Insurance

It might be worth while checking to see if another family member stays overnight in the house every 89 days would that suffice.

We have another similar problem We are selling and storing our belongings in secure storage.
The quotes for insurance are 50% higher than if it was in an unoccupied house.

How weird is that. It will be in a locked sealed shed within a locked camera viewed yard. Beats me.

If you can say that a family member will be checking on the property and keeping it in good care (no long grass & mail being cleared) then you may get the ok from an insurance company for a longer period.

Hi Bob V

We had been with CommInsure for 25 years without knowing the absentee clause. We left them.

We had the house and 100k of contents with them. As we retired and got into caravanning It came to light that after 60 days our $100 excess per claim rose from $100 to $1500 and after 90 days you were not covered for theft at all but you were covered for fire. Comm Insure suggeted getting someone to stay in the house overnight during our absence period as that restarted the clock for the house being unoccupied. The fact that we had have a back to base alarm system (which they gave a discount on premium for having) and a guaranteed response within 5 minutes wasn't worth a sausage to them. They replied that it could malfunction and go dead whilst we were away

Rang NRMA Insurance. They said pretty much the same BUT BUT suggested that this happened...... the peron staying on lets say the 55th or the 85th unoccupied day used my home phone to call their own mobile (presumably in their pocked) and answered it..... AND repeated the same lunacey the following morning. Why I asked.... Because you can use your phone records to show that the house was occupied on a particular date(s). It wouldn't show that the didn't come at 6pm and leave at 6.05pm and come back the following dat at 8.00 am and leave at 8.05 am but the call log and a stat dec. would suggest they stayed overnight

I contacted APIA. They had gave 60 days absence as per the others without question. If we were to be away longer but up to a maximum of 120 days you had to ring them and it was noted on your policy without extra premium charge or increase in excess. For absences longer than 120 days our premium rose by about $6 a week until we came home and informed them we were back.

We were on a canal waterfont home at the time and it was only 750mm above the top of the king tides and APIA allowed free flood cover to the full maximum of the contents and house fabric. We took it.

Sorry this is long. Most people don't know about the absentee clause. We didn't and it is not in Comm Insures hand book but it is on their internet site in the underwriters small print.

Regards
SKI'er

OK, so how do they know that you are away? Surely IF something happened you would be saying "how unfortunate, we only left last week!"

I presume we are all trying to do the right thing and the risk would not change for such things as storm damage or the like. Burglary is the only issue one would think has an increased risk profile and so like the people above have back to base systems that supply as much risk reduction as practical.

Before anyone tells me, I know it is in the policy.

Kind regards

And while on the topic of house insurance, don't you like how the "Act of War" clause has turned into the "terrorism" exclusion endorsement.

But read the not so fine print...

Notwithstanding any provision to the contrary within this insurance policy or any endorsement thereto, it is agreed that....excludes...caused by, contributed to by, resulting from, or arising out of or in connection with any act of terrorism, as defined herein,...
(just so there is absolutely no way of getting around the exclusion)

and the piece de resistance (pun intended) :

An act of terrorism includes any act, or preparation in respect of action, or threat of action designed to influence the government de jure or de facto of any nation or any political division thereof ... etc, etc...

Which means when some low life breaks in and scrawls "Down with Politicians" or some such like "Vote No to Labour" on your walls in tomato sauce, you will not be covered...


lol
Ken

Thanks again to all members for their replies and in particular to Nomadic Navara, I just picked up an adapter called AMP FIBIAN that will do the job, $240.00 buys peace of mind
BobV