House Insurance. This is embarrassing...

Arabella80

..I'm applying for household insurance for the first time. There are things I have no idea about and am actually too embarrassed to ask but feel safer online. So here goes:

When I submit a total for my household contents in a price quotation, should I do an inventory and try to remember the price of everything I brought years ago? Do I submit a total of contents at their brought price or how much they would cost to replace today? How easy is it to be accurate?

Also, a price comparisons website is offering policy quotations with contents cover around twice the value I submitted and building cover up to five times the price BCIS gave me as the value of my property. What does this mean? Should I still take one one of these policy quotations if I choose? I don't want to give inaccurate info or pay over the odds.

I would really value any advice that can be given.

dunstonh

When I submit a total for my household contents in a price quotation, should I do an inventory and try to remember the price of everything I brought years ago? Do I submit a total of contents at their brought price or how much they would cost to replace today? How easy is it to be accurate?

The safer option is to go with a policy with automatic cover up to £xxx. xxx being a high enough value to play it on the safe side. Many plans will more than have enough to cover the average person.

Also, a price comparisons website is offering policy quotations with contents cover around twice the value I submitted and building cover up to five times the price BCIS gave me as the value of my property. What does this mean?

These are the most common plans for the average person nowadays. It is cheaper for the insurers to offer blanket cover upto an amount without going through all the calculations of how much things are worth.

These policies are perfectly fine unless you have specialist contents or buildings of unusual construction.

Arabella80

Thank you for that, you're very kind :beer:

InsideInsurance

You need to add up the cost of buying EVERYTHING again today and brand new.

I emphasis everything because too often people only include the big things like TVs or sofas but its surprising how quickly all the little things can add up to a big number and leave you under insured.

Most people find it easiest to do an inventory and explicitly price the large ticket items and use average figures for the smaller items so something like 300 CDs at £7.50 each

The alternative is to go for blanket cover and hope that it is sufficient but it is still sensible to do the adding up first

With blanket policies it is worth checking (a) what cover there is for valuables/ high risk/ personal possessions and (b) for any policy check the exact definition of the above terms as these can vary significantly