Am about to renew my house and contents insurance and found the policy has gone up to about $3000 per year. Last year it was only $1300. I have premium cover with Westpac, and have asked for a better price but they are not going to offer me anything off. My cover has a $100 excess and it covers accidential damage, non forceable entry, motor burn out, but other than that it is probably the same as most other policies. Just wonder how I can get a better deal? thanks
Need to renew my house & contents insurance who is good in NSW
hsk on 12/12/2012 - 08:13
Comments
I just went through this, and premiums have risen dramatically.
Some things to note:
- motor burn out? Drop it, you'll never claim on it.
- $100 excess? Do you regularly claim for things like broken windows? I changed my excess to $1000 and got a substantial discount - but of course I will only claim for a real incident.
- How much are you insured for? My contents policy keeps rising in value, even though the cost of replacement contents keeps falling. Even if my house burnt down, the furniture, electrical and clothing etc. could be replaced for less than half what the value has grown to over the last 5 years.
- How much is your building insured for? My house was purchased for $500k 5 years ago. The land value is rated at $300k. When I use the online form to estimate my building insurance needs the quote says I need $900k of building insurance! I have been unable to find an insurer who will allow less than the $600k I have on my policy.
- Remember, you insurance is for the building, not the building plus land value. Somewhere like Sydney it is normal for the land value to be worth much more than the building value.
- I found I got better prices by phoning than using the quote forms.thanks, yes I have claimed probably two or three things in the past three years, wind damaged a shed and blew over a cubby house and my iphone was smashed about a year and a bit ago. We had stuff stolen from the car about three+ years ago. I usually like to know I can claim when I want to so that is why I have chosen a $100 excess. I have friends who do not ever claim, because they have a big excess. You are right about the contents though, they have me covered for $85,000 and I am sure that we do not need that much. Might reduce that back to about 1/2 or a bit below and see what that will cost me. I will try youi and see what they have to offer. Any other suggestions?? thanks
You can get the best price by getting quotes from at least 2 to 3 companies and then talking to their reps on the phone. Youi got me a really good price since I have their car insurance as well so if you have car insurance with a specific company and they do contents insurance, you could probably get a discount.
also, your past claims have probably raised your premium.
Go online and try other companies online quotes. when asked about past claims, just put "none" and see what you get, then try again with 2.Also, I note NRMA prices are high compared to before and they are not willing to negotiate.
How is anyones experience with Youi in making a claim?
Can't comment for NSW, but I can give you an estimate of the price I pay for my home insurance in VIC. I was with Allianz last year and now with GIO. I have my house insured for $300,000 and the contents at about $65,000 with one $500 excess for home and/or contents and flood cover and etc. since GIO is one of the few 5 star providers and I pay about $550 a year.
So at first thought $1300 for you sounded a lot to me but things might be different for NSW. I would suggest you to try GIO and Allianz. For my case, GIO was even cheaper than youi.
We found youi to be much more expensive than our current provider.
I'd recommend calling your current provider again (they seem to be good with claims) and ask for a reduction after you've got comparative quotes with other providers they are more likely to match or beat them.
We pay $65 a month for building of $300,000, contents of $120,000, accidental damage of $5,000 (flood cover is included) and $400 excess and 1 pet cover. We are in a high bush fire rated zone in SA though and insured with our NRMA equivalent :)
Try CommInsure (CBA). I have found their rates to be very competetive especially with the 15% discount for the online application.
You can use your CBA Award points to reduce the cost as well.
We are in Qld, and have ours with NRMA - it was about $300 cheaper than youi even though the valuation is automated and wouldn't let us insure for less than $365 000 for a fairly modest house, compared to youi with a rebuild valuation of $169 000. The NRMA price also gives us twice as much coverage on our pets as youi would have done.
I found youi to be very flexible with pricing when giving them a call. try calling them with the cheapest quote, you might get a better price
BudgetDirect … call and discuss options with them … not every option is available online
I just priced Suncorp, and NRMA in QLD. They all want about $1100 for 200k house, 50k contents, personal valuables, and accidental damage. Excess for home at 2k, contents at $100 for suncorp, NRMA 1k.
I did manage to reduce the cost of the house (ours ain't worth 360k!) by telling the online system we only had 2 bedrooms etc. Got it down to a real world value but the above $1100 reflects the adjustments. I don't know how you guys are getting cheaper insurance unless you have security options, or you're not taking out the extra covers?
With NRMA's excess being at 1k… that's painful. If you accidentally broke your fridge (don't laugh, my 4y old used the door as a swing!) and wanted to claim, you'd not bother with 1k excess. At least with some providers you can nominate the excess between contents and house, and still get a modest premium.
Im in Melbourne and I have been using RACV for the last 4 or 5 years
No other company has been able to come close to them
Tho I do have a few polices with them different property's and cars
You would have to call up to see if they work in NSW
http://www.youi.com.au/
best i have found