Having surveyed homeowners across the country Halifax Home Insurance has found that around 1.7 million households have an unfinished renovation project that they have been working around for 2 years or more.
Of the people surveyed by the Halifax almost half of them said they just did not have the time to finish the job off, while nearly 30 percent said they could not afford to complete the work. It appears that the most common room that remains unfinished is the bedroom, perhaps because it is not a room everyone sees.
A Halifax Home Insurance spokesman, looking at the information, felt that effective budgeting at the start of the project could help more people get jobs finished. Taking a realistic view of costs rather than being overly optimistic is perhaps the biggest change to make.
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AA Insurance has asked the government to continue investing in flood defences as well as suggesting local councils should not approve building in high risk areas.
The floods of last year were exacerbated by the inability of the drainage systems to take the water away, aspects that the government can have a big say in. Around 180,000 claims were made last year following the floods said AA Insurance, costing insurers some GBP3 billion. There were also many people without home insurance who suffered as well, highlighting the need for both buildings and contents insurance to protect the most valuable assets people have.
Looking to the future there may be a situation where insurers like AA Insurance and others refuse to cover people for flood damage unless steps are taken to improve the defences available. Such a scenario would be a nightmare for homeowners of course. An alternative may be higher premiums, though the increase would be large in order to cover the potential risk, again leading to many consumers being unable to afford the cover they need.
A fascinating fact about the music festival season is that three out of four people attending them lose possessions while there according to Zurich Insurance.
The study carried out by Zurich found that the typical value of items taken to music festivals by people is over GBP260. The most commonly taken possessions include mobile phones, cameras and MP3 players. The majority of items that go missing are simply left behind, in tents or in bags, with only 10 percent of them being stolen.
Good advice from Zurich Insurance is for festivalgoers to check with their home contents insurer that they will be covered at the festival they are attending. This way at least the financial aspect of losing personal possessions will be dealt with.
