Insurance companies can cover many risks:
For events such as fire or water damage, one may insure only the building or extend the coverage to the technical installations (boiler, heating system, etc).
This leaves an awful lot of decisions to be made. Fellow building owners, which insurance policies did you take (or not), and why?
Adding a side question: anyone knows how war damage on a property (e.g. in the Ukraine) can be insured? To my knowledge, it is un-insureable, as is damage by riots.
I believe a sound approach is to ask yourself the question “would this wipe me out?”. If so, insure it. If not, carry it yourself. High deductibles can help with this.
Usually war is excluded from policies.
Maybe you can create cat bond 
I do remember a similar thread or at least discussion with more replies around it.
I’d start with your local rules and check whether building insurance is mandatory, anyway, and what’s included in that. Mine covers fire, elementary and to some extend earthquake.
Do you rent out? Then civil might be necessary, as well.
I only have the mandatory public insurance, along with third-party liability, which is relevant independent of ownership.
Theft or some water damage seems to abstract, and the damage manageable financially.
Also, I got skeptical based on the insurances’ sales pitch on the additional insurances 
Owning real estate since 1992. The single most used insurance was water damage. In Spain the pipes are of really bad quality and the fontanero (plumber) loves puting iron and copper together… which is a time bomb.
Now, in Switzerland I had only one incident, but I flooded the whole neighborhood. The insurance paid for a “shooting” solution where my garden did not have to be destroyed because they did something like shoot a new tunnel. Insurance paid for it even they did not have to, but reconstructing the garden would have been more expensive for them, was a very nice solution. And it took some time so I did need a temporary solution which I got immediately.
Insurance paid all without even watching the damage… OK, I did send some photos.
Thank you all for the replies.
Insuring only against what would wipe me out if the risk materializes (say, earthquake) sounds reasonable as a general rule, but I wonder if it applies even when renting out (which I’m doing). As a landlord, I could pass on the cost of the “extra” insurances (say, theft) to the tenants. They would pay a higher rent, but ultimately my profit is capped by law (in Switzerland at least), so this operation is financially neutral to me, and the insured risk would no longer bear on me. Am I missing something here?
I am not sure if I read the title right. „Building insurance“ do you mean building your insurance portfolio or chose insurances for a building? The latter makes more sense in the real estate category.
How would you like to insure your building from theft? Usually you insure whats inside of the building from theft, not the building itself. This would be part auf the (extended) Hausratsversicherung.
And I support @cubanpete_the_swiss used water insurances the most. Not sure if it paid out financially, but I guess. If your piping is not PE yet it will be kind of a matter of time until you have some leak.
In this context, I guess it’s not household insurance, but damages to the building. Say, broken windows or door.
Could you or @cubanpete_the_swiss share some examples about the water damage financially? Just to get an idea, was it 1000s, 10’000s? Even more?
10’000s
#1: broken/cracked pipe required re-lining
#2: broken thermostat caused water to overheat and burst pex pipes and flooded
#3: broken water pipe required excavating pipe, replacing pipes from outside into the building
#4: internal pipe leaks requiring digging up bathroom floor to replace pipe and redo floor tiles
add on top any lost rental income etc.
cost of fixing stuff in Switzerland is not cheap.
I meant an insurance for a building and its structural installations (Gebäudeversicherung), and by extension the insurance for its (movable) equipment and maintenance tools (Sachsversicherung).
A theft insurance may cover the damage caused by theft (example: broken front door; laundry payment system) or replace what was stolen (example: lawnmower, snow blower). Some home content insurances may indeed cover these, but they don’t always apply for rented-out buildings.
A theft insurance covers the damages caused by a theft (example: damaged front door,) or replace what was stolen (example: lawn mower).
All building insurances that I’ve seen offer (at least as an add-on) a theft insurance which covers
Ok, I missunderstood, I read first that you expect tenants to pay voluntarily more because you expect this to be a benefit for them. But now I understand.
Indeed there are some not so mustachian things in the law. For example service of the heater or a „Wartungsabo“ can be put on the Nebenkosten bill, but not reparation. Even thought it would end cheaper on the long term only fixing what is broke without subscription. So I think you are right, if you can pass the costs to the tenants it can be better for you than taking the risk yourself.
Today I learned!