‘Flood’ means the covering of normally dry land by water that has escaped or been released from the normal confines of a lake, dam, river etc. We do not cover loss or damage to retaining walls, sea walls, garden borders and free standing outdoor walls. Please check the PDS for more information on what constitutes a ‘flood’.
Home Building Insurance
Your four walls have seen it all. GIO Home Building Insurance is here to help cover your home from a range of damaging events.
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The content on this page applies to policies started or renewed on or after 24 May 2025.
What is home building insurance?
GIO Home building insurance offers cover if your home is damaged by an insured event.^
This includes:
- the main structure of your home – like the walls and roof
- permanently attached fixtures – such as hot water systems and solar panels, and
- other structures located at the insured address – like garages, sheds, and carports.
What’s covered
What’s not covered
We also don’t insure you for bushfire, storm, storm surge, flood or tsunami in the first 72 hours of your policy. Very limited exceptions apply. Read the PDS for further information.
What events are covered?^
Storm, Storm surge and lightning
To learn details of what is and isn’t included, including limitations, read the Product Disclosure Statement (PDS).
In Action
Do I need building insurance?
Are you purchasing a home?
When getting a mortgage, lenders may require you to have home building insurance in place by settlement, or in some states, from the moment you exchange contracts.
Are you a home owner?
Building insurance may help cover you from expensive out-of-pocket costs to repair or rebuild your home if it’s damaged by fire (including bushfire), storms, floods, and theft.
Do you live in an apartment or unit?
Your building is likely covered by strata insurance, but contents insurance provides cover for your belongings, lino, vinyl or floating floors, curtains, blinds, wall paint and paper.
Are you renting?
Your landlord is responsible for their building’s insurance requirements. However, it’s up to you to get cover for your own belongings. For that, consider GIO Contents Insurance.
LEVELS OF COVER
GIO Home Building Insurance coverage options
We have three levels of cover available, so you can choose the policy that suits your needs.
We do not insure you for bushfire, storm, storm surge, flood or tsunami in the first 72 hours of your policy.
Very limited exceptions apply. Terms, conditions, limits and exclusions apply to cover options. See the PDS for full details.
Optional covers
Not sure how much to insure your home for?
Your sum insured should be enough to rebuild your entire home, including sheds, patios, fencing and driveways. Use our Building Calculator to help estimate your home's rebuild cost according to current prices.
Add optional covers to your policy.
For an additional premium, our optional covers can help with everything from excess-free glass claims to providing emergency home assistance.
GIO Home Assist
Get help fast in the event of a home emergency. Plumbers, electricians, locksmiths or carpenters can be arranged when you need urgent attention at home.
Excess-Free Glass Cover
Accidently broken windows, shower screens or skylights? We'll offer cover for the cost to replace glass without you paying an excess.^
Safety Net Home Protection
Rebuild costs exceeding your sum insured? With Safety Net Home Protection we pay a further percentage of your sum insured towards repairing or rebuilding the home.^
WHY GIO
Why Choose GIO Home Building Insurance
With decade of experience, GIO understands the unique risks Australian homes face, from floods and storms to bushfires.
24/7 Claims
Lodge and track claims any time, from anywhere.
Guaranteed workmanship
We guarantee the quality of work on repairs we authorise.
Local knowledge and claims team
99 years insuring homes across NSW and Australia.
FAQs
People also ask
No, your carpets aren’t covered by GIO Building Insurance. You’ll need GIO Home Contents Insurance or a combined Home and Contents Insurance policy to offer cover for your carpets.
For more information, please refer to the Home and Contents PDS.
With GIO Safety net home protection, where repair or rebuild costs after an insured event exceed your sum insured, we pay a further percentage of your sum insured towards the repair or rebuild of the home by our builder, when our builder, or the amount of the builder’s assessed quote to repair or rebuild the home if your claim is being settled on this basis.
Safety net home protection is automatically included in GIO Classic Extras and GIO Platinum home building cover and is an optional cover for GIO Classic policies for an additional premium.
| Classic (available as optional extra) | Classic Extras (automatically included) | Platinum (automatically included) |
We’ll pay up to a further 25% of the home | We’ll pay up to a further 25% of the home | We’ll pay up to a further 30% of the home |
Conditions and exclusions apply. See the PDS for full details.
During renovations or building works we don't cover loss, damage or legal liability including:
- Damage from cracking, collapse or subsidence caused by the works
- Storm, flood or water damage entering through openings in walls, roofs or unfinished areas (even if temporarily covered)
- Theft or damage through areas under construction that cannot be secured
We also don't cover legal liability for or caused by, connected with, or arising from building works where the total cost exceeds $50,000.
We don’t cover any new buildings in the course of construction.
There are certain building works you must tell us about. See 'When you must contact us' in the GIO Home & Contents Insurance PDS for details.
No, GIO Home and Contents Insurance does not cover loss or damage caused by insects, vermin, or rodents – including termites. However, we’ll cover damage they cause if covered by insured events ‘Fire (including bushfire)’ or ‘Escape of liquid’.
If you’d like more information, please refer to the Home and Contents PDS.
Home Insurance provides cover for your home including garages, carports, outbuildings, fixed swimming pools, sealed driveways, gates and fences, along with any permanently attached fixtures like solar panels, walls, ceilings, and floors caused by a range of insured events at your insured address.
Whereas Contents Insurance is for the loss or damage to the contents in your home caused by insured events. Contents are household items that you own or are responsible for and use primarily for domestic purposes. These include things like furniture, furnishings, clothing, unfixed electrical goods and appliances (not housed in a cabinet), window coverings as well as carpet and rugs.
To learn about GIO Home Insurance and Contents Insurance, and what we cover as the home and contents, please refer to the PDS.
GIO Home Building Insurance covers the building and permanently attached fixtures, for example:
- walls
- roof
- windows
- doors
- kitchen cabinets
- solar panels, and
- hot water system.
It also offers cover for other structures and fixtures, such as garages, inground pools, driveways and fences.
GIO Home Contents Insurance covers the household items you own, like:
- carpet
- furniture
- unattached appliances
- clothing
- jewellery
- curtains, and
- rugs.
See the Product Disclosure Statement (PDS) for full definitions, exclusions and limits.
The amount of coverage you need will depend on your personal circumstances and your home’s sum insured – that is, how much it will cost to rebuild. Our Building Calculator can help estimate your home building sum insured.
No. Landlords are generally responsible for building insurance arrangements on their rental properties.
For all your belongings inside the home, you may want to consider contents insurance.
Important information
*If you’re eligible for more than one discount, we apply them in a pre-set order to the discounted premium, before government taxes and charges.
^Terms, conditions, limits and exclusions apply. Read the PDS for more information.
Flood
‘Flood’ means the covering of normally dry land by water that has escaped or been released from the normal confines of a lake, dam, river etc. We do not cover loss or damage to retaining walls, sea walls, garden borders and free standing outdoor walls. Please check the PDS for more information on what constitutes a ‘flood’.
Building Insurance Calculator
This calculator has some questions included that you may not find in other calculators, which will impact the estimate that is calculated.
Storm surge
Storm surge means a rush of water onshore associated with a low pressure system and caused by strong winds pushing on the ocean’s surface. It does not include actions or movement of the sea. The Loss or damage caused by storm surge must happen at the same time as the other insured damage caused by storm.
Flood
Flood means the covering of normally dry land by water that has escaped or been released from the normal confines of things like a lake, river or other natural watercourse. It doesn't include high tides, waves and other movements of the sea, or storm surges, and we don't cover loss or damage to retaining walls, sea walls, garden borders and free-standing outdoor walls.
Storm
We do not cover loss or damage caused by actions or movements of the sea even if they occur during a storm, flood or storm surge.
Lightning
Lightning, including associated power surges, will be covered providing a qualified repairer gives written confirmation to show lightning as the cause of loss or damage and the Australian Government Bureau of Meteorology has a record of lightning in the area.
Fire (including bushfire)
Fire is considered burning with flames and also includes damage from heat, ash, soot and smoke that is the direct result of a fire within 100 metres of the insured address. Arcing, scorching and cigarette burns are not fire damage unless a fire spreads from the initial burn spot.
If there is a bushfire in your area, we will also cover the extra costs of replacing water in any tank, container, pool, spa or other storage vessel that has been used to limit the spread of bushfires in your area, and the cost of cleaning any fire retardant off your home. The most we will pay under this extra costs cover is $1,000 for any one incident.
Earthquake and Tsunami
We cover damage caused in the first 72 hours after an earthquake or tsunami. A tsunami is not considered an action or movement of the sea.
Theft or burglary
Theft or burglary occurs when someone enters the insured address without your consent and steals or intends to steal items. We don't cover loss or damage caused by anyone living at the address.
Escape of liquid
This covers loss or damage caused by sudden and unexpected liquid escaping from certain appliances, fixed pipes, drains and more.
We also cover loss or damage caused by liquid escaping from these items that has occurred gradually when the loss or damage that was occurring wasn’t easily visible to a reasonable person in the circumstances.
We do not cover the cost of fixing the item from which the liquid escaped, or loss or damage caused by liquid from a portable container. Other exclusions apply. See the PDS for more details on what we do and don't cover.
Impact
We cover damage which occurs at the insured address when hit by an object such as a tree, car and even space debris. It doesn't cover trees being cut back, cut down or moved by you or for you.
Temporary accommodation for tenants and strata title owners
If you can't live in your home or unit while it's being repaired or rebuilt as a result of it being damaged by an insured event, we’ll pay your reasonable temporary accommodation costs for you and your pets that you normally keep at the insured address. If you're a tenant who needs to temporarily move out, then we’ll pay for any reasonable extra rent costs for temporary accommodation. The most we'll pay for any one incident under this cover is 10% of your general contents sum insured. Conditions and exclusions apply, see the PDS for details.
Contents in commercial storage (Contents cover only)
If you have contents in a secure commercial storage facility we'll cover them during the period of insurance for loss or damage by an insured event as long as the facility is lockable, only accessible by you or someone authorised by you, and is fully enclosed by walls (including doors), floor and roof. Please read the PDS for limits and exclusions.
Cover for contents while moving to a new address (Contents cover only)
If you have contents cover and you’re permanently moving to a new address in Australia, we’ll cover your contents while they are being moved, for loss or damage during the period of insurance caused by:
- fire
- flood
- collision, overturning, accident, or theft of the vehicle carrying them.