Landlord Buildings Insurance/Residential Buildings insurance.

Riveryellowstone11

Buildings insurance advice please.

I live in a Victorian conversion. Two flats, one building.

One flat is owner occupied, the other is rented. The two flats have separate owners. Share of freehold.

What are the options for buildings insurance please?

MyRealNameToo

Normally you would require a form of commercial insurance thats abbreviated to "Block Insurance" (block being a short for block of flats). There are some intermediaries claiming to specialise in small properties like house conversions. 

Some people report success in getting some insurers to consider it under other forms of insurance but that is only at purchase stage and none have come back to say how any claims went. Certainly some I believe will have misbought and have the claim declined as it was not a single dwelling. 

Riveryellowstone11

MyRealNameToo said:

Normally you would require a form of commercial insurance thats abbreviated to "Block Insurance" (block being a short for block of flats). There are some intermediaries claiming to specialise in small properties like house conversions. 

Some people report success in getting some insurers to consider it under other forms of insurance but that is only at purchase stage and none have come back to say how any claims went. Certainly some I believe will have misbought and have the claim declined as it was not a single dwelling. 

Thank you.

do you think there can be 2 separate buildings insurance policies?

One residential policy to cover the residential property and one Landlord policy to cover the let property?

or has to be one policy to cover entire building(block)?

MyRealNameToo

Riveryellowstone11 said:

MyRealNameToo said:

Normally you would require a form of commercial insurance thats abbreviated to "Block Insurance" (block being a short for block of flats). There are some intermediaries claiming to specialise in small properties like house conversions. 

Some people report success in getting some insurers to consider it under other forms of insurance but that is only at purchase stage and none have come back to say how any claims went. Certainly some I believe will have misbought and have the claim declined as it was not a single dwelling. 

Thank you.

do you think there can be 2 separate buildings insurance policies?

One residential policy to cover the residential property and one Landlord policy to cover the let property?

or has to be one policy to cover entire building(block)?

In principle its possible to, and in Scotland it used to be common to given they dont have leasehold but they are moving more towards having factoring companies that do much the same as a managing agent would in England inc buying block insurance. 

Your risk is... what happens if your co-freeholder fails to declare their criminal record? Or misses the renewal notice? You could find only half the building is insured and assuming you're the top half, if they have a major fire your insurers arent going to fix your half the building until someone has fixed the bottom half/made sure its still structurally sound etc. 

In Scotland, because it's common, there are additional laws like the right to demand evidence of your neighbours insurance and a simple legal process to force your neighbour to buy insurance. As England uses the leasehold system (you presumably are technically co-freeholder (or shareholder of freeloading company) and leaseholder) its not needed similar legislation.