As we live in a mining town, when it comes to insuring your home is it wise to admit there has been historical subsidence in your quote, despite surveys saying they would expect no further movement after all these years? Very interested to know what you all do in this situation. Cheers.
Yes it is wise to admit everything, because if you have any claim for anything covered on your policy & you have not disclosed the required information , the insurance company could declare your insurance invalid , if you check closely it will be in the small print , but at the end of the day, its up to you if you want to risk it
With insurance tell everything you know insurance companies happy to take your money but not so willing to pay out when it comes to it
It depends on the question asked...you must answer honestly. Do you know for certain that your home in particular has been subsidence affected? If so you must answer yes...if you are just assuming that it will have been because the whole area is undermined you are under no obligation to say it is...depending on how they've phrased the question . The top and bottom of it is that some houses have been affected in the past and some haven't, don't admit to something you have no knowledge of on an assumption....if you know for certain that your property has suffered subsidence damage you must state it or risk not being paid out.
As others have said, you have a legal obligation to make a fair presentation of the risk to insurers and disclose all material facts. As mining ceased yonks ago (thanks again, Mrs. Thatch) shouldn’t be much of an issue. And the Coal Authority has legal obligations to compensate for historic coal mining subsidence, with the mining company concerned responsible for more modern stuff. See gov.co.uk. So if insurers paid you out, they could claim their money back, so no exposure to them.
Thanks so much everyone for your help. Just a couple of things of note from some comments above. We've not claimed, or had any problems with subsidence since we moved in in 2010. The surveys said there had been historical subsidence, but it was very unlikely to cause further problems, and no other movement should occur. It just irks me that by saying it has had historical subsidence that the quote then jumps from just over 120 quid, to over 300 quid, for something that highly likely won't even be an issue.
The site where my house sits had a bad subsidence history. The previous building was demolished in 1999 because of it and that made house insurance a right pain. Legal & General are the only people I've found who ask this "Has there been a history of subsidence in the last 15 years". Given they're limiting it to last 15 years it makes it much easier. They're not the cheapest but saves any aggro being able to answer honestly should I ever need to claim.
I've found another provider who is 10 years, so fortunately this avoids any doubt. Thanks again everyone.
