Why should you get landlord's cover?
Landlord's insurance may be something that you may wish to consider because:
- you may not be able to afford to rebuild or repair the property if it were damaged or destroyed by an insurable risk. Even if you could afford to rebuild the property, would you want to pay for the repair work yourself?
- you may be obliged to get let property insurance under the terms of your mortgage. After all, your lender is also taking a risk on the property. As their security, the value of the property is important to them, so they may insist that you have adequate cover in place to repair or rebuild it.
Of course, your let property is more than just bricks and mortar - hopefully it is an asset that provides an income stream. Accordingly, that income stream may also need to be protected. Cheap landlord building insurance may therefore also cover loss of the rent itself, if that loss results from an insured risk. (For example, if your property is damaged by a flood which renders it uninhabitable whilst it is being repaired, your policy may provide loss of rental income cover, up to set limits).
How are landlord's insurance policies different to owner-occupied policies?
A landlord's insurance policy may be quite similar to your traditional home buildings and contents insurance. However, do not be tempted to use an owner occupier policy for a rented property. Even if a landlord does this by mistake, an insurer may be entitled to refuse to pay out for claims because the wrong kind of cover was taken out.
Cheap landlord building insurance may include the risks that are covered by a traditional policy as well as other additional risks (for example, the aforementioned loss of rental income cover); details of your obligations as a property owner; together with exclusions and limitations.
There may also be an excess on the policy, which is the threshold below which the insurer may not entertain a claim. Whilst a higher excess may sometimes mean a slightly lower premium, you may wish to consider whether this means that you would not be able to afford to bring any claims under that policy anyway, as you would always have to fund the excess amount.





