Sharing partners/friends and buildings insurance in flats

Thanks for the replies.

If a leaseholder has a lodger then the leaseholder would only be letting a room in the flat not the whole flat itself so it would be fine and not invalidate the insurance policy.

OK, it sounds reasonable, but I feel it's different to what I've read elsewhere, but I can't remember the source now. And yes of course the mortgage agreement would need to be satisfied too.

Because you don't normally share a bed with your lodger.

What about romantic partners who don't share a bed (not unheard of e.g. if one has health issues that disturb the other, or if they just prefer it that way)? What about partners you sleep with sometimes, but not always, and otherwise lead separate lives from? There must be some legal precedent to show how the decision gets made.

It would also seem quite discriminatory against single people not to allow them to share their flat with a friend whilst a romantic partner is fine. But then again discrimination against single people is quite common anyway...

I'm just wondering now basically if I could ever have a friend come and live with me, if I wanted to.

I agree that it should seem simple - it would seem unreasonable for anyone to object to you having a partner live with you and pay some rent. But that doesn't mean an insurance company wouldn't object if it meant they could avoid paying out - it's not uncommon for people to be caught out by clauses in policies. If cohabiting with a partner is fine, they are probably more likely to object to you having a lodger. If Pixie5740 is right, then there is no problem. But here's one site that says taking a lodger can invalidate home insurance, for example, and I guess the same could apply to flats' building insurance. But there seems to be a whole continuum in between a partner and a lodger, from someone you've met a couple of times who needs a place to stay for a while to your best friend for the past 10 years, and I'm just wondering when is the line probably crossed from the legal point of view? I don't want to do something that I think is reasonable and then find myself in legal trouble later.

If couples can cohabit but not friends, I meant this seemed discriminatory in the sense that single people would then be forced to buy whole flats alone without being able to rent out any part, so their accommodation expense is higher per person than for the couple (unless they were willing to share a mortgage with a friend, which won't be that often). This seems unfair, but that doesn't mean it's not the legal situation with regard to these insurance policies. I just wondered if it's possible to say for definite, and if so is there a precise definition somewhere of what's OK?

I asked first about only the insurance to try and keep it simple. My lease says the flat should be used as "a private residence in single occupation", and none of those terms are precisely defined as far as I can see. I've read elsewhere that freeholders have used such clauses to tell leaseholders they can't have a lodger, but I don't know if that is actually legally justified. If anyone knows where the line is normally drawn with regard to the continuum above, then it would be interesting to know.

I'm fortunately mortgage-free so I can't give an example of how a relevant mortgage clause might look. I was thinking in general terms when I said "the mortgage agreement would need to be satisfied too".

I thought that extracting some clarity on these questions could be generally helpful for people who own flats and have space for another person. If the situation is just that it's legally murky, then so be it, but I thought someone here might know with more certainty.

Well the point I was getting at was that there's not a clear legal distinction to me between letting a lodger or friend pay rent to stay in your flat and letting a cohabiting non-married partner stay. So if letting a room to a lodger can void home insurance (see the link in my post above), why wouldn't having a cohabiting partner staying and paying rent do so too? Would there be differences between how a court treats someone who is denied an insurance claim on the basis that they had a partner, friend or lodger paying rent to them, and what would the legal basis for any difference be? It seems quite important to me to understand the legal situation, as many people could have such living arrangements without updating their insurance.