Home insurance

What is home insurance?

Home insurance is general insurance for a residence. It pays to repair or rebuild the structure and to replace household contents after damage from insured events such as fire, storm, flood, earthquake, landslide or riot, and can extend to burglary, breakdown of appliances, accidental damage and the owner's liability to others. Owners can insure the building and contents together; tenants usually insure contents only.

In India the base of most home cover is Bharat Griha Raksha, the standard fire and allied perils policy for dwellings that every general insurer has offered since April 2021. Insurers then build packages around it with sections for burglary, valuables, electronic equipment, public liability and personal accident.

What a home insurance policy covers

Home insurance does not cover the land, normal wear and tear, gradual leakage, or damage during construction work by the owner. A home loan borrower should also know that this is different from home loan protection or credit life insurance, which repays the loan if the borrower dies.

How home insurance works in India

• Building value. Insurers use the carpet area and a construction cost per square foot. Using the property's market value inflates premium, while using an old purchase price leaves the owner short.
• No average under the standard product. Bharat Griha Raksha does not apply the average clause, so a slightly low sum insured does not reduce the claim proportionately. The claim still cannot exceed the sum insured.
• Long-term options. Policies of up to 10 years are available, with automatic escalation of the building sum insured on long-term covers.
• Tax. Home insurance was not part of the September 2025 GST exemption for individual life and health insurance, so GST continues to apply to the premium.
• Housing societies. Apartment complexes often insure the common structure under a society policy. Individual flat owners then need cover mainly for their contents and interiors, and should check what the society policy includes.

What home insurance means for distribution

• The loan journey dominates. Banks and housing finance companies, acting as corporate agents, sell most home policies at disbursement. Conduct rules require the borrower to be free to choose the insurer and to understand what they are buying. Bundling under pressure leads to complaints and is a focus of IRDAI's 2026 distribution reform consultation.
• Stand-alone demand is thin outside the loan journey. Floods and cyclones in coastal and hill states are a natural moment for local awareness drives. Simple annual covers offered at such times reach households that have no loan and no cover.
• Contents is the upsell. Many loan-linked policies cover only the building. A contents and valuables conversation adds protection where customers actually feel losses.
• Rural obligations include dwellings. General insurers must cover a share of dwellings in the gram panchayats allocated to them. Low-premium home covers sold through Common Service Centres, microfinance partners and Bima Vahaks help meet these targets.
• Claims depend on documents. Photos of the home and an inventory of key contents, kept on the phone, make claims faster. Advisers who suggest this at sale reduce disputes later.