Car insurance

Home Insurance in Ireland – What Will Reduce Your Costs? | Content ...

by OCoileain

It may not be a legal requirement (except in some mortgage-related instances), and is often neglected by Irish home-owners, but insuring your home against damage caused by fire, theft, and other calamities is as important as insuring your car, perhaps even more so. After all, if something terrible happens to your car, you'll still have a home to sleep in. But, if something terrible happens to your home, and you have no home insurance, you could literally end up sleeping in your car!

However, those who do take out an insurance policy on their house make the (often very costly) mistake of sticking with the same insurance provider for years, or, possibly, the rest of their life. They assume it's too much hassle to change to another company and they probably wouldn't benefit much by doing so anyway. But nothing could be further from the truth! Given the ever-increasing level of competition in the Irish insurance market, there is constant pressure on existing companies to force their prices down, as new-comers often undercut them to gain a competitive advantage from the outset.

That why, even if you aren't a first-time buyer, it often pays to check, on a regular basis, that you are getting the best deal you possibly can. This is even more important if you have recently moved house or bought a second home. Also, the amount it would cost to re-build your house after a fire, or other disaster, may have dropped significantly in recent times, especially with the collapse in the building sector of the Irish economy. This could mean you're paying far too much for your current policy, as your insurance company will be charging you based on what it would have cost to re-build several years ago (but, if you actually did make a claim, you would only get the amount of money it would cost to re-build now instead).

Another factor influencing costs is how much you estimated the contents of your house would cost to replace if destroyed or stolen. If you over-estimated their value, again, your insurance company will charge you based on that estimation but would only pay out what they actually cost when you do go to replace them. (In other words, you'd be paying to insure value that doesn't really exist and that you can never benefit from if you make a claim. The only beneficiary is your insurance company's bank account!)

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