4 essential insurance tips for home buyers
Getting house insurance for your new property is a bit of a no-brainer, especially since most lenders won’t provide a home loan without some kind of cover. If you’re planning to buy a new property, here are some tips to keep in mind to avoid any costly mistakes.
1. Research the property’s insurance history
When you find a property that you’re interested in, find out everything you can about things that may impact your ability to get cover. A property’s age, condition, size and construction materials may affect the overall cost of your insurance premiums so it pays to know what you might be getting into before you purchase. It’s also useful to find out if it’s currently insured, how much the premiums are, if there are any special terms or if there have been any incidents that could affect its chances of being reinsured in the future.
2. Sort your cover early
As we mentioned earlier, banks usually make house insurance a condition of any lending, so it’s important to get some insurance sorted as soon as you can. This includes making sure that your cover comes into effect from the date the property becomes yours, even if you’re not moving in yet, to avoid a hefty bill if anything happens. Get in touch with an adviser if you’re not sure what the best cover is for your new home so that you can get it right from the beginning.
3. Get your sum-insured right
Most house insurance is based on a ‘sum insured’ amount – it’s important that you get this number right because this is how much you will be paid out if your home is damaged. Your sum insured amount should take into account the cost of fully rebuilding your home, including any costs for demolition. Don’t get caught out paying too much for insurance you don’t need or not paying enough and fronting the cost should anything happen.
4. Always keep your cover up to date
Your home insurance should always reflect any improvements or renovations you’ve done so that if the worst happens, you’re covered. Depending on what you’ve added to your home, you may need to take a look at your policy to check it’s covered – this is because recreational features such as swimming pools might not be included and you may need additional cover for this. Insurance providers can also reassess the cover they offer over time due to things like increasing erosion risk. This means your future premiums could go up or exclusions could be added. If you want to have a chat about your home insurance situation, get in touch with us and we’ll get you sorted!
The financial strain of an injury or illness can cripple a person’s lifestyle. This is the risk that people take every day as they step out of the shower, as they get into their car and drive on the road, as they go to work. Each and every day people are taking risks, putting their very livelihood at possible danger!
But there is a way to protect that and I am certainly not saying stay at home and hide. But through the right insurance cover you can ease or even completely remove any financial burden caused by illness and injury, and while the cover might not take the physical or emotional pain away, it will allow you to focus on more important things like spending time with loved ones and/or focusing on getting better.
Anyone who appreciates how fragile life can be, should know how important it is to protect it – for it could be the very thing keeping it all together one day, and wouldn’t you be glad that you spent time on getting your insurance cover right if you were faced with the unexpected illness or injury!
