Understanding Home Contents Insurance

Posted by Nick Niesen on October 29th, 2010

Home contents insurance is taken out by home owners in order to safeguard their possessions through accident, theft, fire or any other misfortune that should happen. It will help you to replace the items and for this you pay a monthly set premium to the insurance provider you take the policy out with.

However as with any type of insurance it is never always easy to understand and there are often many hidden exclusions within a policy, which can mean that you wont be able to claim on the policy for certain things. An important factor to take into account when it comes to home contents insurance is that even if you are renting the property, insurance it is still advisable because this cover is put in place to protect your belongings not the shell of the property. When taking out a mortgage the lender might insist that you take out insurance for the shell or outside of your home but the contents insurance is down to you.

There are many different types of policy you can take out, so it is advisable to shop around for your insurance and know what is and is not included within the policy. For example the basic policy will not cover such things as a laptop, which you can take out of the home, while it might be insured if stolen from within the property it probably isn?t covered once taken away from the property.

When it comes to taking out home contents insurance it is essential that you don?t underestimate or overestimate the value of your possessions. If you were to suffer the misfortune of losing all your contents in say a fire and have underestimated the contents then of course you will lose out.

However if you have overestimated the value of your possessions then your premium will be higher then it needs to be.

Finally when taking out a policy do make sure that you know the exclusions and what is and is not covered by the premium you pay. Also ensure that if you have anything of particular value in your home that you mention this when taking out your policy as extremely valuable possessions might need extra cover and may not be included in the standard policy.