home building and insurance

[jean88]

I have been buying home building and contents insurance every year ever since I moved into my house over 10 years ago. All my friends and neighbours(most of the neighbour have not bought insurance) saying I am just throwing my money away because I have not made one claim. I feel a lot better if these are renewed every year. What are your views?

Thanks.

[Fitzer]

If you've bought your house with a mortgage then your lender will insist that you have buildings cover. If it's a council house then one would assume that the insurance is covered in the rent. Contents cover is up to your attitude to risk, every day houses burn down, get hit by floods etc.

[stevie21]

I know I'm not saying anything new but the vast majority of mortgage lenders will insist on buildings insurance so you may have no choice with this.
By all means shop around but you might have to have such a policy in some form.

Some insurance companies give a discount if you take buildings and contents together and I don't remember contents insurance being *that* expensive. The pain of spending �20 a month on it is FAR outweighed by the joy of knowing that all your goodies will be replaced in the event of fire/burglary etc.
If it makes you and your friends happier then drop your old TV and claim for a new one from your insurance company. (Kidding!!)
Is it the fact that you've never claimed that they object to or that fact that you have insurance in the first instance?

Personally, I'd stick with it although it's obviously your decision.

[mcphailan]

Don't forget the risk of flooding ruining your possessions if you live in an area that may be at risk, and - let's face it - more and more people seem to be .....

[spudqueen]

NO WAY are you throwing money away. Just try and calculate how much it would cost to replace EVERYTHING in your home if say a fire was to destroy your house. It would cost thousands and thousands of pounds. Think of everything, furniture, carpets, clothes, shoes, books, cds etc etc. I feel MUCH better being insured, in fact Mr Spudqueen and I are thinking of increasing our contents insurance to ensure we are fully covered. I once knew a bloke who had a fire in his flat, no insurance and all he was left with was the clothes he was stood up in.

[jean88]

Thanks all. I totally agreed with all those points, just some people trying to tell me different.

[Otrere]

You never know what's going to happen so no, insurance is certainly not a waste of money. Me, I've got just about everything insured for my own peace of mind and security more than anything. You could bet your life if I cancelled it something nasty would happen and I'd be in schtuck!

[Mistopheles]

My grandmother has always had insurance and had never claimed, so she decided against it. A few months on, she changed her mind and got it back. 1 week after going back on the insurance, they discovered a pipe had been leaking under her kitchen floor for over a year, and had destroyed most of the ground floor of the property. She had to move out for 6 months, (stayed in a hotel for most of it) and the reapirs to the house cost over �10,000. Fortunately the insurance covered everything. GET INSURANCE!

[nykkieberry]

We had insurance for years then in the space of a month (August 2002), my son knocked a plate of red curry over an expensive cream wool carpet; my partner dropped a glass in the bathroom sink and broke the sink; we dropped a mayonnaise jar and chipped a tile on the kitchen floor - when they replaced the tile, they found a leak under the floor that had rotted the kitchen cupboards, skirting, floor boards and door frame so the whole lot had to be replaced! - and to top it all off, we got burgled and they cleaned out the entire downstairs!

Believe me, the �25 a month premium was WELL WORTH IT!