Home and contents insurance?

[Queen]

So for whatever reason I have never had to buy/use this, and I am in need of some tips

What do I ask for?
What are things I need to know?

What is the average cost?

Ummm I am in WA if that makes any difference?

[Pregnor]

Do you own the house then? If you own it the 'home' part covers the house and the 'contents' covers the stuff inside.
They will ask you how much you think its worth. So say if the house itself burnt down, how much would it cost to rebuild it?

Then the same for contents. How much would it cost to replace everything inside. I think the minimum cover is about 40000 with most places, which isnt that much when you consider things like clothes, beds, couches, tv, computer, cds, dvds, appliances etc.

They also ask if you want insurance for motor damage on appliances less than 3 years old and stuff. Flood cover, and maybe some others, I never get any of the add on type stuff.

Also, I am with SGIO, with them you can adjust your excess to reduce the premium. From memory increasing the excess by like $300 saves you maybe $20 a year, so I kind of felt it defeated the purpose considering that if you were broken into (which is a lot more likely than your house burning down) you might only be claiming $2000 worth of stuff IYKWIM? This is just my opinion though. The staff are normally pretty good, just be aware they will try and make you spend more $$ on extras.

Oh, and they will ask you about the security. If you live in a 'high risk' area and/or dont meet their min security requirements they might not cover you.

HTH

[Pregnor]

Oh our home and contents on a 2x1 in gosnells was about $500 per year.

In vic park we went with GIO for contents, as SGIO wouldnt cover us, and that was about $400 for contents alone

Now we live in boyup brook at it costs us something like $170 a year for just contents (and we have absolutuley no security).

[Queen]

We will be owning the house, and I would want to insure it for more than I what I brought it for yeah? The house alone?
We have contents insurance now, which is $100 a year, which covers up to $20,000.

So confusing...

[2s'nuff]

We insure our home & contents through SGIO. On their website they have some calculators to help you work out how much you should insure your home for:
http://www.sgio.com.au/home-insurance/calculators.shtml

I always over insure rather than under.

Lisa