No matter if you’re renting your apartment, or if you’ve decided to make Hong Kong your home and buy a property, home insurance comes in a variety of shapes and sizes; navigating all your options can be tough. As such, here’s what you need to know to ensure you get the best home insurance cover to meet your needs.
Home Contents Insurance
Of the different types of Home insurance available, Home Contents Insurance is going to be the more common policy type.
As the name suggests, Home Contents Insurance insures your personal possessions. However, this is not to say that your possessions are only insured inside your home. Home Contents Insurance will normally allow for “Worldwide All Risks” insurance on your belongings.
This means that if your camera is stolen in the Philippines while you’re on holiday, or you leave your laptop on a bus, these items can be replaced under your insurance policy. Unless otherwise excluded from your policy on a specific basis,
Under home contents insurance in Hong Kong all your personal possessions are covered up to a pre-defined group limit for all assets; this is normally in the region of HK$250,000 to HK$500,000, with each item being given a maximum coverage benefit. These limits will vary dependent on the insurance company you choose to work with but can be as low as HK$10,000 per covered item or as high as HK$50,000 per item.
Insuring Valuable Items
As can be seen, these individual item limits are not very high. HK$10,000 may cover a basic off-the-shelf laptop or an iPad, but when it comes to the bigger ticket items like Artworks or Fine Wines (or even antique carpets) you will likely need a higher limit to fully protect your possessions.
If you own any highly valuable items, including watches or engagement rings, that will be valued in excess of HK$50,000 then you are probably going to need to add these possessions to your home contents insurance plan as a “specified Item.”
Specified Items can be covered for their full value under a Home Contents Insurance policy in Hong Kong. This will require a proof of valuation be given to the insurance company, and the item will then be insured for that amount. However, providing an accurate valuation by way of original purchase receipt or official 3rd party valuation is extremely important – without a valuation on record any claims in relation to a specified item cannot be upheld. This is due to the fact that there would be no way of proving the value of the item involved in the loss and the claim would only be given up to the standard policy limits.
It should come as no surprise that more expensive specified items will increase the overall premium of your home contents insurance plan, as will including additional properties – did we mention that Home Contents insurance products in Hong Kong are able to cover your possessions in multiple residences, even if you have a property outside of Hong Kong?
Hong Kong Fire Insurance
But what if something happens to the physical structure of your property? In Hong Kong, fire insurance is arguably the more valuable form of coverage, especially if you own your home (rather than renting it).
If you required a mortgage to purchase your Hong Kong property then the chances are that your bank will have required you to take out a fire insurance policy to cover their risk of the property being destroyed or damaged prior to the completion of the mortgage term.
Insuring Against Typhoon Damage
Simply put, Fire Insurance in Hong Kong will cover the rebuilding cost of your property in the event that it suffers a partial or total loss due to Fire and/or any “Allied Perils.” This is an important aspect of Fire Coverage as allied perils can include things like flooding, subsidence, wind damage and more. Due to the fact that Hong Kong often experiences a number of very strong typhoons each year (and the incidence of fire is relatively low), it can actually be the Allied Peril cover on a fire insurance policy which is more important to a policyholder.
If you’re renting your apartment or home in the city then Fire Insurance really is of no consequence to you, but your landlord will definitely have this type of cover in place.
Hong Kong Insurance Made Simple
If you have any questions regarding Fire insurance or Home Contents insurance in Hong Kong just ask CCW Global. Our expert brokers are ready to help answer any and all questions you may have.
More about insurances in Hong Kong:
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