Anybody who rents out their property to tenants needs insurance cover. Many people think that landlord insurance and buy to let insurance is different but both insurance gives the same cover. 
Both landlord insurance and buy to let insurance are needed to by anybody who rents out their property for profit. The buy to let insurance protects the landlord better than a basic home insurance would.

But like any type of insurance, the more you can do to reduce the possibility of making a claim the cheaper the buy to let insurance should be. Simply by installing security alarms, extra external lighting, smoke alarms etc will all help the buy to let insurance company see that there is now less risk and the premium will be reduced.

People get confused between landlord insurance and buy to let insurance but it is identical. People who buy property simply with the sole intention of renting it out do not always consider themselves as landlords and so they ask for buy to let insurance instead.

Buy to let insurance covers the landlord for damaged done by the tenants and even covers theft of any property within the building too. Some buy to let insurance policies will even cover any legal costs that the landlord may need to take against tenants or former tenants.

Buy to let insurance will also cover malicious damage by tenants, water damage, such as tapes been deliberately left running and will even cover structure damage too, if you request that when you purchase the buy to let insurance.

What cannot be covered with a buy to let insurance policy is flood damage if your property is located within an area which has previously been flooded or is at a high risk of flooding especially if the property lies within a flood plain.

If you do try and reduce costs and simply buy ordinary home insurance then the insurance company will not pay out in the event of a claim once they discover that you had tenants within the property as you should have known that once you start hiring out the property then home insurance is not the correct insurance but you should have purchased buy to let insurance cover instead.