New cover guards against against 8.5% annual rise in house prices
Titlesolv.com, the legal indemnities arm of London & European, has launched its Top-Up for homeowners in response to the continuing rise in property prices.
The policy is designed to supplement any existing indemnity policy to safeguard property owners and mortgage lenders against a shortfall in cover caused by soaring property prices.
The Top-Up policy covers the gap left between today’s value and the property value at policy inception.
According to the Land Registry figures, house prices have risen by 8.5% in the last 12 months – the largest rise in two years.
If the indemnity value is not updated to represent the current value of a property any claim on the legal indemnity policy will only be honoured up to the original limit of indemnity, representing a huge potential shortfall for any owner and/or lender.
Brokers and solicitors can purchase the policy for their clients direct from titlesolv.com.
Harsit Nakarja, underwriting manager for titlesolv.com, said: “Considering the current high loan to value rates on mortgages, lenders are keeping a particularly vigilant eye on this issue.
"This latest initiative from the titlesolv.com team represents a significant new development in the indemnities market where there has been an evident lack of innovation for some years.
"Today’s property market is obviously a very different environment to 10 or even five years ago, and insurance is all too often slow to keep apace with changing needs.
"Our Top-Up policies are a new and innovative answer to a very real need evident in the current property market, and we intend to continue to develop other new initiatives over the coming months to meet the changing needs of both the professionals involved in the marketplace as well as owners.”
