The research found that more than a third of men don’t believe they need insurance to protect their mortgage repayments.
While half of the women surveyed said they had taken out some form of insurance to protect the mortgage in the event of illness, only 37% per cent of men said that they had done the same.
A fifth said that cost was the biggest factor stopping them from taking out insurance, even though a quarter of homeowners would find themselves struggling to meet their mortgage payments for more than two months if they lost their job.
John Cupis, Sesame’s head of mortgages, said: “When talk turns to the possibility of an economic downturn, as it increasingly has of late, it makes it all the more alarming to see such a high percentage of homeowners not making any provision for a possible change in circumstances, such as loss of income due to redundancy or illness.
“On the up side, it seems the message is gradually filtering through to women that your home is just too important to take chances with. Unfortunately the same can’t be said of men – we desperately need to get to the bottom of why that should be the case.”
