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Buy to let insurance

Buy to let property insurance is specifically designed for landlords letting out a home to tenants. It’s also known as landlord insurance. Most landlords will need insurance for buy to let to protect their investment. It’s a bigger undertaking than many imagine to find the best buy to let insurance for your particular needs, but a specialist broker such as Apricot can help, as we can tailor your policy to suit your circumstances.

Buy to let insurance quotes

When you compare buy to let insurance, what are you being quoted? Well, buy to let insurance UK tends to include much of the cover you’ll be familiar with from normal home insurance policies. For example buildings cover and contents cover. Please note that the contents insurance with buy to let usually only covers items you’ve provided at the property, not your tenants’ contents. Let’s say you’ve provided carpets, furniture and appliances. These would be covered under your landlord buy to let insurance.

The buildings cover protects you from disasters such as fire or flood damaging your property. You’ve invested a lot of time money on your rental property (or properties) and an event such as this could potentially undo the value of your property and cause serious losses of rental income too.

Is standard home insurance sufficient for a landlord?

In most cases, unfortunately not. In fact, you may well find that a standard household insurance policy could be invalid when you come to claim if you have been renting out the house or flat to tenants. Also, you may have a buy to let mortgage, in which case it’s probable that the mortgage provider may require that you maintain landlord’s insurance.

Furthermore, buy to let policies typically offer additional cover that is helpful (or even, for many, essential) in protecting your valuable property and rentals business.

Can you get cheap buy to let insurance?

In short, yes. Comparatively at least – you should expect your policy to cost a little more than a standard home insurance policy as the risks are greater for the insurer. However, comparing quotes with the right broker or company can result in quotes that are highly competitive and affordable. This page will give some further information about other types of protection offered by buy to let landlord insurance, as well as some hints about pricing and how to get a good deal.

What other types of cover can be included?

Our aim is to provide insurance for your buy to let property which is adapted to your particular needs, so there are a variety of different features that can be included in your quote.

Liability cover is one very important such feature. What if one of your tenants made a claim against you for injury at the house? Despite safety-conscious preparations, this can and does occur. Compensation and legal costs can be sky high, and it’s best to have appropriate protection in place to insure against such an event.

What if your tenants have to move out of the property due to damage (flooding for but one example)? Alternative accommodation cover can protect against such events.

A popular option with buy to let landlords is the rent guarantee cover option. It does what it sounds like – it covers your lost income when a tenant refuses to pay (or is unable). Rental income protection is another element that can be included in insurance for buy to let. It differs from rent guarantee, in that rental income protection is there to cover your lost income if the house or flat is damaged to the extent you’re unable to let it.

The accidental damage option comes to the rescue if damage is caused by your tenants. It covers damage by accident, not deliberate damage, however, there’s also an option for malicious damage cover separately.

Compare buy to let insurance for the best deal

Getting a cheap buy to let insurance quote is obviously desirable, but only provided it gives you the cover you need. Thankfully Apricot have a long history of providing quality cover to landlords at competitive prices, so we definitely recommend enquiring with us for cheap landlord insurance. We compare multiple leading UK insurers, including specialists in buy to let property insurance, so there’s every chance we can find you a great deal.

You’ll need to get a quote to find out the prices for your particular circumstances, though, as insurers determine their pricing based on many different variables. Your property’s (or properties’) location is one such factor, because some areas tend to produce much more claims than others. Another factor that could make a difference is your age, and a further one would be the value of your property (obviously). There are various other factors that can affect the price.

Incidentally, if you are planning to rent your property out for short-term lets on AirBnB or a similar platform, you’ll need slightly different insurance to insure your AirBnB property which we also offer.

So, get a quote or give Apricot a call today so that we can search the market for you for the right policy at the right price.

* 18% of our landlord insurance customers in 2020 had a premium of £100 or less per annum.