Buildings & Contents for big houses - help!

chickenandmonkey

This is my first post - any help would be appreciated! Does anyone know of any companies who provide competitively priced buildings & contents insurance on big houses? Our renewal has just come through with TESCO. Last year we paid about £400, the renewal this year is for £770! We did make a claim earlier this year for a broken camera lens (£220), but have not claimed for about 8 years prior to this. Our house has 5 bedrooms, 12 rooms (not counting kitchen or bathrooms). Most of the comparison sites wont quote if you have more than 4 bedrooms or 9 rooms (not counting kitchen/bathrooms).
Anyone used any good companies?
Thanks!

Kavanne

call tesco and say it is too expensive and you don't want to renew. I bet they will come down.

I did this with RBS they came down from 491 to 390!!!

silvercar

Directline will cover upto 5 bedrooms on their online quote. Their plus policy includes unlimited building cover.

bb2611

Ring a insurance broker i'm sure they will have plenty of companies that will quote

glider3560

What is the rebuild value of the property and value of the contents? If over a certain limit, then a specialist insurer may be the best place to go.

lisyloo

I have a 5 bed house and didn't really have any problems getting quotes.
Last year I went with Lloyds TSB and got £120 cashback with quidco (don't know if that's still a current offer as it was August 08).
The price was £440 before cashback.

We got £240K buidlings and £80K contents.
Did accidental damage for contents and not buildings.
Took personal possessions, legal cover and single item limit was £5K so did not need to list expensive jewelry/cameras.

Your claim WILL increase your premium.
But you do need to shop around as premiums can vary hugely in this part of the market.

dacouch

With a house of that size the OP should make sure whoever they take cover with has a suitable amount of contents cover as most direct companies when they quote will quote a sum insured that is not suitable for this size house. (Check your Tesco Policy as well).

You should also check that the policy offers sufficient cover for the total amount of "High Risk / Valuables" as direct companies often have a very low limit for these eg between £7000 and £13000. With the size of house you have I would expect you have a higher amount of valuables than a normal home

lisyloo

I honestly never had any trouble with this.
I'm pretty thorough about checking all the options - legal, bicycles, accidental damage, personal possessions, single item limit, valuable etc.
My current policy with Lloyds TSB has £5K single limit which covers all our expensive cameras and jewelry items.

One thing I always find difficult is personal possessions as if you take expensive camera, jewelry, watches etc.

I would agree with checking it all out, but I dd find most companies would quote for or requirements.