There is a specific moment in every house move when the packing tape runs out and a quiet worry turns up uninvited. Maybe it is a hired van sitting on the drive with the sofa and half your kitchen inside, doors locked, engine cold. Maybe it is the garage at the old house, full of boxes, while the keys are somewhere between you and whoever buys the place next. Either way, your things are sitting in what we tend to call the unattended interval, the gap between two front doors where nobody is quite watching and nobody is quite responsible. This article is about closing that gap properly, not just hoping it closes itself.
If your stuff is in a hired van right now, jump straight to why a van or garage is a weaker security position.
If you are not sure your insurance covers this, jump to the insurance gap most people don’t think to check.
If you just want the two questions to ask yourself, skip to two questions to ask yourself right now.
Is it actually safe to leave your stuff in a van or garage between moves?
A locked, monitored self-storage unit is more secure than a van on a driveway or a garage in a house that is mid-sale, and unlike most ad hoc arrangements, it requires proven contents protection before you get the keys. That means what happens if something goes wrong is settled on day one, not discovered after a loss. To be clear, this article is about protecting the contents sitting in that van or garage, the furniture, the boxes, the family photographs, not the vehicle or the garage itself as a storable thing. Wigwam does not store vehicles of any kind, and it never has. What we are talking about here is where your possessions live safely while your address is in flux.
It is worth saying plainly that most people never plan to leave their belongings in a van or garage for long. It happens because a completion date shifted, or a chain took longer than expected, or the new place simply is not ready. Nobody sat down and decided this was the safest option, it is just the option that was available on the day, and that is precisely why it is worth a second look before the ten days become the norm rather than the exception.
Why a van, garage or driveway is a weaker security position than a purpose-built unit
A locked unit on a storage site has something a driveway or a garage does not: controlled access and eyes on the site that are not your own. Nobody can wander up to a self-storage unit the way they can wander past a van parked outside a house, or a garage attached to a property that is quietly changing hands.
The driveway van problem
A van looks like a target precisely because it looks temporary. It sits in the same spot for days, sometimes longer if a chain slips, and anyone walking past can see it has not moved. Locked doors on a hire van are a deterrent, not a guarantee, and the van itself was never designed to be a strongroom.
The empty-house garage problem
The garage question is different and, in some ways, trickier. Whose garage is it, exactly, once contracts have exchanged but keys have not changed hands, or once you have bought a place but cannot move in yet? That ambiguity is a liability question as much as a theft question. Nobody has fully claimed responsibility for that space, which means nobody is watching it either. More on the access side of a proper unit further down, but the short version is that a purpose-built site removes that ambiguity entirely.
The gap that keeps growing
Some of this is worse if the chain has already wobbled once. If a completion date has slipped before, there is every reason to expect it could slip again, and what started as a three or four day gap can quietly stretch into two or three weeks. A van hired for a few days, or a favour called in from family to use their garage, tends to hold up fine for a short window. It holds up far less well the longer it drags on, and the ad hoc arrangement that felt fine on day one rarely gets reassessed on day fourteen. A storage unit does not have that problem. The terms agreed on day one still apply on day thirty, without anyone having to renegotiate a favour or re-park a van.
The insurance gap most people don’t think to check
Most standard home contents and van-hire policies cap or exclude cover for goods left unattended off-premises or sitting in a vehicle, and it is a gap that people typically only discover after something has already gone missing or been damaged.
What “away from the home” usually means in a standard policy
Many standard home insurance policies include an “away from the home” clause that limits cover once your belongings leave the house itself. Once those same belongings are sitting in a van, on a driveway, or in a garage that is not currently anyone’s settled home, that clause can tighten sharply or drop away altogether, depending on the wording. This varies by provider and by policy, so the honest answer is: check your own policy wording, or call your insurer and ask directly. This is general information, not advice on your specific cover.
How Wigwam closes the gap: mandatory contents protection
Wigwam’s own self-storage insurance page states plainly that contents protection is a mandatory requirement for every customer for the whole of their rental, not an optional extra you can wave away. You either take Wigwam’s contents protection or you prove you already have adequate cover of your own, but one of the two has to be in place before you get the keys. The cover on offer settles on a new-for-old basis, meaning damaged items are replaced like-for-like rather than valued down for age, and it covers named events like fire, explosion, storm damage, and water damage from burst pipes or leaks. Theft cover is conditioned on forcible entry or exit, so it is there for a forced break-in, not for something that simply goes astray. As with most policies of this kind, there are limits too, things like cash, securities, and certain valuable items typically sit outside standard contents protection, so if you are storing anything unusual it is worth checking rather than assuming it is covered. That is a decision made and documented on day one, which is precisely what a van or a garage cannot offer you.
A worked example: two households, the same ten-day gap
This is illustrative, not a real customer story, but it shows how the same ten days can play out two very different ways depending on where the decision gets made.
Household A: the van on the drive
Household A hires a van and leaves it on the driveway for the ten days between completion dates, sofa and boxes inside, doors locked. Their home contents policy’s “away from the home” clause caps unattended vehicle storage tightly, or excludes it once goods are sitting in a vehicle rather than a building. If a window is forced and the sofa and a box of electronics go missing, they may find their insurer treats the loss as outside standard cover, or subject to a much lower limit than they assumed. They find this out after the loss, not before.
Household B: the storage unit
Household B moves the same items into a self-storage unit for the same ten days. Getting the keys meant either opting into the site’s contents protection or providing proof of their own adequate cover, a decision made and recorded on day one. If the same forced-entry theft happened here, the claim path is already known: an excess applies, new-for-old replacement is the basis for a total loss, and the value declared at sign-up is what any claim is measured against, so under-declaring value to save a few pounds a month simply reduces the payout proportionally. Better, then, to declare properly than guess low.
What about the higher-value or sentimental things?
Some of what is sitting in that van or garage right now is not replaceable at any price, a parent’s furniture, a box of family photographs, pieces that carry more weight than their insured value ever could. That is exactly why a checkable mechanic matters more here than anywhere else. No insurance policy can put a number on what a piece of furniture means to your family, but it can at least mean the difference between something being safe and something being gone. Hope is not a plan for the things you cannot get back. A documented decision, made properly on day one, is, and knowing it is in place is often the one thing that lets you stop thinking about it and get back to the hundred other jobs a move brings with it.
Two questions to ask yourself right now
There are two practical questions worth asking today, and both have a clear next step attached.
Does my current policy cover this, and up to what limit?
Check your own policy wording or ring your insurer and ask them directly whether goods sitting unattended in a vehicle, garage, or driveway are covered, and if so, up to what value. Do not assume the answer is yes.
If not, what would close the gap today?
A unit with contents protection built into renting it. If that is where this is heading for you, you can see units near you across our 15 market towns and get a sense of what is available before you commit to anything.
Security and insurance side by side
The two things genuinely worth comparing here are physical security and insurance position, not price. Here is how they stack up.
| Van on the drive | Garage mid-move | Wigwam self-storage unit | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Physical access control | Locked doors, but parked in public view for days at a time | Ambiguous ownership while keys are in transition, no dedicated monitoring | Smart entry to a monitored site, access controlled per unit |
| Insurance position | Typically capped or excluded under “away from the home” vehicle clauses | Usually relies on whichever household’s policy is still technically live, often unclear | Mandatory contents protection, opt in or prove your own cover, in place before you get the keys |
| What happens after a loss | Discovered and disputed after the fact, cover not guaranteed | Discovered and disputed after the fact, responsibility unclear | New-for-old settlement on a documented, pre-agreed basis, forced-entry theft covered |
What “secure” actually means at a Wigwam site
Specifics matter more than adjectives, so here is what “secure” means in practice. Sites use smart entry rather than a key left under a mat or handed between neighbours, access runs from 6am to 10pm every day, and sites are unmanned but monitored rather than staffed around the clock. Units themselves are kept clean, dry and secure, which protects against damp and the kind of slow damage a garage can quietly do to soft furnishings and paper, without any claim to climate control, which we do not offer.
Locked, not limbo
The unattended interval does not have to stay unattended. The two things that actually matter, physical security and a documented insurance position, are both things a van on the drive or a garage mid-sale simply cannot offer on their own, and both are things a proper unit settles before anything goes wrong, not after. When you are ready, pick your nearest of our 15 towns and get a quote. If you would rather see the numbers first, our pricing guide is the next place to look.
Frequently Asked Questions
It depends entirely on your policy. Many standard home policies limit or exclude cover for goods away from the home, especially once they are sitting in a vehicle or an unattended garage. Check your own policy wording or ask your insurer directly rather than assuming either way.
It means that if an insured item is damaged or lost, it is replaced with a new equivalent rather than valued down for its age or condition, which is the basis Wigwam’s own contents protection settles claims on.
If you declare a lower value than what you actually have stored, any payout is typically reduced proportionally to reflect that under-declaration. It is worth declaring the real value rather than guessing low to save a small amount each month.
Typically, no. Theft cover under this kind of policy is usually conditioned on forcible or violent entry or exit, so a loss without any sign of a break-in is not normally treated the same way as a forced burglary.
Wigwam’s minimum term is two weeks, with no fixed maximum, so a short gap between completion dates or a longer one if a chain slips are both accommodated. You can check availability and get a quote through our locations page.
