Guide to Holiday Home Insurance for Property in the Czech Republic

Introduction - Considered by many to be the centre of Europe, the Czech republic is becoming a popular place to buy a Czech second or holiday home. Obtaining insurance for your property is readily available and should be considered essential, especially if you are considering renting your property out to help pay for the mortgage. AssetSure are able to offer insurance for an Czech holiday home.    Although the Czech Republic is not beset with natural disasters, it in common with many other parts of central Europe has suffered from severe flooding in recent years. As recently as 2002, Prague was on high alert as the swollen river Vltava threatened to break flood barriers and swamp the historic centre of the Czech capital. During this flood, the worst in over 200 years, as many as 200,000 homeowners were forced to evacuate their homes until the waters had subsided. Obtaining holiday home insurance that includes the peril of flood will help to protect your property against the costs of flood damage. The cost of putting right the flood damage following the 2002 incident was estimated at in excess of 1.2 billion pounds needed to repair the damaged caused by earlier floods in 1997. Although thankfully, these occurrences are not happening on a too regular basis, we have seen in the United Kingdom in recent months, the damage that flooding can cause.

Many purchasers wrongly believe that property insurance has to be purchased locally and this can lead to worries about a technical language barrier if the policy wording is only obtainable in a foreign language. Policies are available for the Czech Republic written in English with all help lines & claim lines staffed by trained English speaking assistants. The policy should cover a wide range of insurance perils such as Fire, Lightning, Storm, Flood and Property Owners liability should also be included.

The Czech Holiday Home Market - since gaining its independence, the Czech republic has joined the EU and this has helped reassure overseas investors whom have long been attracted to the delights of this country. The Czech economy is growing at a higher rate than the EU average. It is a desirable place for investments and business activities and this is helping fuel a property boom. Tourism is strong, particularly in the months of May to September, although many holiday makers ferried in by the budget airlines, never seem to make it past the capital city Prague. Provincial towns have a lot to offer the overseas investor ( for one thing they are a good deal cheaper) and a visit will often leave you sufficiently impressed to want to purchase your own holiday home property. Buildings are well preserved and often historical and monuments are maintained with pride. Some of these towns were declared urban monument reservations or even are included on the UNESCO List of World Cultural Heritage sites. Worth looking at are: Cesky Krumlov, Olomouc, Brno,Pizen (Pilsen), Ceske, Budejovice,Telc, Hradec Kravolove, Litomysi & Terezin. All of these towns have good quality property that may be used as a second or retirement home but if your after a real bargain, even cheaper property can be located in many of the numerous Czech villages. This smaller villages and towns are seeing large numbers of younger inhabitants move away to the larger provincial cities in search of work and there are thus many property bargains to be found.
 

Why Buy a Holiday Home in Czech Republic? - In today's Czech Republic, a citizen from one or another of the nations that comprise the EU no longer needs to establish a limited liability company (formally known as an SRO) to take possession and title of a property and making a purchase is reasonably straight forward. Many people still however opt to purchase a property through a limited company as there are often useful tax advantages and an accountant should be able to explain this to you.  Obtaining a solicitor early in the sales process is important as they will be able to guide you through the exact legal requirements, at this stage you can broach the subject with them of holiday home letting and they should be able alert you to any permits required or legislation that has to be complied. with. Once you have located the property you require, an offer is put forward to the vendor, if accepted, it is usual to pay a 10% deposit and this is usually placed in an Escrow account until the purchase is finalised. Your solicitor will now carry out the necessary searches to ascertain title etc and if everything is acceptable, both parties proceed to sign the sale documentation. At this point, the documentation must be forwarded to the Land Registry for registration purposes but alas, this can take several months. The outstanding monies for the sale must now be added to the escrow account and this will only be transferred to the vendor once the paperwork is complete. As well as the purchase price, you should expect to pay between 8 & 10% in taxes and fees, relating to the purchase of the property. The vendor is expected to pay an additional sellers tax which at the present moment is 5%, be warned though, if the vendor does not pay, you are liable for it

The main holiday home areas are: Carlsbad, Central Bohemia, Hradec Králové, Liberec, Moravian Silesian, Olomouc, Pardubice, Plzeň, South Bohemia, South Moravia, Ustí Nad Labem, Vysočina and Zlín.  In addition, Assetsure provide overseas property insurance and holiday home insurance for other countries including Australia, Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Brazil, Canada, Cape Verde, Chile, Croatia, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Egypt, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Liechtenstein, Luxembourg, Malta, Monaco, Montenegro, Morocco, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, South Africa, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Thailand, Turkey, United Arab Emirates, United Kingdom (UK) and Venezuela.