Do You Need to Tell Your Insurer About Renovation Work?
Most standard home insurance policies require you to notify your insurer before significant building work starts, particularly anything involving structural changes, removing walls, or work that leaves your property more exposed than normal (an open rear extension while it's being built, for example). This is standard across the industry, not specific to any one insurer.
The risk of not telling them isn't just about the renovation itself. If something unrelated happens during the build, a burst pipe in an untouched part of the house, for instance, an insurer can potentially decline or reduce a claim if undisclosed building work is found to have changed the risk they originally priced. It's a five-minute phone call that's worth making before work starts, and we always recommend clients check their policy wording or call their insurer directly, since every policy is different.
Contractor's Insurance vs Your Home Insurance
These cover different things, and confusing them is a common misunderstanding:
- Your home insurance covers your building and contents generally, and is your responsibility to keep informed and up to date throughout the project.
- The contractor's public liability insurance covers accidental damage the contractor causes while working, for example if a wall is damaged during structural work, or a pipe is accidentally punctured during first-fix plumbing.
A reputable contractor should be able to show you a current public liability insurance certificate without being asked twice. We're fully insured on every project and happy to provide certificates before work starts, if a contractor is reluctant to show proof of insurance, that's worth treating as a warning sign.
Common Ways Homeowners Finance a Renovation
We're not financial advisers, and nothing here is personal financial advice, but from what we see across hundreds of Manchester renovations, most homeowners pay for a project one of a few common ways:
- Savings. The simplest option where available, no interest, no application process, and no impact on your mortgage.
- A further advance or remortgage. Many mortgage lenders will lend additional money against the equity in your home for home improvements, often at a lower interest rate than a personal loan, since it's secured against the property. This usually needs to go through your existing lender or a mortgage broker.
- A dedicated home improvement loan. An unsecured personal loan specifically for renovation work, more suited to smaller projects where remortgaging isn't worth the fees involved.
- Disabled Facilities Grant (DFG). For accessibility adaptations like level-access showers or grab rails, DFG funding may be available through your local council. See our bathroom renovation cost guide for more on how this applies to accessible bathroom work.
Which option makes sense depends entirely on your circumstances, the size of the project, and your existing mortgage terms, a mortgage broker or independent financial adviser is the right person to talk through the specifics, not a builder.
Phasing a Renovation to Spread the Cost
If financing the whole project at once isn't realistic, phasing is a genuinely common and sensible approach. We regularly work with clients doing a kitchen renovation one year and a loft conversion or extension the next, rather than trying to fund everything simultaneously.
The key to phasing well is planning the sequence properly from the start, for example agreeing electrical and plumbing routes for a future phase during the current one, so you're not undoing finished work later. We quote each phase separately and fixed, so you always know the exact cost of the next step before committing to it.
Budgeting Honestly for the Real Cost
Whatever financing route you choose, budgeting against a fixed, itemised quote rather than a rough online estimate avoids the most common financing headache we see, running out of funds partway through because the actual cost came in higher than an initial ballpark figure. See our kitchen renovation cost guide and bathroom renovation cost guide for realistic price ranges by project type, and book a free site survey for a fixed number specific to your property before you commit to any financing option.