OT:Car insurance $ is killing me!

redtom · Feb 12, 2016

I have 4 cars and a pickup insured. The newest is a 2012. The truck and 2 cars are 06 and one car (mine) an 02. The 4 newest have collision coverage. The premiums are killing me! Granted, my two daughters drive, ages 18 and 21, which I know jacks up the price, but wow! Is there something I'm missing here? Plus my boy is 15 which means another car in a year or so. I got burned a few years ago when my older daughter totaled a car-I had gambled on not having collision and had to eat a $3,500 car. So I keep collision on all but mine. Is there a secret I need to know?

RCP · Feb 12, 2016

We had each of our kids get their own policy through the same company as we were using. They did not need as much coverage as my wife and I, they had much less to lose. By reducing their coverage to more reasonable levels the insurance cost was about the same as being on our policy, the advantage is their mistakes do not impact our long term rates.

Rich

old · Feb 12, 2016

Have you or your parents ever been in the Military?? If you have you could check out USAA insurance they saved me about %50 on my insurance when I switched over to them and I have the same coverage as I did with the other company

glennster · Feb 12, 2016

check and see if raising your deductible will lower the premiums any. the caveat is, can you afford the 500 or 1000 deductible if you have an accident. shop around for some better quotes too, if you have an independent agent in your area have him shop the policies for you. rolling the home owers along with the auto does give you a better price too.

jim buford · Feb 12, 2016

I worked as an insurance adjuster for many years handling commercial, residential automobile, etc. Your driving record has a lot to do with your premium as well as whether or not you have teenage drivers in the home. Also if your vehicle is several years old and paid for you may want to just carry comprehensive and not collision coverage. Comp will cover wind, hail, fire, theft, collisions with deer and most anything not covered by collision. There are multiple car discounts available as well.
An independent agent works for you and his job is to find you the best rate for the coverage provided even if it means moving you around from year to year if there are no accidents. A captive agent is more limited in finding the best quote but there are advantages for him as well.

D beatty · Feb 12, 2016

Dad was a WW II vet ( severed just over 4 years). I looked into that insurance and they would not give any discounts to me because dad did not have or ever used their insurance. From what I was told I would only get discount if my dad had carried the insurance.

jim buford · Feb 12, 2016

That is true and USAA is a very good company.

old · Feb 12, 2016

I do not know any thing about that part of them but I know they say if you or your parent had served in the military you can get insurance from them and it would be cheaper then most companies are not any discount just cheaper insurance.

D beatty · Feb 12, 2016

When they quoted me a price they were the same price as my insurance. If my dad had used their insurance I would have gotten a discount. Dad spent 4 years based in England with the 8TH Army Air Corp..

Bob Harvey · Feb 12, 2016

Looked into 'Fleet' ins. or the like ? When my kids got their drivers permits, I did the Fleet' thing and it saved some $ overall. HTH

Pitch · Feb 12, 2016

You need to take every licensed driver in the house to a Driver Safety course. We were in much the same shape as you with two teen daughters and 4 or 5 vehicles. We all took the course and ended up saving almost six hundred dollars. I think the discount lasted 3 years and then we did it again.

Ray IN · Feb 12, 2016

For liability only on my older vehicles it costs $13-$15 per month. This is with Farm Bureau with house and autos with same company. For teenage drivers, it was closer to $50 per month on the car they were rated on, liability only. It is not feasible to buy collision insurance for teenage drivers on a nice vehicle--let them drive a $2000 car until they can get what they want.

Traditional Farmer · Feb 12, 2016

The daughter has a wreck on here record,any other wrecks or tickets? They'll bump
up insurance premiums in a hurry.

JMS/.MN · Feb 12, 2016

Here we can take a 55/older course...first time it"s 8 hours, refresher is 4 hours. We can get a discount on ins for 3 years, but the company does not tell us when it needs to be renewed. So they raise the rates unless you keep up with that yourself.

redtom · Feb 12, 2016

I should've added, only her wreck. No tickets for any of us. 500 deduct on all. Good school grade discount for them. About $9,000 per year premiums!

Ron-MO · Feb 12, 2016

I know in MO an accident falls off and your rate should drop back down after 3 years, or at least with my company it does. I was in similar situation for a while with my son, and I called just before the 3 year anniversary, and they reduced his rate considerably, but I had to keep on them. Also, see about putting high risk driver as primary driver on a vehicle with liability only, and even though they are primary driver on the low price liability insured vehicle, they can still drive the others if policy is correct. Another thing I ran into a few years ago was that an agent had tagged medical coverage on my vehicles which I did not need since I had health insurance, so I removed that and saved a few dollars.

JD Seller · Feb 12, 2016

So you have some vehicles your paying 20-30% of there true value each year just to have full coverage on them. I bet your agent sends you a Christmas and birthday card. Drop the full coverage on any of the cars worth less than 4 times the cost of the full coverage insurance. Take the money saved from the lower premiums and set aside $3-4K. This will pay for any total loss you have. Your not going to lose a car each year so after a few years you will come out way ahead money wise.

Your paying though the nose because you think you got "burned" by not having coverage on a $3500 car. I bet that full coverage on that car with a teenager driver would have been a $1000 a year. So your buying it back every three years.

moresmoke · Feb 12, 2016

And the collision premium never goes down. Buy a brand new vehicle and the premium is still right up there 10 years later, while the vehicle is not worth much any more.

Ron-MO · Feb 12, 2016

Gotta agree with JD. On a $3500 car, I would drop to liability on it, as you are paying for the car in premiums. I have a couple $2000 cars, and both have liability only, and premium on mine is about $175 per year. Just got my sons insurance dropped due to fact no tickets or accidents under 3 years, and his liability policy on it is $120 every 3 months. I need to dig in more on why his is so high, but likely credit problems, as they tell me that comes into play, but I am not sure why that is the case as they certainly do not allow you to carry insurance without paying.

Bill(Wis) · Feb 12, 2016

Why don't you have USAA?

GordoSD · Feb 12, 2016

You need to buy 2-3 Buick/Pontiac/ Olds four doors,10-14 years old. with 3800 engines and about 130,000 miles on them, They will get 28 mpg, and cost about 3500 dollars. Do not buy any collision or comp ins, Liability only. Your insurance will drop to 3000 a year total, and you can buy two cars a year for that. Look at the "loaners" the dealers and body shops have, They don't carry a nickels worth of anything except liability.
Never , ever insure a car worth less than 10 K for collision or Comp.
And if you have a 80K Vette in the stall , insure for comp only and never drive it. LOL

504 · Feb 12, 2016

We saved 500.00 a year by changing insurance companies. I carry liability and comprehensive(cheep) that covers everything but collision.

Bret4207 · Feb 13, 2016

(quoted from post at 19:10:15 02/12/16) I have 4 cars and a pickup insured. The newest is a 2012. The truck and 2 cars are 06 and one car (mine) an 02. The 4 newest have collision coverage. The premiums are killing me! Granted, my two daughters drive, ages 18 and 21, which I know jacks up the price, but wow! Is there something I'm missing here? Plus my boy is 15 which means another car in a year or so. I got burned a few years ago when my older daughter totaled a car-I had gambled on not having collision and had to eat a $3,500 car. So I keep collision on all but mine. Is there a secret I need to know?

5 vehicles, 4 with collision, under 25 yoa drivers and and an accident? What do you expect? Been there, done that. Have you talked to the kids about getting a job and helping pay? Crazy talk, right? Can you lose a vehicle or 2? You have options, they just may not be the ones you want to consider.

Geo-TH,In · Feb 13, 2016

Go Amish, get your kids horses instead of cars.

K Effective · Feb 13, 2016

I should've added, only her wreck. No tickets for any of us. 500 deduct on all. Good school grade discount for them. About $9,000 per year premiums!

I just checked, two 50+ adults, 3 kids 16-22, 6 vehicles, three with collision, no points, $2095 for six months. I also need to shop the car and farm insurances, but each time I have, I end up liking the car coverage company, and add even more stuff to the farm coverage.

Geo-TH,In · Feb 13, 2016

I just have just a car and truck. If you add all my insurances, auto, tractors, home, business, and all my taxes, property, Fed, State, and local income it will be more than my full SS benefit, which I have to pay Fed taxes on. Think about that before you retire.

Donald Lehman · Feb 14, 2016

Yup, you are missing something. Go to the nearest junk yard pick out two $350 runnable vehicles, then buy them. Present them to your kids and tell them, "Here's your car. Insurance and maintenance is your responsibility. Get a job. This will be the one and only vehicle I will ever buy you. Good luck". It will be the best thing you can ever do for them.

OT:Car insurance $ is killing me!

Well-known Member

Well-known Member

Well-known Member

Well-known Member

Member

Well-known Member

Member

Well-known Member

Well-known Member

Well-known Member

Well-known Member

Member

Well-known Member

Well-known Member

Well-known Member

Member

Well-known Member

Well-known Member

Member

Well-known Member

Well-known Member

Well-known Member

Well-known Member

Well-known Member

Well-known Member

Well-known Member

Well-known Member

Similar threads