If you live in an area that has a past history, then getting home insurance with flooding cover may be difficult to find – from the insurer’s point of view it is a simple question of the risks of loss or damage to the building and its contents being that much higher.

Unfortunately, however, there are a number of locations throughout Britain where each winter seems to bring its spate of flooding either from seas whipped up by storms or rivers swollen by the downpour of rain.

Some dramatic pictures of the effects of flooding from just the first of this winter’s “weather bombs” were published in the Telegraph newspaper last month.

Insuring your home

If you are about to buy a new home or are coming up to the renewal of its insurance, you might want to review the likely risk of flooding. A helpful resource in this regard is likely to be an online, searchable map published by the Environment Agency, which identifies areas at risk of flooding from rivers or the sea and with detail right down to a street by street scale of 1:10,000.

So, what is likely to be the insurer’s response if you are looking for home insurance with flooding protection? The replies may be along one of the following lines:

• if you are completely out of luck, the insurer may decide that the risk of an expensive claim after your home is flooded is simply too great – and therefore decline your application for cover;

• cover against flooding may be available to protect your home and its contents – but only at the cost of a seemingly very high premium; or

• if you had the foresight to consult an independent, specialist insurance broker – such as those of us here at GSI Insurance – you may be able to tap into the experience necessary to identify those insurers offering home insurance with flooding protection at a more competitive price.

Every home is different and you might expect your insurer to take into account the particular circumstances of your own home when assessing the risks. By using a specialist insurance provider you may be able to ensure that your application is assessed entirely on its merits and in the light of the particular flood risks in your neighbourhood.

Even with this type of help and guidance, however, you may still feel that the cost of insuring your home and its contents in an area subject to flooding is expensive. In that case, an experienced provider may be able to identify for your those insurance policies likely to prove more affordable because they specifically exclude the risk of loss or damage as a result of flooding.

In answer to the question first posed, therefore, it is a resounding yes you can get home insurance with flooding – and all the more easily if you know where to look.