Tenant's Need Their Own Insurance!
Specialist Insurance provides landlords and tenants with peace of mind
However, whilst landlords stay insured keeping their property assets protected, very few tenants bother to investing in contents insurance or specialist tenant insurance.
Even though the tenants don’t own the property and are therefore not responsible for the actual bricks and mortar, the property does still contain all of their personal belongings, including important documents and irreplaceable mementoes and so insurance should be an important consideration.
In the event of a claim having to be made, in the case of a fire, for example, tenants may have mistakenly thought they would automatically be covered by the landlord and tried to claim for loss of their important and expensive items from the Landlords Insurance policy, the landlord would receive compensation for the damage to the property, whilst the tenants would find, in most cases, that their claims were unsuccessful and they would be left with nothing.
Tenant Insurance is a necessity is because it is highly unlikely that any tenant belongings will be covered by the landlords insurance. The landlord should have insurance cover to protect the fabric of the building itself, (including certain contents such as the kitchen cupboards, bathroom fixtures etc) and even cover for loss of rent but not the contents of the tenants.
Tenant insurance will also help to protect the tenant’s deposit as good policies cover tenants against accidental damage.
Landlords often ask for a deposit, (which by law, has to be lodged with one of the 3 Government approved deposit protection schemes), and in the event of damage caused, the landlord will make a claim for a proportion or all of the deposit as compensation.
However, there can be disputes over the deposit, leading to lengthy battles over money, often in situations where the landlord is aware that damage caused has been the tenants fault, but the tenant is unwilling to admit responsibility because they need their full deposit back, in order to be able to rent elsewhere.
With tenant insurance, the tenant will avoid any situation like this by claiming for the damage in the first place, getting the repairs done, keeping the landlord happy and being able to claim back the full deposit at the end of the tenancy.
Tenants in Houses of Multiple Occupation (HMO’s), Student houses, or shared flats who don’t want to be accountable for a flat mates mistakes (e.g. Leave for a weekend and return to find damage to personal belongings or the property), want to make sure that they are covered and don’t need to fight for the compensation.
Good landlords should remind all new and existing rental property clients that as tenants, they require adequate insurance to protect their belongings and it may be helpful if landlords recommend a specialist tenant insurance policy.
