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FIVE STEPS TO GET RIGHT OF AUTO INSURANCES

February 14th, 2011 by

When you buy a new automobile, not only do you have a monthly car payment to make, but you also have an insurance bill to pay. Because you know that going in, you have a glorious bit of power that you should exercise, and that power is to buy an automobile that insurance companies will love to insure so that you can get a cheap auto insurance quote.

Consideration 1: Easy to repair

Instead of choosing an expensive foreign model with fussy repair requirements, choose a classic model that is easy to repair. As an added benefit, these models are generally less expensive, requiring lower auto insurance limits. Also, since many of these models tend to have aggressive speed capabilities, they are higher risk.

Consideration 2: Safety measures

The less risk you offer an insurer, the less costly your insurance policy will be. One of the risks that an insurer takes on when insuring you is the risk of bodily injury. Airbags, anti-lock brakes, automatic seatbelts and daytime running lights are all relatively standard safety measures that will reduce your insurance expenses. Side airbags, rearview cameras and other electronic notification measures are newer methods of ensuring safety that an insurance company will look kindly on.

Consideration 3: Anti-theft and recovery measures

A car with a car alarm or locking steering wheel reduces the risk that your car will be stolen, which means your insurance company is less likely to have to pay for the theft of your car. A service like OnStar can increase the chances that your vehicle will be recovered if it does happen to be stolen.

The Next Step

Once you have done your research, test drove some possible car choices and narrowed down your options to a vehicle that is cheaper to insure, it is time to get your cheap auto insurance quote. When you do, don’t just get the quote from one company. Instead, compare the auto insurance quotes of multiple insurance companies so that you know you get the cheapest coverage possible. Make sure you think about any discounts you might be entitled to and that those are factored into the quote.

Don’t Scrimp Just to Save

One final note about making sure that you secure that cheap auto insurance quote; it is important that you don’t choose a super low limit and super high deductible in order to save money on your monthly auto insurance premium. While it might sound smart to choose a high deductible, if you actually have an insurable incident, that high deductible could stand between you and getting your car back on the road. And the same goes for high limits – if you don’t insure your car for what it is worth and opt for bodily injury liability limits that could actually pay real costs for a possible injury, the difference is going to come out of your pocket, whether you can afford it or not.

ABOUT CAR INSURANCES

February 12th, 2011 by

It may be the recession, but that never gets in the way of a good party. Whether it’s the traditional blow-outs like Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Year, or just a cookout with a few friends standing around the BBQ nursing cans of beer, there’s a potential problem if you are a little too generous with the alcohol. And, let’s face it, we all need a little sustenance to be able to face each new day. Not as a slippery slope into alcoholism, of course. But just to unwind, shooting the breeze and nibbling on a chicken wing (hopefully dead).

Now, as if there wasn’t enough to worry about, those activist judges have started to get at us partiers. Those Brits used to have something with the idea of their homes as castles. High walls to keep out the local sheriff, his deputies and any passing members of the DEA. So, what’s the problem? Well, let’s suppose you are passing around the cans or pouring into glasses. Everyone is getting gently mellow. Are you going to let them all drive home? What happens if one or more of your guests is involved in an accident on the way home?

Decades ago, states decided that bartenders should start to care about whether their drunken customers drove home. Across the nation, the Dram Shop Acts made any bartender liable if he or she had served obviously intoxicated customers, knowing they were going to drive. But there was no mass movement to extend this principle to the home where you give the booze away. Lawmakers said it was reasonable to make a commercial organization liable – bars can insure against this liability. What people do in their own homes is their private business. Well, that was then. Now bars across the US are feeling the pinch. It’s cheaper for people to buy their booze in Wal-Mart or Target, and drink at home. So the courts are extending the principles of the Dram Shop Acts to you as social hosts. Courts are holding you negligent if you let an obviously drunken guest drive away from your door.

In some states, lawmakers are offering some degree of protection to social hosts, but the trend is spreading fast. So, if you are planning a feast with alcohol flowing, you should build in a period for sobering up before letting folk attempt to drive home. Plenty of black coffee should be on offer. If that’s not working, call for cabs to take your guests home. Why? Because the policies coming from the usual car insurance quotes don’t cover you when third parties have an accident. It’s possible your homeowners policy has some coverage, but check it out. Assume the worst. Assume you have no insurance against this risk. If one of your guests does get into an accident and only has cheap car insurance, the victims will come after you for damages. Now that’s a real sobering thought. So, before you get all generous with the Christmas spirit this year, think about everyone else on the road and have a safe New Year without claims against you and your family.

PAY AS YOU DRIVE INSURANCE

February 12th, 2011 by

There’s always quite a big political edge to issues surrounding the insurance industry. In the case of vehicles it comes down to two big question marks. The first is whether the insurer should focus interest on the driver; the second on whether the insurer should use price as a lever to change driver behavior. You see the first in the ongoing debates on whether premium rates should be based on the ZIP code or the driver’s credit score. You see the second in the continuing environmental debates about pay-as-you drive.

The argument is easily put. At present, the insurer creates big groups of drivers and shares out the cost of the risk between them. This means all the safer drivers subsidize all the more dangerous drivers. Obviously there are some trade-offs, but the range of premium increases for individual drivers who prove unsafe is limited by the “profit” the insurer makes from all the safer drivers. Now look around you. We are living in the middle of a technological revolution. The vehicles we now drive are full of chips and many of us carry cell phones and other technology that allows service providers to track where we are. If we wanted, all vehicles could be fitted with technology to capture how and where we drive. This information could be transmitted on a continuous basis to our insurers. Those that drive the lowest number of miles and have the fewest accidents could then pay less to insure. Everyone who breaks the speed limits and travels thousands of miles a month would pay more.

The environmentalists love this idea. Price will be used to encourage people to drive less. There will be fewer greenhouse gasses released into the atmosphere. The world will be a better place. Law-enforcement are also excited by the possibility of being able to monitor all vehicles close to the scenes of reported crimes. Just think how useful it would be to know that seconds after a bank robbery, a car drove away from that location at 100 mph and was then abandoned in an alley where a second car then left. . . and so on. A recent study by the Conservation Law Foundation looked at the relationship between mileage and insurance claims in Massachusetts. It estimates that switching to pay-as-you-drive insurance would encourage drives to use the car less, reduce CO2 emissions, and cut accident costs.

Well, if you live in California, you will be able to try it out as from February 2011 when you apply for your auto insurance quotes. If you work from home, are unemployed or retired, or just generally drive less than 19,000 miles a year, you could be in line for a discount. State Farm and the Automobile Club of Southern California will be offering you the chance to self-report your odometer readings or to have a communications device installed that saves you the trouble of that cellphone call. So use this chance with your auto insurance quotes to save the planet and save dollars. Drive less, keep the gas in the ground and have better air to breathe.

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