What affects the cost of home insurance?
Property insurance is crucial to protecting your home. But what affects the cost of home insurance?
Home insurance quotes can be influenced by a range of factors. This includes factors that you can and can’t control. We talk through the key factors and how to help keep your premiums low.
Home security
The security of your home can play a part in what affects the cost of home insurance. This includes the locks upon your windows, the kind of locks you have on all of your doors and whether you have any security installed such as cameras and alarms. Installing more security can help to lower your premiums.
Location
Location always pays a big role in what affects the cost of home insurance. You can have the same policy in two different cities, and one policy can cost twice as much. Each postcode across the UK is rated differently. This is due to the crime rates in each area or the risk to external factors such as flood. To help eliminate this factor, research the safest places to live when looking for a new home. This will not only affect your home insurance but your motor insurance too.
Your Claims History
Premiums can increase as a result of your history of claims. If you are seen to make more claims your premiums will rise as it is seen you are more likely to claim again.
The Building Blocks
What you home is made of has a big impact on your home insurance. For example if you live in a thatched property, you are open to risk of fire so your premiums will be higher. Make your home safer by replacing materials that are seen as a safety risk.
IPT
IPT stands for Insurance Premium Tax and is a big factor in what affects the cost of home insurance. This has increased dramatically over the last couple of years, and will be rising to 12% this June. This has an effect on all insurance policies as it increases the overall cost. This is having a significant impact on the motor insurance industry especially.
Repair Costs
The cost of repairing homes from damage has risen. As a result the pay out from insurers has had to increase which in correlation puts premiums up.
Amount of Claims
If an insurer has had an influx of claims due to causes such as bad weather, their prices may rise as a result.
Contents
Although it is not essential to include your contents within your home insurance, many do for ease and peace of mind. However, if you have a lot of high value contents then your premiums will rise.
