Home insurance for old house pre 1830

So I took the advice and phoned around...

Aviva: online quote 8 euros more expensive than broker quote i.e. about 14-15% up on last year. Refused to speak to me on the phone because I have previously dealt with a broker. Would not permit any complaint to be made about this or about the price hike. Unimpressed.

Zurich: Would not quote for subsidence cover within the policy. What??? I live in South Cork. I don't believe there have been any landslides or earthquakes here recently... The house has stood here for over a hundred years and hasn't subsided yet so pretty unlikely. I thought this would be the cheapest as I also have motor insurance with Zurich. I think the agent probably messed up the quotation? Or else their database is severely out of whack.

Allianz: could not complete quote process online. Hopeless telephone agent who could not retrieve the quote to find out why and did not know what to do, then the fire alarm went off in their call centre so could not complete the process.

Liberty: Could not complete the quote online. Extremely noisy call centre and agent with close to impenetrable NI accent but very patient. Quote 33% MORE than Aviva. Did find out that a stone and slate house is regarded as "standard" construction if you get asked that question.

FBD:Could not complete the quote online. Terrible hold music but excellent agent. Quote 17% CHEAPER than Aviva and roughly the same as what I paid Aviva 2 years ago. Only company that asked any questions about the house (when last reroofed, when last plumbed, when last rewired).

Now off to ask my broker how come they couldn't have found this out?

NB the Google search results suggest three of these companies use the same call centre on contract for their policy sales (Abtran). Moral of the story: shop around guys...

Did you not try RSA? One of the biggest insurers in the country and they definitely cover old houses as I've had my insurance with them for a few years.

I might have had cover with Aon before that.



Steven
www.bluewaterfp.ie

try Hickey Clarke & Langan. They are brokers in Donegal but act for Lloyds and can get very competitive quotes.

Thanks for the suggestions. I personally could not ever use RSA after the way their loss adjustors treated some friends of mine whose house had burned down some years ago, but I plan to follow up on the others!

I (almost) have a house I'm trying to insure and running into the same issues as discussed here. It's 1890s build so not as old but hasn't been reroofed for almost 40 years. Of course it's bone dry (and used as to store documents by the vendor). I'm trying to find out what they mean by "reroof" to estimate the costs but it's not written in any policy docs I've looked at. Is it simply replacing/refitting the slates or is it replacing the rafters (ie a much bigger job)? Some insurers insist this is done within the last 20years - nobody reroofs every 20 years?! Does anybody have a better understanding of this?