Having just had to replace a boiler at short notice, we’ve been looking into what our property owners insurance would cover…and it’s not a great deal.
If we had a serious problem that meant having to temporarily rehouse tenants or put them up in a hotel we wouldn’t be covered.

Any landlords on here? What cover do you have/what experiences have you had etc.

cheers

I’m with direct line and their policy includes allowance for major heating failure – hope I’ll never need to claim on that though.

Never had to call on insurance to cover temporary housing, but I have the cover as part of the policy.

I have had a house suffer significant fire damage after a tenant had his car torched in the driveway and it spread. In that case the tenant wasn’t interested in living there afterwards after he had fallen out with the wrong people and they had found out where they were living.

In that case the insurance company were happy for me to do use my own connections and labour to get the place back to normal. That took about two weeks, much of which was the lead time for a handful of upvc windows.

On the heating front, if it fails it fails. We keep a few fan heaters, oil filled radiators, and two portable gas heaters on standby, plus each property has an electric shower so people can have a hot wash. No reason for a boiler failure to necessitate rehousing.

Direct Line landlord here – I just re-haggled as the renewal was up (again).
I tick a few of the ‘re-home if…’ and similar options.
I don’t pay for the legal cover – I read the detail and basically unless you use their forms, printed on lime paper, on a full moon Thursday then they will not cover….

Also with direct line now, was with British Gas/AXA but moved to Direct line this week as axa wouldn’t reduce renewal premium.

As above never had to claim.

Quidco doing £100 cashback with direct line.

Also with Direct Line ..I replaced the boiler about 5 years ago and have it serviced every year to keep it in warranty ..
While every effort would be made to get the fault repaired quickly ..its up to the tenant to supply secondary heating.
Very few seem to take out contents insurance even though it’s stipulated on their agreement ..this being in unfurnished property.
I also have electric fan heaters which I can loan if the tenant has no alternative .

Thanks all. The boiler was really just an example – and agreed, not usually reason for rehousing, but there are plenty of other possible events where decent landlord cover might be handy.

Seems that direct line is the most commonly used (by rental property owning mountain bike riders at least…)
I was put of DL a little by their low general ratings, but appreciate that’s across all of their services/products not just LL insurance.
Any of the DL users above had experiences of claims with them?

I use Simply Business to broker the LL insurance, though the actual underwriter has changed twice in the many years I’ve used them. I do shop around a little annually to keep them price matching so they don’t take the P on renewals.

Direct line

They actually refunded my other halfs pemium when they admitted on the phone that they never had any intention of ever paying out any claim made under landlords insurance.

When we evicted her tennant and the place was destroyed with dog piss soaking the carpets in two rooms and fag burns in most of the carpets. Graffiti on the wall, wooden furniture all smashed. They absolutely refused to pay out for any of it.

I only use them for buildings cover, I don’t bother with contents insurance, its all cheap ikea shit anyway.