House insurance - Premises sum insured

Hi,

I have looked for this on previous threads but cant find the exact match. I'm a bit embarrassed having to ask the following but think i was in a daze when we were buying our house.

We took out home insurance when we bought our house. House cost €380k and i notice the premises insured value is 178,500 which covers accident damage. The contents is 31,500 which does not include accidental damage.

Having a very short-term memory, I cant remember:

1. Where the premises insured value came from? Was that from our mortgage providers valuation?
2. Should we have contents insured for accidental damage? I assume we should to cover fire or flood?

thanks,

kcat said:

1. Where the premises insured value came from? Was that from our mortgage providers valuation?

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Probably. You should review this each year at least. See this SCS guide for more on this:

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2. Should we have contents insured for accidental damage?

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Depends on whether you think you need this or not. What is necessary varies depending on your personal circumstances. For example I opt for a higher excess and no accidental damage to get a lower premium on the basis that I will self insure for small to medium accidents and only call on the insurance for larger ones (e.g. house burning down, burglary and extensive damage to contents etc.).

I assume we should to cover fire or flood?

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Do most policies not cover these automatically unless specifically excluded for a specific property?

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Thanks Clubman.

Accidental damage covers things like you dropping your tv and breaking it, spilling a tin of paint on the carpet etc. Basic cover will normally cover, fire, storm, flood and theft.