United Kingdom Holiday Home Insurance

If you own or are purchasing a holiday home in the UK then Insurance For Holiday Homes can offer you insurance for buildings and contents designed exclusively for these properties

What do insurers class as a holiday home or second home?

Our Insurers class a home to be a holiday / second home if it:

Is used by the owner and family/friends for recreational use for holidays or short breaks.
Is Let out for financial reward providing the property is let for recreational holidays or short breaks, no single let can exceed 6 weeks.
Is located in an area that insurers perceive would be used in for holiday use.
Is of standard construction, being built of brick, stone or concrete and roofed with slates, tiles asphalt or concrete. However underwriters will consider other construction if it complies with building regulations.

Why do you require a specialised Holiday Home insurance policy

As an owner of a holiday home or second home, you need to consider many aspects of an insurance policy. A standard household insurance policy will have many restrictions and limitations such as the holiday home having to be occupied every week, no extension to allow the home to be let for holiday use, limited or no accidental damage extensions, restrictions on liability cover, and in truth there will be many more!

Hence the need to obtain an insurance policy that caters for the needs of a holiday home / second home owners.

Why choose us “Insurance For Holiday Homes”

As our name suggests we specialise in insuring holiday homes, we have worked very closely with our underwriters at Lloyd’s of London to design a flexible and comprehensive policy to meet the needs of holiday and second home owners as well as being competitive for the level of cover we provide. We also believe in a very high level of customer service.

Benefits of insuring through “Insurance For Holiday Homes”

As a policy holder you will benefit from a comprehensive level of cover. Here is a brief outline of the level of insurance cover we can provide.

Buildings Insurance – Loss or damage to the property caused by – fire, lightning, explosion – aircraft – earthquake – storm – flood – escape of water, and frost damage – impact – falling trees – locating leaking water – accidental breakage to fixed glass, ceramic hobs and sanitary fixtures – riot and malicious damage – theft or attempted theft – plus many more.
Contents Insurance – Loss or damage to the contents caused by – fire, lightning, explosion – aircraft – earthquake – storm – flood – escape of water, and frost damage – impact – falling trees – accidental damage to mirrors, glass tops and fixed glass in furniture – riot and malicious damage – theft or attempted theft – plus many more.
Your Policy will be underwritten at Lloyd’s of London – one of the world’s largest and most established insurer.
Accidental damage cover – available for Contents with the option to extend accidental damage cover to your contents caused by guests staying at your holiday home.
Accidental damage cover – available for Buildings with the option to extend accidental damage cover to your Buildings caused by guests staying at your holiday home.
Loss of rent cover for up-to £35,000 – for pre-booked rentals following a loss covered under the buildings.
Alternative accommodation cover – following loss covered under the buildings.
Legal Liability to the public of £5,000,000 – this is a crucial element of cover for any holiday home owner’s particularly when the home is being let for holiday use, due to the increasing trends to towards suing for damages to property or injury.
Accidents to Domestic Staff – cover for bodily injury to domestic staff employed in connection with the insured premises.
Swimming Pool cover included – cover automatically included under buildings insurance along with Legal Liability to the public.

Reasonable requirements

Due to the increased risk of escape of water, theft, or unnoticed damage that comes with insuring UK holiday homes as opposed to a main residence, insurers have been known to make unreasonable demands of their clients to validate their policy, which can be found after digging through the small print. However at Insurance For Holiday Homes we are transparent about our simple requirements:

The property must be checked internally once every 60 days – this is to prevent any damage from growing over a long period of time. Most insurers will require this, or ask that all claims must be reported within 60 days of the damage.
Minimum security requirements when contents are insured for more than £30,000 – we ask that all external doors are fitted with five lever deadlocks or the European equivalent, which may include doors with multipoint locking systems and all windows are fitted with key operated locks, or shutters with internal catches.
Escape of water requirements between Nov 1st and March 31st – to be covered against escape of water you have 3 options, either turn your water supply off at the stopcock at the first available entry to the home and turn on your hot and cold taps to drain the water from the system. Alternatively you can keep your home heated at a constant 10°c 24 hours a day with any loft hatches left open on a thermostatically controlled system (excluding night storage heating systems). Or if you have a frost stat setting on your heating system, that needs to be set to operate at no less than 4°c.

Fortunately “Insurance For Holiday homes” can provide a solution. We are specialists in holiday home insurance abroad, but we operate entirely in the UK. You can call us and speak to our team of advisors in our UK office, claims are reported to the insurer’s UK claims department and our policy is underwritten at Lloyd’s of London, one of the world’s leading insurers.