When you are shopping for home insurance, you may be offered add-ons to your contents insurance, including home legal cover. Home legal cover can help with the expenses of legal action and is often sold with home insurance or car insurance for around £15 to £20 extra on your annual premium. Sometimes it is included free. Limits of coverage usually range from £50,000 to £100,000.

Household legal cover typically covers personal injury, property disputes (over boundaries, for instance), employment disputes, or disputes over goods and services. Though all policies differ, common exclusions include things like divorce and custody issues, defamation cases, contracting disputes over major home improvements, and matters that would typically go to small claims courts.

Legal cover may insure you in the event of legal expenses related to nuisance or trespassing on your land, your bodily injury, or civil court actions relating to property you own or for which you are responsible.

Before seeking out home legal cover, check to see if you’re already covered. Some policies include it automatically. Additionally, membership in some professional societies or trade unions may entitle you to free legal advice. And you should be aware that most insurers insist that there be a reasonable chance of your legal claim being successful before they will take it on, and will require you to accept any reasonable offer to settle, or else you’ll have to cover legal costs yourself.