House insurance for new property

poppysocks1

Moved to this section - hopefully someone can help:

Survey back today for house we are buying. Small section saying that there has been some movement of the structure but not recent and it is due to property being on a sloping site. Surveyor not too concerned and no indication it is an ongoing problem but it is mentioned so I assume I do need to declare this when taking out buildings insurance and I have tried to get a couple of quotes this evening. One company I called has refused to insure the property and another company needs to know when it happened before they can make a decision but I dont know exact dates.

Does anyone have any experience of this? I feel rather stressed right now as if we cant get insurance then we cannot proceed. Any advice welcome.

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jenny74

If it is a new build (it is unclear from your post as the title suggests it is, but the texts staes the movement is not recent) then it sounds like normal settlement of a new house, which is excluded from general insurance polices, BUT covered by the buikder/deveopler under the buildings guarentee.

If it is an older property, then that is a different story, and you will only normally get insurance through the company who currently insurer it, they will continue to insure the risk. SO find out who the current (or last) insurer is (was) and go to them.

I remember an old lady rang to cancel her buildings policy for some obscure reason, and that the policy had increased in premium by £2 ... We asked her if she was sure she wanted to cancel, yes she was. She was back on the phone less than 2 days later wanting to re-instate the policy as she couldn't get cover elsewhere. (Her house has previous subsidence).

Don't panic, you will be able to insure it.

poppysocks1

Hi
Thanks. It was built around 1870, victorian semi detached.

poppysocks1

I assume that it wont be cheap, if it is a specialist type of insurance that is needed. I cannot find any normal insurers on line that will cover anything that has had movement (even minimally), and although it probably isnt even a problem, it states it in the survey so I feel like I cannot ignore it as then i wont have disclosed the full facts but it is a real pain and is going to affect how we feel about going ahead with the purchase.

jenny74

Just find out from the vendor who currently insurers the property and then ring them up. They may have to refer the quote, (To a supervisor or underwriter, cos most of the people you get on the phone are monkeys) but it shouldn't be overly expensive.

It's not (or shouldn't be) a problem. My house had mining subsidence years ago, and we just took out a policy with the previous insurer when we bought the house.