Almost half of home owners in the UK fail to insure outside possessions in their gardens

Nearly half of home owners in The UK do not consider garden contents when buying home insurance, new research suggests.

Three quarters of people value garden items at less than £5,000 and those in Northern Ireland are most likely to not include their garden possessions, according to the study by AA Insurance.

It points out official data published by the Office for National Statistics shows that there were 595,000 thefts from gardens in 2018, up 23% from 2017 and it says that just because possessions are outside, it does not mean they should not be insured.

Overall 48% of home owners do not consider the items in their garden when buying home insurance and 64% of gardens in Northern Ireland could be underinsured as they did not consider any aspect of their garden contents when buying their home insurance.

More than half of home owners in London, some 54%, and 53% in the North East of England also did not add their garden items to their insurance.

Three quarters of the 15,500 strong AA-Populus Panel who have both home insurance and a garden believed that their shrubs, pots, garden tools, chairs, tables and garden toys would cost no more than £5,000 to replace.

More expensive gardens could be found in Eastern England, the South West and Wales where more than one in 10 believed their garden contents costs between £5,000 and £10,000.

Separate AA research shows that 36% of households plan to spend more than £150 on garden tools and 9% spending £900 on a hot tub this summer.

‘As a nation we love our gardens, and we spend a lot of our hard earned cash improving them each year. Garden theft has seen such a sharp increase last year so it’s good to protect yourself,’ said Janet Connor, managing director for AA Insurance services.

‘A few minutes spent in the garden will give a good idea of how much you’d need to spend should the worst happen. When faced with filling out an insurance application, the term contents can be misinterpreted to just the things within the home. Even though it’s outside, you should still insure it,’ she added.