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Finder’s home insurance methodology 2023
How our experts and insights team calculated the Finder home insurance awards and Finder rating.
What are the Finder home insurance awards?
Finder's home insurance awards is a ratings methodology that compares both price and features across 21 home and contents insurance policies. To determine the ratings, we researched a total of 68 home insurance policies which we narrowed down to 21 based on our eligibility criteria. In total, we got 312 home insurance quotes based on 15 different profiles.
We use the final scores from our insurance awards to inform the top picks on our best home insurance.
While we have gathered quotes for a broad range of different areas, your costs may differ a lot since prices vary significantly depending on the area you live in and the type of home you own. We did not include quotes for regional areas of the country. The ongoing weather events meant that several insurers were unable to provide cover at the time we gathered the quotes.
If you're looking to get cover and live in a regional area, it's worth calling the insurer directly to see if they will cover you.
What is the Finder rating?
The Finder rating is designed to make it easier for you to compare insurance policies side-by-side. It's based on the same information we gather as part of the Finder Awards. Each policy score is represented by a star rating out of 5.
To determine the ratings, our insurance experts and research team analyse policies based on price and features. The Finder ratings score you see on some of our tables and guides are based on a combination of price and features. Features account for 55% of the score, price accounts for 45%.
We also created separate scores for price and features to make it easier for you to weigh up what matters most to you. You can find these scores when you hover over the Finder rating. For example, Youi scored 5/5 for price and 4/5 for cover. It had a 4.5/5 Finder rating.
Finder's home insurance awards criteria
The criteria for Finder's home insurance awards was determined by our insights team and insurance experts. It must:
Home insurance eligibility criteria
The home insurance provider must be in the market for at least 12 months
Policies must be directly available to customers
Cover must be offered to all ages
The brand must have an online and accessible product disclosure statement
The brand must have an online quoting engine or tool
Cover must be available in major states (NSW, VIC, QLD, SA, WA)
Combined home and contents insurance policies must be available
The brand must offer some form of underinsurance protection, guarantee or safeguard
The brand must offer flood cover (including optional)
The brand must offer accidental damage (including optional)
Finder's home insurance awards methodology
1. How we calculated our price score for home insurance
To determine our home insurance award winners, we got prices across a total of 10 customer profiles. We got quotes for homes in the following areas of NSW, VIC, QLD, WA and SA:
Leichardt NSW 2040
Richmond VIC 3121
Red Hill QLD 4059
Subiaco WA 6008
Mile End SA 5031
Eastwood NSW 2122
Chadstone VIC 3148
Chermside QLD 4032
East Fremantle WA 6158
Redwood Park SA 5097
Wollongong NSW 2500
Geelong VIC 3220
Southport QLD 4215
Meadow Springs WA 6210
Kapunda SA 5373
2. How we calculated our features score for home insurance
Comprehensive Weighting
Features
Comprehensive Weighting
Choice of excess
1%
Cooling off period
1%
Document replacement
1%
Electrical motor burnout
1%
Environmental upgrades
1%
Fire
5%
Flood
5%
Food spoilage
2%
Full building replacement
9%
Guest's contents
1%
Home office contents
5%
Impact
5%
Jewellery
5%
Legal Liability
1%
Mortgage discharge costs
1%
Online discount
1%
Pay monthly at no extra cost
5%
Removal of debris and trees
3%
Replacement of locks
5%
Solar panel
2%
Storm surge
5%
Temporary accommodation
5%
Temporary accommodation due to emergency evacuation
5%
Underinsurance Protection
10%
Price
15%
Total
100%
Value weighting
Features
Value Weighting
Choice of excess
5%
Cooling off period
5%
Fire
1%
Flood
3%
Food spoilage
4%
Home office contents
4%
Impact
4%
Jewellery
4%
Legal Liability
1%
Mortgage discharge costs
2%
Online discount
6%
Pay monthly at no extra cost
6%
Removal of debris and trees
1%
Replacement of locks
4%
Solar panel
1%
Storm surge
1%
Temporary accommodation
3%
Temporary accommodation due to emergency evacuation
2%
Underinsurance Protection
3%
Price
40%
Total
100%
3. How we calculated our final scores for home insurance
What are the Finder customer satisfaction awards?
The Finder customer satisfaction awards recognise Australia's favourite brands across a huge number of categories. We survey thousands of Australians to understand how they feel about their recent product purchases to help you make a decision about what product to get. It's an independent awards program calculated by our data and insights team. Commercial partnerships do not influence the results in any way.
1. Home insurance customer satisfaction awards criteria
The recency period varied between 3 months and 3 years.
We got a minimum of 35 responses for each home insurer for each of the 5 states we looked at (NT, TAS and ACT were not included because the sample size was too small).
Respondents were asked whether they would recommend the home insurer to a friend. This result was scored out of 5 as a percentage. For example, if 80% of respondents said they would recommend a product, it received a score of 4 out of 5.
Customers were also asked how they would rate each home insurer overall on a scale between 1 and 5 and in terms of:
Features and benefits
Customer service
Value for money
2. Home insurance customer satisfaction awards methodology
The overall score for NSW, QLD, WA, VIC and SA was calculated as an average of the metrics outlined above.
To determine the national winner, we calculated the average score from the top ranking brands from each of the 5 states we looked at.
To determine the insurer of the year winner, we calculated the average score of all top ranking insurance brands included in the customer satisfaction awards.
Our research in numbers
Total number of responses for NSW: 1266
Total number of responses for VIC: 1308
Total number of responses for QLD: 1275
Total number of responses for WA: 1222
Total number of responses for SA: 1045
What are the Finder Green Awards?
The Finder Green Awards aim to identify sustainability leaders across some of our main comparison categories including banking, insurance, superannuation, utilities and travel. We highlight the winners on our review pages and comparison tables to make it easier for you to compare policies and know that you're purchasing a policy with a more sustainable brand.
Finder's Green Insurer of the Year methodology
We use a dynamic scoring system to decide the winner in each of the industry categories of the Finder Green Awards. Rather than awarding a set number of points for certain values, Finder's dynamic scoring system awards points relative to the other submissions by adjusting scores based on the actual range of submitted values for each category. These sources will then be adjusted to reflect the weightings shown as percentages in the tables below:
Eligibility criteria: Company must have offered insurance products to consumers in Australia in the 12 months prior to 31 December 2021.
General environmental criteria:
Current performance: 40%
Emissions intensity
Emissions intensity (incl. offsets)
Energy from renewable sources
Waste avoiding landfill
Environmental targets and reporting: 21%
Emissions target
Renewable energy target
Waste target
Public climate change plan
External benchmarks/accreditation
Sector-specific environmental criteria:
Climate risk and sustainable investment: 17%
Climate change impacts factored into risk management
Climate change factored into investment decisions
Climate-friendly products: 22%
Incentives/discounts for sustainable purchases or behaviour
Carbon neutral products
What are the Finder Innovation Awards?
The Finder Innovation Awards acknowledge excellence and creativity while recognising the impact of innovation across a range of industries. There are 21 innovation award categories including best insurance innovation and best insurtech.
Both categories were judged by a panel of internal and external experts including founder of Determined Consumer Chris Zinn and Managing editor of Insurance News John Deex. Each judge scored the brand out of 100. The finalists were chosen based on who had the highest average score.
Why you can trust Finder's home insurance experts
We're free
You pay the same as buying directly from the home insurer. Better still, we regularly run exclusive deals that you won't find on any other site – plus, our tables make it easy to compare policies.
Unlike other comparison sites, we're not owned by an insurer. That means our opinions are our own and we work with lots of home insurance brands, making it easier for you to find a good deal.
We're here to help
Since 2014, we've helped 150,000+ people find home insurance by explaining your cover options simply and clearly. We'll never ask for your number or email. We're here to help you make a decision.
Frequently asked questions
We currently run our Finder home insurance awards once a year. The 2023 awards are based on policies that were available to take out during the 2022–23 period.
We endeavour to assess the majority of products in the market but this isn't always possible and it may be that not every product or brand in the market was included for judging. For our home insurance awards, we looked at a total of 68 home and contents insurance policies. Our eligibility criteria narrowed it down to 21.
Sometimes we aren't able to include an insurer in our final results because we were unable to get enough quotes from them or they did not meet our eligibility criteria.
Gary Ross Hunter is an editor at Finder, specialising in insurance. He’s been writing about life, travel, home, car, pet and health insurance for over 6 years and regularly appears as an insurance expert in publications including The Sydney Morning Herald, news.com.au, The Telegraph, Explore Travel and Escape. Gary holds a Kaplan Tier 1 General Insurance (General Advice) certification and a Kaplan Tier 1 Generic Knowledge certification which meets the requirements of ASIC Regulatory Guide 146 (RG146).
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