Insurance for second homes

If you’re fortunate enough to own a second home, you may want to consider taking out insurance to ensure suitable protection is in place — especially for when it’s left unoccupied for an extended period. That’s because, unless you have someone keeping a close eye on things, you might not know what’s happening until it’s too late.

That’s why we provide second home insurance. This property insurance policy offers financial protection for your property, should a disaster occur.

We offer second home property insurance in the UK (England, Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland and the Channel Islands) and across Europe, including Spain, France and Italy. We also offer cover for select locations outside of Europe. What’s more, we cover second homes ranging from holiday lets to apartments, caravans, and villas.

What is second home insurance?

Second home insurance is a policy that helps to protect properties that aren’t your primary residence.

A minor inconvenience such as a dripping tap can turn into a major issue if it’s not fixed straightaway. What’s more, a significant problem, such as a burst water pipe during the winter, could cause extensive damage to your home’s structure. A minor problem can quickly become a major headache for second homeowners, as you may not be at the property often enough to avert every issue.

However, with second home insurance from Intasure, you can get financial support for insured claims when the worst happens.

What locations does second home insurance cover?

You shouldn’t feel restricted when buying a second home. This is a chance for you to secure your dream holiday home, after all! That’s why we’ve extended our holiday home insurance to cover more than 20 countries and territories across the EU and beyond, covering many popular British tourist destinations. What’s more, our customer service is handled by a UK-based, English-speaking support team.

Our holiday home insurance abroad can cover many popular British tourist destinations, such as France and Spain. Looking to go somewhere further afield? We also offer policies for locations such as Turkey and the UAE. Here’s our complete list of destinations:

What does second home insurance cover?

Second property insurance can provide a range of cover. As you might expect from a home insurance policy, buildings and contents cover are the most basic form of protection.

However, the protection your policy provides can depend on the extent of the cover you take out. For example, a basic policy can cover problems like loss or damage to buildings caused by fire, smoke, lightning, storms, and flooding.

Here’s a summary of what our second home insurance policies typically include:

Buildings and contents insurance

  • Damage from natural disasters

  • Physical loss or damage caused by smoke, riot, malicious damage, storm, flood, hail, or avalanches

  • Escape of water or oil from fixed household appliances

If you take out second home contents insurance, your possessions are covered up to the policy amount. So, for example, any single item of up to £3,000 is covered (unless otherwise stated in your policy). There may be certain provisos, though, such as ensuring that any jewellery, cameras, watches, money, and credit cards are removed when the property is left empty for more than 48 hours.

Loss of rent cover

Up to £25,000 – applies to confirmed bookings following an insured loss under buildings cover.

Alternative accommodation cover

Following an insured loss under buildings cover, we’ll help cover the cost of alternative accommodation if your property is rendered uninhabitable.

Emergency travel

Following an insured loss, your policy can cover travel costs so you can reach your second home.

Public liability cover

If you want to let out your second home to paying guests for extra income, you are covered up to £5m public liability insurance as standard. So, if a tenant injures themselves during their stay and claims for personal injury compensation, your legal costs can be covered. In addition, public liability insurance can protect you against the financial cost of third-party claims for property damage.

Swimming pools and hot tubs

We offer protection against damage sustained to swimming pools and hot tubs.

Optional accidental damage cover

Our customers who rent out their second homes can choose to extend accidental damage protection to also cover family and tenants.

Optional theft by tenant cover

Extends protection to instances where tenants are accused of stealing your belongings.

These are brief product descriptions only. Please refer to the policy documentation paying particular attention to the terms and conditions, exclusions, warranties, subjectivities, excesses and any endorsements.

What does second home insurance not cover?

The following is excluded from our second home policies:

  • Damage caused by faulty workmanship or defective design
  • Damage caused by pets, moths, or vermin
  • Malicious damage caused by persons legally in the property
  • Loss or damage caused by rising groundwater tables

What is classed as a second home?

We appreciate it’s often hard to decipher the definitions surrounding ‘second homes’ if you’re new to property insurance. So, let’s try to clear things up.

Our policies cover the following:

Why choose Intasure?

With over 20 years of experience providing cover for second homes in the UK and abroad, we’ve built up a team of specialists to help you find suitable cover.

Some of the benefits of taking out an insurance package with Intasure include:

Cover overseas

We provide cover in more than 20 countries and territories

UK teams

We have an in-house UK-based customer service team

English documents

We provide all policy documents and communications written in English

Rated ‘Excellent’

We are rated ‘Excellent’ on Reviews.io, with 96% of reviewers recommending us*

*correct as at January 2024

What types of property insurance do we offer?

We’re here to help you take care of your investment with insurance cover for your property. Talk to our experienced staff today to arrange a policy that fits your property. Call us on 0345 111 0680.

Policy documents

View and download policy documentation

Need some help?

Call us on 0345 111 0680

Monday – Friday 9am – 7pm

Monday – Friday 9am – 5pm

Second home house insurance FAQ

Please note that these frequently asked questions are not a substitute for the policy wording. For full terms and conditions please see the policy documentation.

It can be difficult to provide an accurate assessment of how much your policy will cost without first assessing the following variables:

  • Size – larger properties can have higher insurance costs
  • Age – well-maintained new builds can have lower premiums than older properties needing
    maintenance work
  • Contents – does your property house expensive items? If so, this can affect the premium you
    pay
  • Rebuild cost – make sure to calculate the cost of rebuilding your property accurately. This
    cost is factored into your buildings cover premium

We can provide you with cover for both second home buildings insurance and second home contents insurance. Plus, you can add on additional protections to standard cover depending on the contents insurance you need. So, whether your second home is just for family or you’re planning to rent it out, you can have cover all-year-round.

Our mission as second home insurance specialists

We comprise of an in-house team of sales, renewals, customer service, claims, and underwriting specialists. Our aim is to help you find property insurance that suits your needs.

20

Years’ experience
providing holiday home insurance

96%

of reviewers recommend Intasure
on reviews.io*

20+

Countries Covered by
Our Policies

*correct as at January 2024

Specialist second home insurance from Intasure

Learn more about the cover our products provide:

Buildings and contents insurance suitable for holiday homes let via Airbnb.

Insurance for holiday homes in the UK and abroad.

Cover for UK let properties.

Cover in the UK and abroad.

Helpful articles from Intasure