Tips on How to Keep Your Holiday Home Safe and Secure

Video transcript

As holiday homes are regularly left unoccupied, they are a little more susceptible to break in and damage from maintenance issues which may go un-noticed when no one’s home. But there are a few things you can do to reduce these risks and make sure that every time you come back to your holiday home, it’s in the same state you left it in.

In terms of keeping your property secure, the insurers we use require your property to have a certain level of security in place for your cover to remain valid. You must have locks on doors including patio doors and garage doors which meet BS3621 standards to avoid your cover becoming void. However, as an extra measure, we recommend using a house alarm to keep your property even more secure. To minimise the risk of theft you should also hide valuable items away and out of sight where possible. Ideally, you should take these items with you but this may not be possible with larger items such as TVs. In this case, it’s best to at least move them out of immediate view.

Another common danger for unoccupied holiday homes is escape of water. If you don’t speak insurance, escape of water means a water leak! This is normally caused by a burst pipe or malfunction with a central heating system.

It’s likely that you’ll spend less time in your holiday home over the winter months however, this is also the time when burst pipes are most likely to happen. There are a few things you can do to stop this happening though.

1. Insulating pipes

   This is known as lagging and involves wrapping waterproof and insulating material around pipes to stop them freezing

2. Insulating storage cisterns

   Again, these can freeze over in cold conditions. Most DIY shops sell materials for you to do this yourself.

3. Draining down

   This involves getting all of the water out of all pipes and systems. If there’s no water in pipes, it can’t freeze, it can’t expand and it can’t burst pipes. If you’re unsure how to do this, contact a plumber.

4. Keep the property heated

   If you have your heating on a timer while you’re away, this can help heat the property sufficiently to stop pipes freezing.

5. Know where your stop cock is

   If you’re in your house when disaster strikes it’s helpful to know where the stop cock is so that you can shut off the water quickly and minimise damage. Similarly, if you aren’t there and you need to call out a plumber, you can direct them to the stop cock with ease. Better to know before an emergency than after it happens.

    

If you have any further questions on keeping your holiday home safe, our advisors will be happy to help. Give us a call or go online to get a quote.