# Contents Insurance for Renters: What It Covers and Whether You Need It > Your landlord insures the building, not your things. What contents insurance covers when you rent, how much cover you'd need and what to check in a policy. Canonical HTML: https://getclova.com/blog/contents-insurance-renters Clova is an Australian budgeting app. [Join the waitlist](https://getclova.com/) [Home](https://getclova.com/) → [Guides](https://getclova.com/blog) → [Life costs](https://getclova.com/blog/topic/life-costs) → [Contents Insurance for Renters: What It Covers and Whether You Need It](https://getclova.com/blog/contents-insurance-renters) - Author: Marnix - Published: 2026-10-31 You've signed the lease, carried the boxes up the stairs and set up your room. The building has insurance, so you'd think a break-in or a burst pipe is covered. For the walls, it probably is. For your laptop, bed and clothes, it usually isn't. That gap is what contents insurance fills. Start with what replacing your belongings would cost. ## What contents insurance protects **Contents insurance** is cover for those belongings: things that aren't fixed to the building, from furniture to clothes. It usually includes **legal liability** cover too, which pays if you're found responsible for damage to someone else's property or an injury to another person. Two policies, two jobs: - **The building, under your landlord's insurance:** walls, roof and windows; floorboards; anything fixed to the building. - **Your things, under your contents insurance:** furniture and your bed; clothes and shoes; laptop, phone and TV; rugs and pot plants; covered legal liability (usually part of a contents policy). If you're still setting up your first place, our guide to [moving out of home](/blog/moving-out-of-home) covers the other costs that come with the lease. ## What a contents policy covers A policy pays out for **insured events**, the things it lists as covered. These usually include theft, fire, storms and malicious damage. Flood is sometimes covered and sometimes excluded, so it's worth checking if you live near a river or a low-lying area. A few things often need checking or adding: - **Accidental damage.** Most policies don't cover a spilt drink on the couch or a dropped television unless you add it. - **Portable cover.** Things you carry, such as a phone, laptop or bike, are often only covered away from home if you add portable contents cover, usually with a limit for each item. - **Limits for each item.** A policy might pay at most $1,000 for an electrical item, for example, even if yours cost more. - **Exclusions.** Theft can be excluded if a door or window was left unlocked. ## Work out what your things would cost to replace The amount you're covered for is called the **sum insured**. A good place to start is to list what you own using current replacement prices. Hana is made up. She rents a room in a share house in Brisbane, and her room holds most of what she owns. Everything in Hana's room, priced new (made-up prices): clothes and shoes, a laptop, a bed and mattress, a phone, a bike, a desk and chair and kitchen things, largest first. Together they would cost $9,000 to replace. Most policies pay the **replacement value**, sometimes called new for old: the cost of buying the item new. Some pay only what the item was worth at the time, which drops as it ages. Replacement value costs more but leaves less of the bill with you. While you're listing things, a short video of each room on your phone, plus receipts and serial numbers for the expensive items, makes a claim easier to prove later. The Insurance Council of Australia has a contents calculator, linked from Moneysmart's [contents insurance guide](https://moneysmart.gov.au/home-insurance/contents-insurance), if you want a second estimate. ## Compare policies on more than the premium The **premium** is what you pay for the policy, and the **excess** is what you pay towards each claim. Choosing a higher excess usually lowers the premium, but you'd need that amount ready if something happened. Our guide to [car insurance under 25](/blog/car-insurance-under-25) shows how a cheaper premium with a bigger excess can cost more in a year with a claim; the same sum works for contents. Ask for the insurer's **Key Fact Sheet**, a standard summary for comparing policies. The product disclosure statement, or PDS, has the full detail. If you share a house, check whether the policy covers a room in a share house, and whose belongings it includes. Paying the premium once a year can be cheaper than paying monthly, but it means finding the whole amount at once. Our [yearly bill converter](/tools/yearly-bill-converter) turns a yearly premium into an amount to put aside from each pay. Clova is a budgeting app that includes bills like this in each pay's plan. Clova is an Australian budgeting app. Join the waitlist and we’ll be in touch. [Join the waitlist](https://getclova.com/) What would be hardest to replace from your own savings gives you a place to start when choosing cover. ## A note from us Insurance is a bill for something you hope never happens, which makes it easy to put off. We are building Clova so bills like that have a place in every pay. ## Common questions ### Is renters insurance the same as contents insurance? Yes, it's contents insurance under another name. Moneysmart notes that policies sold as renter's insurance often have more exclusions and limits than regular contents insurance, so compare what each covers rather than the name. ### Do I need contents insurance if I don't own much? It depends on what you could replace from your own savings. Moneysmart notes that a policy can still be worth having for its legal liability cover, which pays if you're found responsible for damage to someone else's property, such as a leak from your washing machine damaging the flat below. ### Is contents insurance compulsory when you rent? No. It's your decision as a tenant. Your landlord's insurance won't pay for your belongings, so without a policy you'd cover the cost of replacing them yourself. ### How much does contents insurance cost? It depends on your sum insured, your excess, where you live and any extras such as portable cover. Moneysmart notes some insurers give discounts for deadlocks, smoke alarms or a security system. Quotes from more than one insurer are the way to see your own price. ## Sources 1. [Contents insurance](https://moneysmart.gov.au/home-insurance/contents-insurance) · ASIC Moneysmart ## Related reading - [What it costs to move out of home in 2026](https://getclova.com/blog/moving-out-of-home) - [Car Insurance Costs Under 25: What to Compare Before You Buy](https://getclova.com/blog/car-insurance-under-25) - [Travel Insurance Explained Before Your First Overseas Trip](https://getclova.com/blog/travel-insurance-explained) [Report a correction](https://getclova.com/contact) This guide explains a budgeting method in general terms; it doesn't consider your circumstances.