Although taken over by Royal SunAlliance, AMEV is still operating its own schemes. Under HomeMaker Plus, the minimum sum insured is £50,000 for Dublin and £40,000 for the country. For certain Dublin areas, alarms are mandatory and also on all properties with contents valued at more than £30,000.

For a city property worth £100,000, with an alarm, the premium will be £132.60 per annum for building cover only. For contents insurance, you specify the amount involved subject to a minimum of £15,000. The £25,000 contents insurance on top of £100,000 building cover, will cost an additional £127.50 (total: £260.10). Under the Homesafe scheme, you specify the building sum insured at a minimum of £50,000 (£40,000 in the country). The contents insurance is automatically fixed at half the building sum insured. The building sum insurance maximum is £200,000, meaning that contents is limited to £100,000. Both are index-linked annually and both provide full accidental damage cover.

Under both schemes, cover is provided for contents in the open, loss of food in the freezer, and unauthorised use of credit cards.

Home Portfolio is designed for insuring high amounts. The minimum rebuilding sum value is £150,000 with minimum contents insurance of £30,000. Alarms are mandatory for all properties. Business equipment in the home is covered to a maximum of £5,000.

NORWICH UNION

KeyFifty has two types of policies, one Homeplus which includes optional contents cover on top of building cover, and the other including contents cover amounting to 50 per cent of the standard building sum insured. For the £100,000 property in Dublin the premium would amount to £295.80 per annum. In Cork city and Co Wicklow this reduces to £265.20, with the rest of country charged £255.

An approved burglar alarm will result in a 10 per cent discount, with a further 10 per cent if the householder is aged over 50.

Under the Homeplus scheme, building cover is charged at £1.50 per £1,000, amounting to £150 for the £100,000 property. For £25,000 contents cover in Dublin city and county, the premium would be £119.50, which combined with building cover, plus the 2 per cent Government levy, amounts to a total of £274.89.

A similar contents cover in Cork city and Co Wicklow would amount to £82.62 (including the levy), decreasing to £69.87 for the rest of the country.

HIBERNIAN

A Homewise quote for the Dublin area, based on the rebuilding valuation of £100,000, would automatically cover you for £50,000 contents.

For somebody under 50, with a burglar alarm and two smoke detectors, the premium costs £294.78. In Kerry it would amount to 277.44. There are also two options.

Option A gives all-risk cover with a single article limit of £1,000, meaning you pay a premium of £372.81 (Kerry £277.44) on your £100,000 building

Option B offers all-risk with a single article limit of £1,500. The premium would rise to £424.83 (Kerry £329.46). First-time buyers qualify for a graduated scale of discounts over five years in relation to contents insurance. In the first year contents are insured at a maximum £25,000, allowing a 20 per cent discount on the premium. In the second year contents cover increases to £30,000 and a 10 per cent discount is allowed, and so on up to £50,000 by the fifth year when the discount reduces to zero.

Under this scheme the premium for basic cover works out at £225.42 per annum in the Dublin area in the case of the £100,000 example. Alarms and smoke detectors are required.

ROYAL SUN ALLIANCE

Its building cover rate is set at £1.60 per £1,000, but the company provides building/ contents packages called Homecover, Homecover Plus, and Home Insurance.

Homecover uses the number of bedrooms as a guide to building size. The minimum you can insure for is £20,000 and the maximum is £40,000, in multiples of £5,000.

For a Dublin city three-bedroom house with £25,000 contents, the contents premium works out at £119.85. The Dublin county premium would be £95.62. For Cork, Limerick, Waterford, and satellite towns of Dublin, that would be £67.57. All other areas would be £54.82.

Along with the usual discounts, SunAlliance provides 5 per cent discount for being in a Neighbourhood Watch Scheme, giving a 30 per cent maximum discount. Homecover Plus is more expensive because the contents cover ranges from £30,000 to £40,000, and there is an all-risk extension under this scheme. A set £3,000 total cover is provided for personal possessions outside the home, such as clothing and jewellery with a maximum of £1,000 for one item. Mind you, bikes are not classed as personal possessions. Home Insurance caters for individuals seeking contents cover for low sums. It starts at £10,000 with no maximum limit and is priced at £1.60 per £1,000. It is ideally suited to the £10,000 to £20,000 range.

FIRST CALL DIRECT

Church & General is the underwriter for First Call which offers highly-specific policies. A quotation was sought for a three-bedroom semi-detached five-old-year house in Templeogue, unoccupied during the day, with window locks, five-lever mortice locks front and back. The policyholder would be aged 30.

With no smokers, no fire brigade call out charge and a 15 per cent discount for the approved burglar alarm, the premium costs £111 per annum for building cover only. Like other building only policies, it covers accidental damage on "anything that is stuck". For example, it would cover a bottle of after shave falling on the wash basin, but not paint falling on a carpet.

With £25,000 contents insurance, with no individual items valued £2,000 or over specified, that premium would rise to £219. Accidental damage on contents, such as the ill-fated paint on the carpet, would cost an extra £35.

For an all-risk policy, covering jewellery or golf clubs which go out of the house and can be stolen from the car, items must be specified. For a set of golf clubs worth £500 and an engagement ring worth £1,000 plus a Camcorder worth £700, the cost of the policy rises to £279 (£23.38 for those three items).

AIB

The AIB scheme, underwritten by Guardian/PMPA, offers a unlimited contents cover on its combined building/ contents policy.

On a £100,000 rebuilding cost property, cover costs £306 per annum, including accidental damage on the building, and unlimited contents cover. When you want accidental damage on contents, that brings the premium to £346.80. However, discounts are also available for burglar and smoke alarms, which would bring the £306 charge down to £260.10.

For areas excluding satellite Dublin, the cover is £244.80, rising to £285.60 for accidental damage on contents. Fire Brigade cover of up to £1,500 is provided on all policies. A spokesman said that from "a hassle point of view", unlimited contents cover saves you having to do an inventory of your contents when taking out the policy. The information package is available to all prospective home insurance purchasers at AIB branches.