I just came home and found a letter from GIO about the home and contents insurance renewal - I guess 12 months is up.
The whole insurance comes to approx $1800 for a year, with $500 excess. While I'd keep the home insurance in case of catastrophe, (my suburb is surrounded by national park - we are just out of the bushfire zone - when I enquired about joining the local volunteer bushfire group the person at the other end of the phone line said I couldn't because the zone officially stopped about 8 doors further down the street ).
Anyway, I'm thinking about dropping the contents insurance, (costing us over $300 a year) because if we did lose our contents or we were robbed, we don't really have that much stuff of value.
The stuff of value would be cameras (and they aren't especially high end anyway), a computer or two, a few regular push bikes (again, not high end in any sense of the word), a mobile phone or two, a bed mattress, a dining table (which was originally a $300 secondhand purchase from ebay in any case), a fridge, a washing machine, shoes and clothing, a few luggage bags, books and this iPad. We don't have a valuable music, video/DVD, jewerly or fine art collection.
The TV is not a LCD or plasma, it's a solid 70+kg CRT thing.
In terms of neighbourhood, we live in a great area - there's never been any theft that I know of except somebody breaking into cars to take fairly worthless things (why bother). There's a $500 excess anyway on claims so once we pay that, there's probably virtually nothing left to pay on! Apparently we are insured for $74k of contents but I guess we'd only get that if the whole building was destroyed.
I'm sure if the worst was to happen, family and friends would come to the rescue for any essentials in the short term. There's usually someone looking to give away a bed frame, furniture, sofas and whatnot. I can easily replenish the wardrobe and kitchen contents. I don't watch tv (I can go for months without it) so I wouldn't care too much if it was stolen or destroyed.
In the garage we have garden maintenance equipment etc. but I'm sure we could get the essentials from neighbours or from gumtree or from somebody else upgrading.
Anyway, has anybody else put this much thought into their home contents insurance and decided it was or wasn't worth it?
Btw, I personally would drop the sum insured of the house too - they reckon $428k? I think we could do a brick 2 storey project home on this site for $350k or less. (ATM this is a weatherboard single storey home with two living areas and a garage underneath). Btw I'd upgrade to brick/brick veneer 2 storey if I had the chance in a rebuild situation.
What are your thoughts? Is the contents insurance unnecessary?
Cheers.
The whole insurance comes to approx $1800 for a year, with $500 excess. While I'd keep the home insurance in case of catastrophe, (my suburb is surrounded by national park - we are just out of the bushfire zone - when I enquired about joining the local volunteer bushfire group the person at the other end of the phone line said I couldn't because the zone officially stopped about 8 doors further down the street ).
Anyway, I'm thinking about dropping the contents insurance, (costing us over $300 a year) because if we did lose our contents or we were robbed, we don't really have that much stuff of value.
The stuff of value would be cameras (and they aren't especially high end anyway), a computer or two, a few regular push bikes (again, not high end in any sense of the word), a mobile phone or two, a bed mattress, a dining table (which was originally a $300 secondhand purchase from ebay in any case), a fridge, a washing machine, shoes and clothing, a few luggage bags, books and this iPad. We don't have a valuable music, video/DVD, jewerly or fine art collection.
The TV is not a LCD or plasma, it's a solid 70+kg CRT thing.
In terms of neighbourhood, we live in a great area - there's never been any theft that I know of except somebody breaking into cars to take fairly worthless things (why bother). There's a $500 excess anyway on claims so once we pay that, there's probably virtually nothing left to pay on! Apparently we are insured for $74k of contents but I guess we'd only get that if the whole building was destroyed.
I'm sure if the worst was to happen, family and friends would come to the rescue for any essentials in the short term. There's usually someone looking to give away a bed frame, furniture, sofas and whatnot. I can easily replenish the wardrobe and kitchen contents. I don't watch tv (I can go for months without it) so I wouldn't care too much if it was stolen or destroyed.
In the garage we have garden maintenance equipment etc. but I'm sure we could get the essentials from neighbours or from gumtree or from somebody else upgrading.
Anyway, has anybody else put this much thought into their home contents insurance and decided it was or wasn't worth it?
Btw, I personally would drop the sum insured of the house too - they reckon $428k? I think we could do a brick 2 storey project home on this site for $350k or less. (ATM this is a weatherboard single storey home with two living areas and a garage underneath). Btw I'd upgrade to brick/brick veneer 2 storey if I had the chance in a rebuild situation.
What are your thoughts? Is the contents insurance unnecessary?
Cheers.