnership with Endsleigh Insurance to offer all our landlords low cost Insurance at great prices. For an online quote please Click here or call Endsleigh on 0800 783 2526, and please remember to mention Rental Trader.
Landlord contents insurance
Many landlords add contents to their buildings insurance policy for a small additional premium. Some insurers will apply a discount when you take out a policy which has both contents and buildings insurance, which in some cases means that your premium will be lower by adding the minimum value of contents to your policy. Usually the tenant’s contents would not be covered by the policy, only the contents of the landlord which are for the use of the tenant, such as whitegoods. The cost of the policy will depend upon the value of the contents you wish to insure.
We highly recommend that you insure the contents of any let property, e.g. carpets, curtains and whitegoods, against risks such as fire and theft.
Rental Trader works in partnership with Endsleigh Insurance to offer all our landlords low cost Insurance at great prices. For an online quote please Click here or call Endsleigh on 0800 783 2526, and please remember to mention Rental Trader.
