Unoccupied House Insurance

There are several reasons your home may be unoccupied for an extended period, including:

• A holiday longer than 60 days.
• Long term care, whether in hospital, a care home, or moving in with relatives.
• Spending time at a holiday or second home, either in the UK or abroad.
• Working away for an extended period.
• Moving out to have renovations done. Read more: A guide to buildings insurance for renovations
• Landlords finding themselves between tenants.
• Waiting to sell a house after you’ve already moved into your new home or selling a home you’ve inherited.
• Waiting for probate.

Our unoccupied home insurance policy includes cover for:

• Natural disasters including fire, storm, and flood.
• Escape of water, including for burst pipes (subject to keeping the heating on low in winter or draining the heating system).
• Subsidence, heave, or landslip.
• Property owners’ liability insurance, covering damages awarded to a third party injured on, or because of, your property.
• Vandalism caused by criminal damage to your property.
• Theft or attempted theft of your contents, including damage caused to the building by forced entry.

Cover will vary from insurer to insurer, but most will exclude theft from unforced entry as a result of a failure to take adequate precautions to protect your property.

Our unoccupied property insurance covers buildings in the course of renovation or repair, but some insurers exclude cover for incidents that happen as a result of major works. For more details visit our home renovation insurance page.

Building contractors should have their own public liability insurance for any damage they cause to your property.

Full details of what is and isn’t covered can be confirmed by reviewing your policy documents after receiving a quotation.

As there are many variables within an unoccupied home insurance policy, how much you pay will depend on your requirements. For instance, the length of time you want to be insured for, the value of the contents of the property, and the location of the property will all make a difference to the premium you pay.

Yes you can, although at the outset it makes sense to overestimate the time involved as the pricing to extend is based on short-term policies.

No, until the property is secured and brought up to a reasonable standard you are unable to insure the property.

Most standard home insurance policies provide cover for unoccupied properties up to 60 days in a year. If your home is empty for longer and you fail to inform your insurer, you risk invalidating your policy should you need to claim.

Your insurer will have a standard procedure to follow when making a claim, which should be clearly stated in the policy documents.

Before making a claim, consider if the value of the claim is worth losing any no claims bonus you have built up, also taking into account any excess that would be due.

Yes you can, but you are unable to do so on a household policy and it will require an unoccupied commercial property insurance policy.

No, but it is possible to get another policy to cover this. Please see our home renovation insurance. 

Not all unoccupied home insurance policies are the same, so you shouldn’t judge a policy on price alone.

Different insurers will include different levels of cover, have different excesses, and insist on different security and water / heating system requirements to prevent burst pipes.

Before you decide which policy to buy, check you’ve got the cover you need and you can fulfil all the terms and conditions.