5 Star Landlord Insurance

Before you turn off thinking "oh yeah it’s another plug for landlord insurance," I would explain that I would like to share some useful information that I came across last week.

What is 5 star landlord insurance?

In an increasing number of TV adverts you will see and hear reference to five star rated products, but what does it mean? Five star rating is often associated with hotels and is a guide to the quality of hotel and service you would get. Whilst five star insurance doesn’t really conjure up the same images and emotions as five star hotels the rating concept is still exactly the same. As hotels are rated on facilities, insurance products are rated on features and benefits.

Search online for a hotel room and there is often a filter to rate by stars, given the choice most people would probably discount the one star/unrated hotels and look at higher rated options. With insurance this is very different with price being the number one concern for most people and quality of product is a second thought. But what if you were able to consider the quality of product?
If you’re like me and don’t have time to study the ins and outs of every policy and product there is a great tool available on line from independent market research company Defaqto that helps analyse the rating for each product.

Reading about the star system from their website , Defaqto assess each of the landlord insurance policies against 40 – 100 separate criteria.

These include:

• Buildings accidental damage: Cover is usually provided on a ‘specified perils’ basis. ‘Specified Perils’ can include cover against fire, earthquake, explosion, lightning, theft or attempted theft, malicious damage and flood, amongst others. Accidental damage cover caused to the building is also available, usually as an optional extra. 

• Loss of rent: Insures against loss of rent as a result of loss or damage caused to your buildings, which means that the property cannot be lived in.

 • Malicious damage by tenants: Cover is provided against malicious acts or vandalism caused to your property by your tenants. 

• Landlord’s contents: Covers contents that belong to you which are kept at the property. 

• White goods: Covers ‘white goods’ kept at the property. These usually include washing machines, fridges and freezers.  Property owners liability: Cover is provided against any accidents which cause bodily injury or death, or damage to property for which you are legally responsible as owner of the property. 

To check our the quality of your landlord insurance just go to their website. 

The Defaqto tool breaks down each insurance product and then rates it against a benchmark, awarding a rating of between one and five stars. This is a great tool to use when making a decision around who to use for your insurance. Many insurance companies will offer cheap and competitive insurance, but a quick look on this tool and you may see you really are getting what you pay for, but at least this way you’ll know in advance.

For the savvy shopper who really cares about getting a quality product at competitive pricing this tool really is useful. Personally I’m someone who wants a quality product at competitive prices and whilst cheap insurance is obviously important I will never go for cheap over quality.

The full intricacies of landlord insurance are complex and for most landlords probably not that interesting, but I hope the star rating gives landlords some basic assurance of the actual quality of cover provided.