Do you carry full coverage auto insurance on your older vehicle?

[traces7]

Do you have deer and icy roads like we do? I keep full coverage on all 3 of ours because it seems as though one of us hits a deer every other year.

Terri

Yes to both! That's what I said to DH, if I dropped it, it wouldn't cover if I hit a deer or something.

 

[tvguy]

When I used to work in an Insurance Sales office, I would always ask the person if they would be able to come up with the money to replace the car if it was totaled or had a very expensive repair. You should base your decision on that answer.

I suspect if a car's value was low enough to even consider dropping collision, the insurance payout, after your deductible, isn't even going to make much difference in your ability to replace the car just with insurance money. For most folks, they'd be up the creek financially either way.

 

[IDoDis]

We have 2 vehicles, the car is 2001 and carry full coverage. The other is a 2000 work van and I have to carry two different insurance coverages. I was so grateful to have full coverage on the other two work vans. One literally burned to the ground. So the coverage on the van was paid for by both. The other van well a lady knocked down a whole carport and hit the van which they rendered totaled. So I carry full coverage.

If a lady knocked down the carport, then her insurance would have had to cover your car, so having full coverage on that vehicle would have been a non-issue, assuming the lady had insurance herself.

After spending a decade in auto claims working for Progressive and Allstate, I have to tell you that for $112 I would definitely keep the full coverage. Here is why:

You are in an auto accident where you say it was the other person's fault and they say it was your fault. If the other person uses their collision coverage to repair their car, their insurance company will subrogate (ie. come after your property damage coverage on your car insurance for repayment). Their insurance will also deny any payment to you for repairs because their insured says it was your fault. Often, if you don't have collision coverage, your insurance company will not waste time investigating the accident because they don't have to pay you and they don't have to pay the other person because you are stating that the loss was the fault of the other person.

Why would the other insurance company come after your property damage coverage? Isn't that what the liability insurance premium is for? To cover someone else if you are at fault? I'm confused.

Well, some of you have really inexpensive insurance. We pay through the nose in NM due to so many uninsured drivers and so many DUI's. For three cars - Toyota '03 x-cab Tacoma, '10 Corolla (full coverage on both but no rental car coverage) with $300,000/$500,000 limit, and a '00 Honda Civic (same limit, but liability only), we pay $1387 every 6 months with Geico. We also have homeowners tied to the plan and get a "discount" for that. We also have good driver discounts, DH took some kind of online test when he turned 50 this year and we got a $25 off every six months for that, but that amount is still a killer! The Civic is DD's car. She's 17, and her vehicle alone for liability is $86/month/$1032 a year. However, our limits are also high.

So, in order to compare apples to apples as far as policy prices go, you must also look at the amount of coverage. A bare minimum 25,000/50,000 policy is going to be a lot cheaper than a $300,000/$500,000 policy. Many people are under insured and could lose their assets if they are in an accident and the medical and vehicle damages are over the $25K their policy allows -- which is not hard to do in this day and age.

We upped our limits when DD started driving. Someone I work with has a brother who hit someone on a motorcycle and his family lost their home due to the medical expenses of the motorcycle driver who sued for their personal assets because their policy did not have enough coverage. The motorcycle driver lived, but was in critical condition for a a few days and the medical bills were 15 times the low coverage the driver carried. So make sure you have enough coverage to at least cover your assets (home, valuables, savings, etc...).

 

[kellia]

I dropped full coverage on my 2003 Grand Prix last year, Michigan has high insurance! Dd got her license and a car, so that helped cover the cost of adding her on. My car looks and runs great, but it has 220,000 miles on it, so blue book isn't going to give us much if it got totalled and if anything happens they'd probably total it instead of fixing it.

 

[LeslieG]

My understanding has been that when I rent a car and decline their insurance, if I don't have full coverage on at least one of our family's vehicles, then I will not have full coverage on the rental car. That has made me always carry full coverage on at least one of our vehicles.

 

[Yellowstonetim]

I have never even considered keeping full coverage on an older high mileage car. Given the high cost of the insurance and the low value of the car, you are better off banking the money and paying out of pocket should something happen. If the car gets banged up but is drivable, no big deal. And in a relatively short number of months you've saved the value to replace the car!

 

[IDoDis]

I have never even considered keeping full coverage on an older high mileage car. Given the high cost of the insurance and the low value of the car, you are better off banking the money and paying out of pocket should something happen. If the car gets banged up but is drivable, no big deal. And in a relatively short number of months you've saved the value to replace the car!

Not to mention that a lot of people don't even report claims on fender benders in older vehicles because they don't want their premiums to go up AND pay a $500 or more deductible. They either live with the dent or find a friend or someone on Craigslist to do the body work.

Now there is one negative of having only liability coverage and this happened to me. A guy hit me in a parking lot after he came barreling around a food delivery truck that was in the alley that lead to the parking lot. I was in a 13 year old '96 Geo Prism ad only carried liability on that car. He was the at-fault driver but the police would not come since the accident occurred on private property (restaurant parking lot). The other driver apologized to me, gave me his insurance info and said he'd call his insurance that afternoon. I called both mine and his insurance companies and gave a recorded statement to each. But after waiting almost a month and several phone calls, his agent said they could not get a hold of their driver to get a statement and therefore had to drop the claim. They said that they sent him notification that they were dropping his policy in 30 days. I called back my insurance company and was told that since I only carried liability on the car, they could not fight the other insurance agency on my behalf. I could have suede the guy in small claims court, but I was able to have a friend do the the body work for $400, so I just left it at that. It wasn't worth the hassle and missed time at work to pursue a claim. Even if I had full coverage I would not have had my insurance fix it because the deductible would have cost e more than fixing the car, but it would have ben nice to have had my insurance company help me get the payout money from the other agency.

 

[traces7]

It's been interesting reading everyone's responses, thanks for all the advice! We still haven't decided what we're going to do. Our policy renews on Sept 3, so I have a little time to think about it.

 

[tvguy]

Not to mention that a lot of people don't even report claims on fender benders in older vehicles because they don't want their premiums to go up AND pay a $500 or more deductible. They either live with the dent or find a friend or someone on Craigslist to do the body work.

Now there is one negative of having only liability coverage and this happened to me. A guy hit me in a parking lot after he came barreling around a food delivery truck that was in the alley that lead to the parking lot. I was in a 13 year old '96 Geo Prism ad only carried liability on that car. He was the at-fault driver but the police would not come since the accident occurred on private property (restaurant parking lot). The other driver apologized to me, gave me his insurance info and said he'd call his insurance that afternoon. I called both mine and his insurance companies and gave a recorded statement to each. But after waiting almost a month and several phone calls, his agent said they could not get a hold of their driver to get a statement and therefore had to drop the claim. They said that they sent him notification that they were dropping his policy in 30 days. I called back my insurance company and was told that since I only carried liability on the car, they could not fight the other insurance agency on my behalf. I could have suede the guy in small claims court, but I was able to have a friend do the the body work for $400, so I just left it at that. It wasn't worth the hassle and missed time at work to pursue a claim. Even if I had full coverage I would not have had my insurance fix it because the deductible would have cost e more than fixing the car, but it would have ben nice to have had my insurance company help me get the payout money from the other agency.

I only drop collision, not uninsured motorist and comprehensive. Those two always are very little money.

 

[IDoDis]

I only drop collision, not uninsured motorist and comprehensive. Those two always are very little money.

The driver was insured, so that would not have helped me. He just never returned phone calls from his agent and did not respond to a notice they sent him in writing. Since he never called in the accident nor responded, his insurance company denied my claim. They should have still paid, it but without having anyone to fight for me, I was out of luck unless I wanted o hire an attorney or take him to small claims court. I was tempted to do that just out of principle, but I didn't have the time to deal with it.

 

[disneefamily]

Disnee Dad Says..........................................Comprehensive is peace of mind. If anything happens to your car it's covered, like when my car was stolen. It's a matter of what can you afford. Can I afford to have my car stolen? Yes. Will I pay a few hundred dollars a year to not worry about it? Yes.

Unless you are a bad driver, collision is a bad bet on old cars,unless you have no money. If you can replace an old car with another old car, then collision is useless. It only works when you cause the accident. If someone hits you, your collision does not cover it, the other persons insurance does.