Compare and take out your vacation home insurance

A vacation home is a second home for many people. A place to get away from it all and enjoy a change of scenery. A precious possession, where beautiful memories lie. So a vacation home is just as important to insure as a home. Suppose your vacation home is severely damaged by a storm. Not only will you lose a valuable asset, you will also be faced with high financial costs. Consider cleaning up the remains of the home, rebuilding and replacing all the belongings. These costs quickly run into the (tens of) thousands of euros.

Please note that the insurer will impose a number of conditions on the insurance of a holiday home. These are, for example, conditions concerning rental and occupation of the home. For example, during periods of long-term vacancy, limited cover often applies. This means that you are not insured in case of burglary or damage, for example, during this period. Always check this carefully in the insurer's conditions.

Other conditions also apply to renting out a vacation home. These include the number of days per year you rent out the home. Most insurers allow you to rent out a vacation home for a maximum of 6 months per year. This can vary from one insurer to another, so always check the policy conditions. With some insurers, letting is covered under the basic coverage and with others you can take out a separate coverage for this. If you rent out your vacation home more than 300 days per year, you will need to purchase business property insurance.

You can insure a vacation home with buildings insurance. This covers all real estate, such as a built-in kitchen or bathroom. But if a fire breaks out in your vacation home, your household contents may also be damaged. For this you need a separate contents insurance. We call this combination of insurances a home insurance. You can also extend the home insurance with liability insurance, legal assistance insurance and continuous travel insurance. When you take out these insurances together we call this a home insurance package. So you do not have to take out all insurances separately. With a home insurance, you can be sure that your vacation home is fully insured.

A holiday home is of course a different type of home than a normal house. Often, the owner of the holiday home does not live there permanently. In some cases, the house is largely rented out and thus different people live in it throughout the year. A holiday home is vacant more often than a normal house and is often not located in a residential area, which means there is less supervision. All these factors together make insuring a holiday home a bigger risk for an insurer than insuring a house. That is why you cannot insure your holiday home with every insurer. Fortunately, there are still plenty of insurers with whom you can insure your holiday home.

What is covered with a building insurance for your holiday home depends on the coverage you choose. With the standard coverage of a building insurance your holiday home is insured against fire, burglary, vandalism and damage caused by weather conditions, such as storm, hail and lightning. If you choose for an all-risk coverage you are also insured for sudden, unforeseen events. This includes for example damage to your holiday home caused by falling, bumping or colliding.

The cost of insuring a holiday home depends on a number of factors:

• The type of holiday home
• The construction type of the dwelling
• The reinstatement value
• The desired coverage
• The own risk
• The residence/region

Insuring a holiday home abroad is somewhat more difficult than when the home is in the Netherlands. Only a few insurers can insure a holiday home abroad. Many insurers limit themselves to the Netherlands, Belgium and Germany. If you have a holiday home in another country, you can only approach a limited number of insurers. These are usually insurers who specialise in insuring holiday homes. Sometimes you can take out a policy with an insurer in the country in question.

Through Alpina, you can purchase home insurance for your vacation home. You first fill in some personal data and details about your property, in our online comparison tool. In this step you can also indicate what kind of property it is, in this case a vacation home/recreational home. After this you can choose the desired coverage. Then you will get an overview of all insurers who offer insurance suitable for your vacation home. You will not only get an overview of all premiums, but also of the corresponding policy conditions. Take a good look at these as well, as they can sometimes differ greatly from one insurer to another.

Do you still have questions about insuring your vacation home? Then be sure to contact us! We can be reached by phone Monday through Friday from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. at 088 - 688 3700. Of course, you can also send us a message via chat, WhatsApp or Messenger. In that case, we will answer your question as soon as possible during office hours.