Any advice on shopping vehicle insurance rates?

I’m paying way too much for insurance right now and am about to get some competitive quotes. It looks like there are a lot of one-stop brokers offering multiple quotes from different companies. But I’m not sure if this will generate the best rate since it goes through an intermediary. Getting individual quotes takes more time and could result in an apples to oranges comparison though.

Any advice from anyone who has done this recently?

 

I changed last year and improved a little. I was doing better unbundled - but last year I managed a bit of an improvement with the bundled coverage.

In the last couple of days, without any additional violations or anything remotely deserving an increase from an operational standpoint; my insurer just sent notice of a 50% increase on one vehicle, and 80% on the other...

B@st@rds!

What could possibly merit such a dramatic increase?! The property coverage did not increase - but I may take my WHOLE coverage elsewhere!

That can't be called inflation.

Ringing my agent is on my to-do list. Likely a more prudent course than a visit.

 

Bait and switch.

 

I give my current dec page to 2 independent agents who rep at least 5 companies with no overlap.

That gives me apples to apples comparison.

Had been with same carrier since 11, big jump this year. Shopping got a 400 better price. With a major carrier. A+ rating minimum

 

I'm not saying to not shop around. But sometimes you get what you pay for. You might save a few bucks on the premium and get screwed if you have a claim. And many insurance companies are constantly looking for ways to increase your premium or cancel you outright over small stuff. That introductory premium might go way up in 6 months.

 

Fl is getting outrageous…… I just bought a house in Lakeland and when getting home owners the agent gave me a quote for Auto. Now I have an excellent credit score above 825 great driving record for 35 yrs. $1835 every 6 months. Now for my 23 4 Runner and paying $100 month 250/500 with an umbrella policy. I was just told this coverage is going up $31 month starting in August at renewal and my home owners on my main residence in Charlotte is going up $400 yr September.

 

It's not just Florida. But they are hiding behind the premise of weather risks.

See if you can get an agent to quote you on Tower Hill for homeowners. We did well on the rental with that after doing some storm hardening (which needed doing anyway)

 

i just shopped around similarly. i reached out to every local broker i could. it made sense-- instead of me contacting every single different company, and guessing on the coverage i should need, or what they omit, i could allow someone that is educated within the system to work for me. even if it costs a little more with a middle man, i'm man enough to admit that i'm not an expert in everything, and sometimes the wisest choice is to admit that and allow the experts to work for me.

out of 50 i contacted, 3 responded. and only one of those seemed to have an interest in touching base with me after the initial quote, but later went entirely radio silent.. i was later at an RV show, and got a quote from an allstate agent. that agent WON'T LEAVE ME ALONE. and for kicks, i also tried gieco's online estimate as well. the individual quotes were exactly as you describe-- apples to oranges. the broker quotes were all similarly-quoted, with only minor differences that the brokers could explain the differences in--some companies simply don't offer the exact same options.

my sister and her husband had allstate-- they like to get new customers with an incredibly low initial rate, and then jack the rates up afterwards to compensate. i was warned that by 2 of the brokers as well.

i'm not going to give all of the coverage options i was quoted, but for a rough idea, the majority of house coverage options were around $1300-2000/yr for me. allstate claimed $500/yr for the same coverage. i'm paying $1100/yr currently. realistically, changing was going to raise my house insurance rate, no matter which company, but that also entailed a higher insured property value, so outside of allstate, they were all roughly inline with each other.

car insurance, which was what started the entire shopping around process, i'm paying $2400/yr for two vehicles. most of the quotes were in the $1100-1500/yr range for similar coverage.

house insurance-- 2 representatives informed me that most insurance agencies are going through lots of changes, and many companies will no longer write new policies for houses with roof's older than 10 years, some at 15 years, regardless of the quality of roof installed (i'm at 22 years on a 30 year shingle), most wouldn't even write a policy because of this for me. i did briefly discuss with the agent the cost of replacing the roof and getting one of the other policies, but it really only resulted in a roughly $200/yr reduction in insurance cost.

and as far as car insurance, i dropped the idea for a little while, as my policy was due to renew soon, and the week before i was going to switch, i had a deer strike my vehicle. i'm letting the dust settle a little after making the repair claim before i'll re-approach the idea.

after all that, the only one that's even tried touching base with me is the allstate agent. the rest have completely disappeared from contact. no quick "have you considered us again?" emails, or anything, which i find particularly odd.

all in all, i found the broker method really weird. i never expected to have to work this hard to have other people do work for me, many times, it almost seemed like i was forcing them to issue the quote...

 

All across the board it seems to have gone up by about 40% in the past 3 years...

 

I am calling right now, I’ve got a new car soon and have 2 different companies for my bike and for my truck.

It's crazy how expensive it is. I'm going higher deductible and still way more than I expected.

My motorcycle policy only accepts calls during the day.

It's nuts, 2350$ for a 2016 rav4 comp and collision. I may drop comp and put fire theft only on it, I park on private property 100% of the time. If it was new I'd treat it differently.

 

As someone who works in the INS industry, rates are up a bit for a few reasons.

-Inflation
-Amount of claims has been up significantly/fraud
-People are driving now, whereas with covid people were not.

So expect rates to have "caught up"

That said, really shop around. For me, some companies either flat out denied me coverages (no accidents or claims) or were 2x the cost of others.

I ended up going with progressive. I have full coverage and pay less than 110$/mo.

 

Vehicle rates should go down each year since they depreciate in value, but not in the eyes of insurance companies. I get mad just thinking about it.

 

Stay the hell away from GEICO. I just got popped with this threat "you have 8 days to send this entire list. Otherwise your coverage will be terminated on the 22nd."



I like to shop around every year, but they are probably going on the never-again list this November.

 

Sounds like fraud is rampant and this is a measure they are using to punish everyone else.

 

Fraud is one thing. I'm going to chalk half that list up to underwriters that are too lazy to do basic research.

 

I'd 100% cancel, you'd never get that info out of me, you didnt need it before you dont get it now.

My motorcycle insurance required a photo of the bike. I never had to do that before but it was interesting, perhaps a new method of fraud detection.

 

I actually just sent it as a "good faith attempt" - I currently have three open claims with them (2 cars, 1 house). They underpaid all three by a lot and I'm currently fighting for them to make it right.

 

Haha, mine asked for a picture too. Thanks Google.

Insurance is a government sanctioned scam

 

My rates went up recently. I am with farmers for home and auto. I haven't been able to find much better rates though. I wish it were 2019 again.

 

Generally speaking, insurance companies are (legitimately) losing some cash and are having to increase rates. People doing multiple windshield claims a year, w.o realizing they cost 1k+ to replace these days (cams need to be calibrated etc) while policies only cost ~1k a year, is a losing game for carriers.

Plus, "increased intense weather events" are up, quite a bit. So more totaled vehicles to fires, floods, hail, tornados etc.

A fire wiping out a town is a catastrophic loss, and having this become more normal is again, a losing game.

This is why you are seeing companies back out of states like FL and CA, because legislation doesnt allow for rate increases unless approved by the state.


I would stay away from Geico, they dont really want new customers right now.