Short-term home insurance is sometimes called unoccupied property insurance. It covers your property temporarily while it’s left empty. You can buy just a few weeks or months of cover at a time.
Regular home insurance usually has restrictions on leaving your house empty for more than a specific period of consecutive days – usually 30 days but in some cases, it may go up to 60 days.
So if your property is empty for longer than that, you’ll need to take out short-term home insurance to cover the property while it’s empty.
Can I buy normal home insurance for the short term?
No, regular home insurance policies cover your property for 12 months. The only way to buy home insurance for a shorter time than that is to buy unoccupied home insurance.
What if you need cover for a shorter period of time and you’ll still be living there? Perhaps you’ve put your home on the market, it’s under offer and you anticipate moving out in just a few weeks or months. In such a case, you can still buy an annual policy and cancel it for a pro-rata refund of unused months when you move. But there might be administration charges.
