It depends on how you own your home. Buildings insurance covers the permanent structure — walls, roof, floors, fitted kitchens and bathrooms, and usually outbuildings, boundary walls, drives and fences. Contents insurance covers what you would take with you if you moved: furniture, clothing, electronics, jewellery and the small things that quietly add up.

If you own the freehold of a house, you are responsible for the structure, and any mortgage lender will require buildings cover to be in force from the moment contracts are exchanged — not from completion. That catch surprises a lot of first-time buyers, so we arrange cover to start on exchange day.

If you own a leasehold flat, the freeholder or management company normally insures the building through a block policy and recovers the cost through your service charge. You then only need contents, although it is worth checking what the block policy includes, because internal fixtures are sometimes your responsibility.

Tenants need contents only. Landlords letting a property out need a specific landlords policy, because a residential policy will not respond to a tenanted risk. Where both buildings and contents are needed, a combined policy is usually simpler and cheaper than two separate ones.

A standard policy responds to a defined list of insured events: fire, smoke and explosion; storm and flood; escape of water from pipes, tanks and heating systems; theft and attempted theft; malicious damage and vandalism; subsidence, heave and landslip; falling trees and aerials; and impact from vehicles or animals. Most include alternative accommodation if your home becomes uninhabitable, and personal liability cover as standard.

What sits outside that list is where policies differ most. Insurance responds to sudden, unforeseen events — not to the slow decline of a building. Wear and tear, gradual deterioration, damp and rot, poor workmanship and lack of maintenance are excluded everywhere, as is damage from a defect you knew about and left. Storm claims are frequently declined where a roof was already in poor condition.

Other exclusions catch people out. Homes left unoccupied beyond 30 to 60 consecutive days usually fall outside cover unless you tell the insurer. Business stock kept at home is rarely covered. High-value single items — engagement rings, watches, bicycles, instruments, artwork — must be specified individually above the single-article limit, often around £1,500. Accidental damage, home emergency, legal expenses and personal possessions away from the home are normally optional extras. We go through all of it before you buy, not after.

Yes. Essex has a long coastline and several tidal rivers, and homes in areas such as Canvey Island, Wivenhoe, Maldon and parts of Basildon and Southend can carry a meaningful flood score. Mainstream insurers sometimes decline these addresses outright or apply a very high flood excess, which is why people assume cover is unobtainable. It usually is not.

Flood Re is a government-backed reinsurance scheme funded by a levy on UK insurers, set up specifically to keep flood cover affordable for higher-risk homes. Insurers participating in the scheme can pass the flood element of your policy to Flood Re and offer a capped premium and excess. Most homes built before 1 January 2009 in council tax bands A to H qualify. New-build homes completed after that date, and most leasehold blocks and commercial property, do not.

If your home sits outside Flood Re, specialist insurers still write these risks individually. Evidence of local flood defences, fitted air-brick covers, non-return valves or a raised boiler can materially improve the terms you are offered. Send us what you have and we will approach the right underwriters.

Subsidence is covered as standard under buildings insurance, and it matters here because much of southern Essex sits on shrinkable London clay. In dry summers the clay contracts, in wet winters it expands, and older properties with shallow foundations — particularly with mature trees close to the walls — can move as a result. Postcodes across Ilford, Romford, Basildon and the Thames-side belt appear consistently on insurer risk maps.

Cover is standard, but the excess is not. Subsidence claims almost always carry a separate excess of around £1,000, and they are expensive: the ABI put the average household subsidence claim at £17,820 in early 2026. Once a property has an accepted subsidence claim or has been underpinned, many mainstream insurers will decline it at renewal or when it changes hands.

This is precisely where a broker earns their keep. Specialist insurers will write previously subsided and underpinned homes, provided they can see the engineer’s report, details of the remedial work and a certificate of structural adequacy. Send us the paperwork and we will approach the insurers who genuinely consider these cases rather than filtering them out automatically.

Comparison sites are quick, and for a straightforward modern house with no claims history they can produce a competitive price. Their weakness is that they rank almost entirely on cost, so the cheapest policy shown is often the one with the narrowest cover, the highest excess and the least generous claims service.

They also struggle with anything unusual. Thatched roofs in rural north Essex, timber-frame and other non-standard construction, listed buildings, flats above shops, homes with a history of flooding or subsidence, high-value contents and unoccupied or holiday properties are frequently declined outright by automated systems — not because they are uninsurable, but because the form has nowhere to put them.

A broker asks about the property rather than about a form. We interpret the questions correctly on your behalf, which matters more than people expect: a misdescribed roof or an understated rebuild value can invalidate a claim years later. We also handle the awkward cases individually and stay involved at renewal. Ask us how we are remunerated on general insurance business and we will tell you plainly.

Timing is the thing to get right. On a freehold purchase you become legally responsible for the property at exchange of contracts, so buildings cover must be live from that date even though you will not have the keys yet. Your lender will ask for evidence of it. Contents cover normally starts on completion day, when your possessions physically arrive.

You then have two options for an existing policy: transfer it to the new address, or cancel it and start fresh. Transferring keeps your no-claims discount intact but may trigger a mid-term adjustment premium if the new property is a higher risk. Cancelling mid-term usually incurs an administration fee and returns only a pro-rata refund. Which works out better depends on the numbers, and we will run both for you rather than guessing.

One more thing worth checking before moving day rather than after: many policies include limited cover for goods in transit with a professional remover, but it is rarely comprehensive, and self-move damage is often excluded entirely.

Contact your insurer’s claims line as soon as it is safe to do so — most operate around the clock. Make the property secure, photograph everything before you clear up, keep damaged items, and report theft or vandalism to the police for a crime reference number. Do not commission permanent repairs before the insurer has authorised them, though emergency work to prevent further damage is expected and reimbursed.

Timescales vary widely. A straightforward contents theft or a single damaged appliance is often settled within one to three weeks. Escape-of-water and storm claims involving drying and reinstatement typically run to two or three months. Subsidence is the outlier: monitoring alone takes at least twelve months before a cause can be confirmed, so two years from first notification to final settlement is not unusual.

Claims are also getting larger — the ABI recorded an average home claim above £7,000 for the first time in mid-2026, driven largely by weather. We are not the insurer and we do not settle claims, but we will help you understand your policy wording and chase on your behalf.