Outbuildings, covered as standard?

Mr.Boy

My newly purchased property is a large detached Victorian house, separately in the garden there is a timber cabin which is fully fitted out with electricity, water and heating, bathroom & kitchen, essentially a 1-bedroom wooden bungalow. Full planning permission, council regs approval. It even has a separate electrical connection.

I'm getting building insurance quotes before moving in and unclear if this would be covered as standard? I have not been prompted to provide any information about this on comparison sites. 

MyRealNameToo

What are you using it for? 

It will make answering questions like how many bathrooms are in your property more complex and certainly I'd be wanting clarification on if that should be answered for the main building only or both. 

As long as it's not being lived in and certainly not being rented out so you are just going to use it as OTT storage or occasional family visits etc then some will be comfortable considering it an outbuilding. Note that the cover for outbuildings is often different to that for the main building, there is often an inner limit on contents claims within them and in some policies claims for subsidence etc will not be considered if they only effect the outbuilding. 

Mr.Boy

MyRealNameToo said:

What are you using it for? 

It will make answering questions like how many bathrooms are in your property more complex and certainly I'd be wanting clarification on if that should be answered for the main building only or both. 

As long as it's not being lived in and certainly not being rented out so you are just going to use it as OTT storage or occasional family visits etc then some will be comfortable considering it an outbuilding. Note that the cover for outbuildings is often different to that for the main building, there is often an inner limit on contents claims within them and in some policies claims for subsidence etc will not be considered if they only effect the outbuilding. 

I don't know yet, I haven't moved in. I am not getting contents insurance quotes at this point but that seems odd because garages often contain expensive tools, etc.

But regardless, what/how am I supposed to make sure the insurer knows these details so they can give a reasonable quote and issue a policy that gives proper cover? Do I do an online comparison to get an idea, then phone up a couple and do it the old fashioned way? 

MyRealNameToo

Mr.Boy said:

MyRealNameToo said:

What are you using it for? 

It will make answering questions like how many bathrooms are in your property more complex and certainly I'd be wanting clarification on if that should be answered for the main building only or both. 

As long as it's not being lived in and certainly not being rented out so you are just going to use it as OTT storage or occasional family visits etc then some will be comfortable considering it an outbuilding. Note that the cover for outbuildings is often different to that for the main building, there is often an inner limit on contents claims within them and in some policies claims for subsidence etc will not be considered if they only effect the outbuilding. 

I don't know yet, I haven't moved in. I am not getting contents insurance quotes at this point but that seems odd because garages often contain expensive tools, etc.

But regardless, what/how am I supposed to make sure the insurer knows these details so they can give a reasonable quote and issue a policy that gives proper cover? Do I do an online comparison to get an idea, then phone up a couple and do it the old fashioned way? 

And people often find they are under insured at the point of claim.

Direct Line for example give you £50,000 contents cover as standard but only £2,500 for outbuildings contents; their "plus" policy doubles both. This is why I push for people to not just buy on price and actually read the documentation before buying! With DL you can adjust the contents cover up but the outbuilding limits are fixed so if £5k is too low for all the stuff you store in your outbuildings then it's not the policy for you. 

Assuming you are otherwise a fairly standard household then yes thats what I would do, get quotes online and do deeper investigations with the ones that return favourable prices. If you are not a standard household, particularly if you have a lot of stuff over £1k then you may be better off dealing with insurers aimed at those who are more affluent etc. NFU dont work for us because of their approach to personal possessions but rural houses with lots of outbuildings they are good with as their background is farming where outbuildings are much more common. 

Mr.Boy

Oh yes I think I've heard a previous owner mention NFU. Google also threw up Towergate who I will contact.

MyRealNameToo

Towergate are an intermediary, they are very variable depending on which part of the business you are dealing with... if you were to look at Trustpilot you'd probably be put off but its a little more complex because of how fragmented they are.