Home insurance - subsidence

kittb

Hi
Do you have any pointers please on how to get a good price for home insurance as I have the words "subsidence" in the survey on my mortgage. When we bought the house I phoned many many difference companies and explained the situation .... we apparently have a history of non progressive subsidence ie at some point in the last 40 years the house shows signs of having shifted. Nothing current and nothing that needs dealing with.

I only managed to get one company happy to insure us and that was direct line. They didn't seem the least bit concerned, I had to check, check and check again that they had understood. We have a higher excess if a claim is related to subsidence and obviously the premiums reflect that they are covering us when noone else will.

But the renewal has just come through for £950 for buildings and contents on a modest 3 bedroom semi. I have looked through to see if they have added any nice extras that have made it go up by £110 from last year but no. And I can't see anything that we could cut out to reduce the cost.

So just a desperate plea for advice please?

Thanks
Kit

huckster

How long ago did you have the house surveyed and what did it say exactly?

When was the house built, construction type, cause of the original subsidence? Is the property in an area known for subsidence, as far as your are aware?

The reason for asking these questions, is that when you approach companies or brokers, they will need to obtain a lot of information. Some may require a new structural engineers report, before they are willing to look at quoting.

vaio

From the other reports of premium hikes in different threads only 12% increase almost sounds like a result

*Scarlett

How expensive is the contents element with Direct Line?

You will probably always have difficulty obtaining a really good price on the buildings with the subsidence issue but there is nothing stopping you from moving the contents cover elsewhere.

You might have some exclusions applied to the contents cover eg alternative acommodation might be excluded for subsidence claims (but you might have this type of cover on the buildings anyway).

Get a few quotes for your contents and see if you could make a saving. Ask Direct Line for a price to cover the buldings only and you can work out if it would be worth shifting the contents elsewhere.

If you have had the policy for a few years, you can probably find a cheaper deal for your contents.

Hope this helps.

kittb

huckster wrote: »

How long ago did you have the house surveyed and what did it say exactly?

When was the house built, construction type, cause of the original subsidence? Is the property in an area known for subsidence, as far as your are aware?

The reason for asking these questions, is that when you approach companies or brokers, they will need to obtain a lot of information. Some may require a new structural engineers report, before they are willing to look at quoting.

The survey was 6 years ago and said:
"there is slight differential movement between the entrance porch and main building but this is within acceptable limits and not a serious defect. There are several step fractures to the rear elevation. These are unsightly due to have being not properly repointed. This is unlikely to be a result of progressive structural movement, but the exitsting Buildings Insurance Policy should be retained as a preaution due to there being a history of structural problems in the area"

We're on a hill with really bad clay soil so I think its when it gets wet and then dries hard, the garden has great cracks across it in the summer. Its a standard brick built house built early 70s.

I'll definitely call up and ask about splitting off the contents although I have a vague memory (due to two small children who don't let me sleep properly) that we had trouble getting that cover too.

I've had reasonable success calling each year and just asking them to reduce it, checking through the details etc and we do have all our policies with them as you get a discount on each and they've always been competitive. Guess we've just been hit with the general hikes by the sounds of it though.

Thanks for replying.
Kit