If you let out a property to paying guests, whether through Airbnb, a booking agency, or your own website, standard home insurance will not cover you. Holiday let insurance is a specialist product designed for properties that are rented out on a short-term basis, and it covers risks that a normal residential policy ignores entirely.
Why Standard Home Insurance Does Not Work for Holiday Lets
A standard home insurance policy assumes the property is your primary residence. You live there. You maintain it. You lock the doors at night. A holiday let breaks all of those assumptions. The property sits empty between bookings. Strangers come and go with keys. Guests use appliances, light fires, run baths, and leave windows open. The risk profile is fundamentally different.
Most standard policies contain an exclusion clause for properties used for commercial letting. If you make a claim and the insurer discovers the property was being let to paying guests, the claim will almost certainly be declined. The policy may even be voided entirely, leaving you with no cover at all.
What Does Holiday Let Insurance Cover?
A proper holiday let insurance policy covers the specific risks that come with short-term rental use. The main areas are:
- Buildings and contents cover with higher limits for guest-related damage. Broken furniture, stained carpets, damaged appliances. All part of the letting business.
- Public liability for injuries to guests on the property. A guest slips on a wet deck, trips on a loose step, or burns themselves on a faulty appliance. You are liable.
- Loss of rental income if an insured event like a fire, flood, or storm makes the property uninhabitable during a peak booking period.
- Unoccupancy cover for the gaps between bookings when the property is sitting empty. Standard policies often limit or exclude cover after 30 consecutive days unoccupied.
- Employers’ liability if you hire cleaners, gardeners, or a property manager.
Does Airbnb Host Protection Cover You?
Airbnb offers a Host Protection Insurance programme, but it is not a substitute for a proper holiday let insurance policy. It has significant gaps. It does not cover your buildings or contents. It does not cover loss of rental income. It does not cover unoccupancy. And the claims process goes through Airbnb, not a regulated UK insurer, which can mean longer resolution times and less favourable outcomes.
Treat Airbnb host protection as a secondary safety net, not your primary cover. If the property is yours and the income matters to you, insure it properly.
What About Properties Near the Coast or in Flood Zones?
Cornwall is full of holiday lets in coastal locations and flood-risk areas. These properties need specialist underwriting because the risk of storm damage, flooding, and coastal erosion is higher than that of an inland suburban house. Not every insurer will cover them, and the ones that do will often have specific conditions around flood defences, property maintenance, and winter drainage.
Our holiday home insurance page covers the details on insuring coastal and flood zone properties. If your holiday let is in one of these locations, a specialist broker is not optional. It is the only way to get meaningful cover.
Holiday Let vs Holiday Home. What Is the Difference?
A holiday home is a second property you use for your own holidays. A holiday let is a property you rent out to guests for income. Some properties are both. The insurance distinction matters because a holiday let has commercial elements like public liability, guest damage, and rental income protection that a pure holiday home policy may not include.
If you use the property yourself and let it out at other times, you need a policy that covers both uses. Most specialist private client insurance providers offer combined policies that handle this, but you need to declare the letting use upfront. If you also have a business that needs commercial insurance, we can look at everything together.
Let Out a Holiday Property?
We will find you specialist cover for letting, unoccupancy, guest liability, and rental income protection.
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