Guest House & B&B Insurance
A guest house or B&B is a home with a business inside it. You live there, guests sleep there, and the same kitchen often feeds both. That overlap is the thing an ordinary insurance policy handles worst.
Where Your Home Ends And The Business Begins
A household policy is written for a family home and typically excludes business use, or limits it to someone working at a desk. Paying guests sleeping in the house are well outside that. A commercial policy written for a hotel, on the other hand, may say little about your own belongings and private rooms. What a guest house needs is a policy that covers both halves of the building on purpose.
The other thing that changes the moment a guest pays is fire safety. Sleeping accommodation for the public is held to a higher standard than a private house, and insurers read your fire precautions as a direct measure of the risk.
What Guest House and B&B Insurance Covers
Buildings, including your private accommodation
The whole building on a reinstatement basis, guest rooms and family rooms together. Rebuild cost for a period guest house with several bathrooms is often far higher than its market value suggests, so it is worth having it assessed rather than guessed.
Business contents and your own household contents
Beds, linen, furniture and kitchen equipment used for the business, and your own family's belongings in the private part of the house. A combined guest house policy should list both rather than leaving one of them to an assumption.
Public and product liability
Claims from guests and visitors injured on the premises, and claims that food you served made someone ill. Slips on stairs, scalds from showers and breakfast are the everyday sources.
Guests' belongings
Liability for guests' property lost or damaged while they are staying with you. Usually a stated limit per guest, and worth checking against the kind of guest you take.
Employers' liability
A legal requirement once you employ anyone, at a £5 million minimum, including a part time cleaner or someone helping with breakfasts in the season. Close family members are sometimes exempt, but it is worth confirming rather than assuming.
Loss of income
Booking income lost while rooms cannot be let after an insured loss, plus the cost of somewhere for you to live if the private side of the house is uninhabitable too.
Where The Cover Stops
Wordings differ between insurers, so treat these as the usual position rather than as universal fact. Where one of them matters to you, it is worth checking on your own schedule before you need to.
Running it on a household policy
Most home insurance excludes business use beyond working from a desk, and paying guests are a material change. A claim on a household policy for a fire started in a guest room can be refused outright. This is the commonest gap we see in the trade.
Fire precautions not kept up
Insurers commonly attach conditions on smoke detection, fire doors, escape routes and emergency lighting, and ask for a fire risk assessment. Letting those slip is the quickest way to weaken a fire claim.
Selling alcohol without declaring it
A residents' bar or wine with dinner changes the risk and usually requires a licence. Insurers ask whether you are licensed, and an undeclared bar is an undisclosed material fact.
Guests' valuables
Cover for guests' property is limited, and cash, jewellery and laptops above that limit are typically excluded unless kept in a safe. A notice in the room and a safe at reception are the practical answers.
Long closures out of season
Because you live there, the building is not usually unoccupied when you close for winter. But if the family leaves too, for a long trip or while the house is being refurbished, unoccupancy conditions may start to apply.
Why A Household Policy Is Not Enough
Plenty of B&Bs start as a spare room or two, and the household policy simply carries on. It is understandable and it is usually wrong. Taking paying guests is a change insurers expect to be told about, and many household wordings exclude it entirely.
The risk is not theoretical. If a guest is hurt falling down your stairs, a household policy's liability section is written for visitors to a private home, not customers of a business. If a fire starts in a guest room, the insurer will ask how the room was being used. Either can end with the claim declined and the cost falling on you.
The fix is a policy written for a guest house, which treats the building as both a home and a business. It covers your family's belongings and the guest side together, includes liability for guests, and is priced on the number of letting rooms rather than on a family home.
Fire Safety Once Guests Are Paying
In England and Wales, fire safety law applies to premises that provide paying guest accommodation, even when it is in your own home, and the responsible person is required to carry out a fire risk assessment. Scotland and Northern Ireland have their own equivalent rules. Local fire services publish guidance for small guest houses and B&Bs, and it is worth reading.
What insurers look for in practice follows the same lines: interlinked smoke detection, fire doors that close properly on guest rooms, a protected escape route, emergency lighting where needed, extinguishers and blankets in the kitchen, and a written assessment you have actually reviewed. The more of that you have, the better the risk looks.
Keep the evidence somewhere you can find it. Alarm servicing records, the fire risk assessment, electrical and gas certificates. After a fire those documents are the first things asked for, and having them ready changes how a claim runs.
Breakfasts, Bars And Evening Meals
Serving food to paying guests makes you a food business, which in most cases means registering with your local council and being inspected. Your liability cover should include product liability for the food you serve, and your hygiene rating is something insurers increasingly ask about.
A residents' bar, or wine served with evening meals, is a step further. Selling alcohol generally needs a licence, and a licensed guest house is rated differently from an unlicensed one because the premises, the hours and the liability all change. Both are perfectly insurable. The point is to describe which you are.
If you also open the dining room to non residents, or host small events and parties, say so. At that point part of the business is closer to a restaurant than a B&B, and the policy should know.
How To Choose Insurance For A Guest House Or B&B
Guest houses fall between household insurers, who do not want the business, and hotel schemes, which do not always think about the family living on site. We are an FCA regulated broker and will not tell you we are the best choice. These are the questions that decide whether a policy actually fits.
Does it cover your home and the business together?
Ask to see how your own accommodation and belongings are described on the schedule. If they are not mentioned, they may not be covered.
Is it rated on the right number of letting rooms?
Rooms, maximum guests and whether you serve evening meals are what insurers price. Getting them right protects the claim as well as the premium.
Has the licensing position been asked about?
Licensed and unlicensed guest houses are written differently. A broker who never asks whether you sell alcohol has not described your business fully.
Do the fire conditions match what you actually have?
Read the fire precautions on the policy against your own alarm, doors and risk assessment. Any mismatch is worth fixing before a claim, not after.
Does loss of income include somewhere for you to live?
If the house is out of action, you lose the booking income and your home at the same time. Both need to be covered.
Factually, we place guest houses and B&Bs with insurers that write owner run accommodation rather than on a household policy with a business extension, we put the private accommodation and the guest side on one schedule, we ask about licensing, meals and the number of rooms at quotation, and we go through the fire conditions with you before cover starts. We are a broker, so it goes to several insurers rather than one. Call 02382 000820.
What Moves The Price
Every policy is priced on the business behind it. These are the things that move the premium:
- Number of letting rooms and maximum guests
- Rebuild cost of the building, including the private accommodation
- Whether you are licensed, and whether you serve evening meals
- Fire precautions: detection, fire doors, escape routes and the risk assessment
- Contents values for the business and your own household
- Construction, age and whether the building is listed
- Location and claims history
We are a broker, so we take it to several insurers rather than quoting one. Call 02382 000820 for a quote.
What We Need To Quote
- Full address and the rebuild cost of the building
- Number of letting rooms and maximum number of guests
- Whether you live on the premises
- Whether you sell alcohol and hold a licence
- Which meals you serve, and whether non residents dine
- Values for business contents and your own household contents
- Number of staff, including seasonal help
- Five years of claims history
Cover that often goes with this
The gaps we most often find sitting next to this policy.
- Hotel insuranceFor larger, staffed accommodation without the family living on site.
- Holiday letsSelf catering property where you do not live on the premises.
- Property owners insuranceThe parent page, and the reinstatement cost mistake almost everyone makes.
- Property owners liabilityClaims from tenants, visitors and the public arising from the building itself.
- Talk to a brokerTell us how the building is used and we will tell you what it actually needs.
Common questions
Can I use my home insurance for a B&B?+
Usually not. Most household policies exclude business use beyond working from a desk, and taking paying guests is a material change you have to tell your insurer about. If it is not declared, a claim can be refused. A guest house or B&B policy is written to cover the home and the business together.
What insurance do I need to run a bed and breakfast?+
Buildings and contents cover that includes both the guest rooms and your private accommodation, public and product liability for guests and the food you serve, cover for guests' belongings, loss of income, and employers' liability if you have any staff, which is a legal requirement. If you sell alcohol, the policy needs to reflect that you are licensed.
Is a guest house cheaper to insure than a hotel?+
Usually, because there are fewer rooms, fewer staff and often no bar or restaurant open to the public. But the price depends far more on rebuild cost, fire precautions, licensing and claims history than on the label, so a large licensed guest house can cost more than a small hotel.
Does B&B insurance cover my own belongings as well as the guest rooms?+
It should, if the policy is written as a guest house policy rather than a commercial one. Check that your household contents in the private part of the building are listed on the schedule with their own sum insured.
Do I need a fire risk assessment for a small B&B?+
In England and Wales, fire safety law applies to paying guest accommodation even in your own home, and a fire risk assessment is required. Insurers also commonly ask for one. Local fire and rescue services publish guidance for small guest houses that sets out what is expected.
Who insures guest houses and B&Bs in the UK?+
Several insurers write owner run accommodation, often through brokers, with policies that cover the private home and the business in one. What separates them is how they handle the licensed side, the fire conditions and loss of income. Going through a broker means your guest house is presented to more than one of them.
Other property we cover
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