Is Cloth-Covered Wiring Safe?
Not by current standards. The insulation cracks with age and raises fire risk, which is why many insurers decline it.
Free to compare
Insurers treat cloth wiring, sometimes called knob-and-tube, as an age issue rather than a performance one. The fabric insulation dries out over decades and the wiring was never built for how much power a modern house draws, from air conditioning to a houseful of chargers. An inspection or a past claim usually brings it to light, and once it's on file, most insurers decline or cancel rather than price around it. Rewiring the affected circuits and getting an electrician's signed statement is typically what it takes to get an insurer to reconsider.
Old wiring won't get cheaper with time
Insurers are pulling back from houses with cloth wiring across the board, not just raising prices. Rewiring first puts you back in reach of normal coverage. Comparing quotes now shows what's actually available before the deadline on your letter hits.
What an electrician will actually find
Cloth-covered wiring shows up most in houses built before the 1960s, though some from the 1970s have it in a few circuits. An electrician opening a wall or a panel checks whether the insulation is brittle or cracking when flexed. They also look at whether the house still has the original fuses or a modern breaker panel, and whether aluminum wiring was added at some point, which carries its own risks. None of this shows up on a home's exterior or in a quick walkthrough, which is why many homeowners only learn they have it from an inspection tied to an insurance application or a sale.
Knob-and-tube is the version most insurers name specifically, strung through ceramic knobs and tubes rather than bundled in a sheath. It has no ground wire, which matters for anything plugged in today, from a laptop charger to a refrigerator. Some houses have it only in parts of the structure, like an attic or an older addition, while the rest was rewired at some point. An electrician's report should say which circuits are affected and which aren't, since insurers respond differently to a house that's fully cloth-wired versus one with a single legacy run feeding an unused room.
Rewiring doesn't always mean tearing out every wall. Many electricians can run new circuits through existing routes or accessible spaces, and the cost depends heavily on the house's layout and how much of the wiring needs replacing. A full rewire of an older house is a real expense. It's also the kind of upgrade that tends to last the life of the house, unlike a roof or a water heater that will need attention again in a decade or two.
Once the work is done, the documentation matters as much as the wiring itself. Insurers that declined the house typically ask for a signed statement from a licensed electrician before reconsidering it, sometimes called a certificate of compliance or a repair letter. Keep a copy for the records even after coverage is in place. A future insurer may ask for it again at renewal or at the next sale.
Does cloth wiring ever get a pass from insurers
Some houses with cloth-covered wiring still get coverage, usually when the amount of it is small and clearly contained. A single abandoned circuit in an attic that was capped off when the rest of the house was rewired is a different case than a whole house still running on it. An electrician's report that spells out exactly where the old wiring is, and confirms it's not in use, gives an insurer something concrete to weigh instead of just the word knob-and-tube on a form.
Insurers also look at whether the wiring is live. A circuit that's been disconnected, with the knob-and-tube left in place but no current running through it, carries less risk than one still powering outlets in daily use. This distinction doesn't always come through on a standard application, which asks whether the house has cloth wiring at all rather than whether it's active. A clear answer, backed by an electrician, can be the difference between a flat decline and a conditional approval.
Partial rewires are common in houses that have been updated over time rather than all at once. A kitchen or bathroom added in the 1990s might run on modern copper while the original bedrooms still have their 1940s wiring behind the walls. Insurers that decline the house as a whole sometimes reconsider once the remaining knob-and-tube is addressed, even if the rest of the rewire happened years earlier. The report matters more than the house's overall age in these cases.
None of this is guaranteed from one insurer to the next, since each sets its own underwriting rules for older wiring. A house that gets declined by one insurer with cloth wiring in any form may get a conditional yes from another that's willing to look at an electrician's documentation. That's part of why comparing options matters here, not just after a rewire but sometimes before one, to find out what a given insurer actually requires before paying for work that may be more than necessary.
Before you call an electrician
Check your declarations page or ask your insurer exactly what they flagged, a whole house or one circuit. That answer shapes what you need next. Compare quotes to see what other insurers actually require.
