If you're settling into life in Mexico — renting long-term or buying a place — chances are you'll hire someone to help around the house at some point. A cleaner, a gardener, a pool technician, maybe a plumber for a one-off job. What many foreign residents don't think about is who pays if one of those workers gets hurt on your property, or accidentally causes damage to someone else.
The scenarios are easy to picture. A housekeeper slips on a tiled floor and needs hospital treatment. A gardener falls off a ladder while trimming a tree. A pool maintenance worker trips and hits his head. And it's not just the worker's own injuries: if that gardener drops a branch onto a neighbour's property, or a plumber's pipework floods the apartment below yours, you could be on the hook for someone else's medical bills or repairs. If a worker is seriously injured and can't work for months, you could even face a claim for lost earnings — or a civil lawsuit in the worst cases.
The answer is a home insurance policy with third-party liability cover, which is available in Mexico whether you own or rent. Renters can insure their personal belongings plus liability only; there's also the option to buy third-party liability as a stand-alone product. Coverage kicks in for medical costs when a worker is injured at your home, pays out when a worker or family member accidentally injures a visitor or damages a third party's property, and covers legal expenses if a serious incident leads to a civil suit — legal costs are typically covered up to 50% of the insured amount, so it's worth reading the fine print.
Know the exclusions before you buy. Injuries to you or your immediate family aren't covered. Neither is anything that happens during construction, a major extension or remodelling (though routine repairs and maintenance visits are). Guests who injure themselves on your property are only covered if the accident was caused by you, a family member, or someone working at the home. And as you'd expect, anything involving criminal activity, deliberate negligence or suicide is out.
On the numbers: US$300,000 of coverage is considered a sensible minimum, with policies available up to US$2 million. Premiums are quoted and paid in US dollars, and payouts are made in dollars or the peso equivalent. There's no deductible on most third-party liability claims — except when a claim covers an injury to someone working in your home, where a small deductible of around MXN$600 (roughly US$30) per claim applies. Policies can be quoted and arranged online in minutes, with immediate cover on acceptance.
For anyone spending a season or a lifetime in Mexico with household help, this is one of those unglamorous but genuinely useful things to sort out early. A modest premium is a lot cheaper than a lawsuit — and it means a worker's accident doesn't have to become a financial crisis on top of a human one.
