Contents insurance before bought any contents?

Brian88839

I am buying my first home and have to have building insurance in place immediately, but would like to have contents insurance once I have some contents.


I am in furnished rented accommodation at the moment, so own no furniture or appliances, and will be buying these over the first month when I own the house. I'll have about a month overlap with the rented accommodation and will move into the new house once it's got the essentials in.


Do you have any advice on getting insurance?


If I get building insurance, would it be for a year, and would I be locked to that provider if I wanted to upgrade to contents insurance once I had some contents?

Robin9

It will make little difference to the premium just how much stuff you own. So you won't be upgrading every time you but something new.

You do have contents already - clothes, money, camera, phone .........

Aretnap

Brian88839 wrote: »

If I get building insurance, would it be for a year, and would I be locked to that provider if I wanted to upgrade to contents insurance once I had some contents?

If you want to go down that road buildings and contents insurance can be bought entirely separately - it's only for convenience that most people buy a combined policy.


However contents insurance is pretty cheap and for the sake of a month's premium I would just get buildings and contents insurance together from the date of purchase.

Brian88839

Thanks for the replies. I will also be putting in a kitchen - which I think falls under the buildings insurance side.


Would I be able to get a quote for the prospective value of the contents once all bought?
(as opposed to adding the items to the policy later - and not being able to price compare at the updated price).


I've never had house insurance before. If contents insurance is pretty cheap, perhaps I'm overthinking it

Aretnap

Brian88839 wrote: »

Thanks for the replies. I will also be putting in a kitchen - which I think falls under the buildings insurance side.

Rule of thumb: pick up the house and shake it. Anything that rattles is contents - anything that doesn't is buildings.

Would I be able to get a quote for the prospective value of the contents once all bought?
(as opposed to adding the items to the policy later - and not being able to price compare at the updated price).

Yes, it should be fine to get a quote for the value of contents you anticipate having eventually. Certainly I never feel the need to update my insurers when I get a new washing machine.


When working out what the value of contents is likely to be, don't forget that possessions like clothing, book, DVDs etc quickly add up - especially as you should be valuing them on a new for old basis (ie the cost of replacing all those old clothes you barely wear with equivalent new ones).



On the whole it is better to be insured for too high a contents value than too low - the difference in price between £10K and £15K of cover is likely to be negligible - but could save you a lot of hassle in the event of a claim if the assessor thinks that £10K is too low. Many policies won't use the value you provide anyway and will offer a blanket cover of, say, up to £50K, which is way more than you need, but isn't necessarily any more expensive than trying to find a policy to cover you for £13,047.64.


Most policies also have a limit on what they'll pay for any single item unless it's declared to them specifically, so you'll have to think about whether you're going to get anything above that limit. Though TBH it's unlikely to be an issue unless you're into expensive jewellry, antique furniture or very high end electrical goods.

alfie1950

You are overthinking it.
Just take out buildings and contents insurance together.....usually the standard policy is for preset amounts unless you have unusual circumstances.
e.g. buildings covered up to £1,000,000 and contents £75,000.
I have found sometimes that once you start trying to alter these amounts the cost rises even though you reduce the amount of cover.
Usually I manage to get B+C insurance for around £110/year and by using cashback sites can usually get another £50 or so off that figure.
You can keep the cost down by not specifying loss of expensive items away for the home and being realistic about the level of excess needed.
Some insurers even used to give free standard contents cover if you took out buildings insurance...from memory I think it was Aviva and Morethan but haven't checked if they still do.