How do I work out rebuild cost for ins

retiredandskint

Having made major changes this year to our outgoings the last one on the list is house and contents insurance.

I can go room to room working out approx cost of fixtures, fittings and the bits in between but have no idea where to start on rebuild cost or working out square footage.

ACG

Most policies offer a generic sum such as £500,000 or £1,000,000 or even unlimited.

retiredandskint

Thanks ACG

Aretnap

The ABI have a calculator for estimating the rebuild cost here

https://abi.bcis.co.uk

Though definitely err on the side of caution - over insuring by a few grand will likely make very little difference to your premium, and it's a lot better than finding that you're underinsured by a few grand if the house burns to the ground. As ACG says, many policies these days cover you for a generic sum (eg £500K) which is set so as to be much higher than the rebuild cost of most normal houses (maybe you'd need a higher sum if you live in a castle, or a 16th century listed thatched cottage).

Also err on the side of caution when estimating the value of your contents. Remember that (a) you shoukd calculate the value on a new for old basis and (b) you have to include all the contents, whether or not you would actually be worried about replacing them. Which means that you have to include the cost of replacing all the old clothes at the back of the wardrobe, all the DVDs you don't watch anymore and all the junk in the loft with equivalent new stuff. It's surprising how quickly those sorts of thing add up - the final tally will be more than you expected, I can almost guarantee it. Again, many policies these days apply a large generic sum (eg £50000, £75000) which will generally suffice unless you have very expensive tastes, or an inordinate amount of junk in the loft.

retiredandskint

Thanks for that. No castle or thatched cottage here sadly just a 10 year old house.

It's not the junk in the loft that bothers me but my husband's large library of expensive specialised books (not first editions).