Recently moved into your newly renovated home with beautiful hardwood flooring? Or decked out your home with the latest OLED television? You might have invested in the items in your house and the total value of your fixtures, floorings, home appliances, kitchen silverware and carpets might be worth a lot. Ensure you have home and contents insurance to keep these items sufficiently protected in the event of a fire, flood or some other mishap. In this article, we list some factors to consider when choosing a home insurance plan to protect your home in Singapore.
What should you look out for when choosing home insurance?
1. Property ownership
The type of home insurance you should purchase is dependent on whether you own your house, are renting the property or are a landlord leasing out the property. If you own the property, insurance advisors recommend getting comprehensive coverage to ensure that you are well protected financially if your property and its contents sustain loss or damages during a fire, flood or in the event of a theft.
If you’re a landlord leasing out your furnished home, it’s especially vital that you buy insurance plans to cover the cost of damages to furniture, appliances or priceless items like artwork. By purchasing home insurance, you also mitigate potential rental loss if you are unable to rent out your property if this happens. If you’re a foreigner renting an apartment in Singapore, you might want to consider purchasing home and contents insurance especially if your home is unfurnished and you have bought several expensive items, as these items belong to you and not the landlord.
2. The value of your home’s contents
It’s sometimes easy to overlook the fact that your home is where all your personal items are housed and that the combined value of all your items can be significant. From home appliances to bathroom fixtures, to kitchen crockery – you want to ensure all of it’s protected in the event of a break-in or if a fire breaks out.
Big-ticket items like sofas, as well as home electrical appliances, such as your refrigerators and washing machines, can be costly. Your personal belongings like your clothes, shoes, bags, and jewellery are also considered part of your home’s contents and should be calculated as part of your home’s total value. Don’t forget to also add in your fine art and antique collection, such as paintings, and sculptures which can be especially hard to replace.
If you’ve renovated your home, take note to also include this cost when calculating the value of your home. Renovating your home can be costly, especially if it’s a major renovation involving flooring replacement, or the addition of built-in wardrobes, or new bathroom fixtures such as new toilet bowls and wash basins.
3. Coverage and add-ons
An important part of the process is determining what you would like to be covered for. For example, in the event of a major fire, what happens if your home is destroyed along with all your personal items, you sustain injuries and require a temporary place to stay? Will your insurance cover the costs of all of this? Taking the time to select a home contents insurance plan that provides coverage for these would help you put your mind at ease. Some key items include the following:
- Damage to physical structure of house – Covers building structure.
- Home contents – Covers home appliances, furniture, electronic devices, home entertainment systems.
- Personal liability – Covers injuries sustained by someone in your home or any damages done to your neighbour’s property in the event a fire, for example, breaks out due to personal negligence.
- Alternative accommodation – Covers interim accommodation if you can no longer live in your home while it’s being renovated.
- Pets – Covers loss of pets.
Different policies offer levels of coverage and some providers offer add-ons at higher premium rates. Read the policies presented to you carefully to determine what is covered. To obtain comprehensive, all-inclusive coverage, consider all-risk plans – plans that cover you for everything except for what is explicitly excluded. Otherwise, insured peril policies provide coverage for only what is listed in your plan.
Insure your home and valuables with Expat Insurance
When deciding on a home and contents insurance and which provider to go with, it’s important to calculate what your home and the contents within it are worth to be able to determine if the coverage provided by the insurance plan sufficiently covers you. Browse Expat Insurance’s Home, Contents and Valuables Insurance to find out more. Or speak to our insurance advisors to learn more about how our plans can fit your needs and ensure you and your loved ones are adequately protected.
