Cigi

Hiya all

My wife and myself have been in the States since 1995 but intend to retire back to the UK in around 6 or 7 years.

When my wife's father died she inherited his small house and we intend to live there on our return.

In the meantime we really need to get some property insurance on the place but it seems that you cannot do this unless you are resident in the UK.

Has anyone else faced this problem and have any suggestions/answers they'd be willing to share?

Thanks in advance.

Dashie

Yes, you can get insurance, landlords do it, and you do not have to be resident. When I worked in insurance there, we had many overseas clients with property back home. I'm guessing that you were trying to get a quote online direct with an insurer? They generally only insure very standard, very low risk situations. My advice would be to contact insurance brokers, they would be able to help you. The type of policy they select for you will depend on what you will be using the property for. Not many insurers like a property to be empty for more than 30-60 days at a time, and by that I meant they want someone staying there, not just someone collecting any post and turning lights on.

Jerseygirl

You do not have to be a UK resident to obtain property insurance. Although you will probably find you cannot get insurance if the property is empty for more than 28 days.

dunroving

Ditto to what everyone else said. If it will be empty for long periods, consider renting it out, or letting a friend or relative live there. If you want to use it when you return for holidays, you could just rent a room via spareroom.co.uk. Then the lodger only uses one bedroom so you can use the rest when you are home.

lf1

We bought our house 3 years before moving back to the UK and used it as holiday home until our return last year. It was not easy to find an insurer, but I managed to find one that would provided broad coverage and also frost/freezing whilst the house was unoccupied. The caveat with the frost/freezing coverage was that the temperature was to be maintained at 8c or above or the water supply be shut off.

The company is Intasure and the insurance is underwritten by RSA. I was very comfortable with that as I had worked with RSA for many years. I talked directly with Intasure, so was able to address all of my questions with them. I also contacted an independent broker, but the coverage they were able to offer was much more restrictive, having said that a broker in a larger centre may be able to offer something better.

Good luck.

Cigi

Many thanks for all your replies.

Our Granddaughter is going to rent the house and our daughter will be "administering" things.

So it sounds as if we should have no problem.