Home Insurance

P. Rajkumar: I recently purchased a house in Faridabad that cost me ` 40 lakh. I have taken a home loan to buy the house. Now I want to buy home insurance to safeguard the property. Please tell me how to choose a good policy and what is the likely premium?

Yashish Dahiya, Co-founder and CEO, Policybazaar.com, replies:

Home insurance can be split into two parts – structure insurance and content insurance. These can be bought separately or as a clubbed policy. The clubbed policies are often known as comprehensive home insurance policies.

Before buying a policy, read all aspects of the insurance cover and make sure that the sum offered by the insurer is adequate to rebuild your house if it is damaged or demolished. Your policy should not have voluntary deductibles, and when buying it, you must submit a complete list of contents lying in your house, including paintings, white goods, electronics and the likes. Find out if gold and jewellery will be covered or not. Some insurers cover gold and jewellery by default while others offer it as an add-on and charge an additional premium. For ` 50 lakh sum insured (`40 lakh for structure and ` 10 lakh for contents), the premium will be around ` 7,000-10,000, including add-on cover for gold and jewellery.