My 1997 Acura Integra has long since been paid off. I found on the web that the blue book value is right around 5 grand. It is paid off I do not need to keep full comprehensive coverage on it. I haven’t had an accident in 6 years when I last hit a deer. Before that it was even longer. Although I have no traffic violations I seem to be paying a large premium (1200) a year. This seems to be linked to the car model, because I shopped around. I am thinking that it would be wise to switch to minimum coverage (I’m not yet sure what the savings would be) and put the rest away towards a new car. Once this car hits 150 thou or so, I will probably replace it anyway. It currently is around 100 thou. Dopers, any advice?
I would like to remind you (as a former Insurance Chick) that if you are hit and run, the Collision portion of your insurance covers that. And boy, it happens a lot. It happened to my car in Yellowknife, it happened to my sister’s car in small-town Alberta, it happens all over where you would not expect it. If you are solvent enough that you can afford to pay for repair after someone does that, then by all means drop the coverage.
Discuss it with your broker/agent before you make the decision. I was never on commission, so I would always give people straight answers; lots of brokers won’t do that, so please take their word for it if you trust their advice.
Can you afford to buy a new car or repair the damage if you cause an accident or you hit another deer?
You probably won’t save as much as you think dropping the collision insurance. That extra $20 or $30 a month might very well be worth the peace of mind it buys.
It depends. Do you own a house or have any assets that you would want to protect in case you have an accident and get sued? That is what car insurance is really for. Let’s say you get the state minimum (mine is 20/40/5) and have an accident, your fault, and get sued, and have a judgment of $250K slapped against you. If your car insurance can’t cover it, the plaintiff is surely going to go after your house or whatever else you have of value.
I don’t think any states require comprehensive coverage, do they? (I think you mean you don’t have to carry “full” liability and collision coverage anymore - “comprehensive” is a specific category of coverage; it’s not the same as liability or collision - it’s for theft and I forget what else.)
If your state has a minimum, obviously you will have to get at least that. Raising your deductible will lower the premium - IMO, you might as well make it $1,000 since pretty much repairing a minor bump will be close to that anyway and putting in claims for something smaller will likely raise your premium. If your car is paid off, you can get rid of the collision but you will still have to carry your state’s minimum for liability and uninsured/underinsured motorist.
Bottom line is, if you own a house or have assets, you need to have car insurance and possibly an umbrella in an amount to protect those assets.
Yes, I can. Most of the other men my age that I know are paying almost half of what I pay a year. Again, I suspect that it is linked to the car model because my driving history is pretty clean and I have done some comparison shopping.
Yes, this is what I meant by:
That sounds like good advice. Although he is almost impossible to get in touch with.
How about the zero-deductible full glass coverage? I was required to have that on my car when it was financed. Now that it’s paid off, should I drop it? How much does glass work cost in the real world?
Then get a new broker. He’s supposed to be available to you, and if you’ve got questions, he’s supposed to answer them.
It’s important to be aware that laws vary widely from state to state and, believe it or not, between the US and Canada too!!!
I hate to break it to you, but your car isn’t worth as much as you think. Yeah insurance companies look at the blue book value but then subtract something like $0.70 per mile after the yearly allotment of the average 12k miles. So 5k - ((100k - (6years old * 12k))*.7) = $5k - (28k * $0.70) = $5k - $19.6k = -$14,400 = You’d have to pay them to take it.
I cancelled my full coverage last month when I sat down with my insurance agent at her office and all of this was explained to me. I now have liability and comprehensive with a $500 deductible and am still paying $700 per year on a '95 Civic SI w/185k miles. My driving record is clean (as far as they know) but I dare to live in downtown Chicago = premiums doubled when I informed them of the move.
The only thing collison does is pay for your car if you cause a wreck. If someone else causes a wreck then it’s their insurance that pays. If that other person doesn’t have insurance, it comes out of comprehensive. All you gotta do is to not cause an accident = don’t leave your lane. As soon as you leave your lane, if you hit anything it’s your fault.
Hope this helps 
Have a nice day.
One comment here. In the above example the /5 means $5,000 for property damage. Hell, if total the other guys KIA it gonna run two to three times that. If you hit a Benz, a font bumper, and fender will be close to that. 5K property damage is just not enough any more. My policy has 100K for property damage.
The minimum statutory requirement in the common-law provinces in Canada is $200,000 for Public Liability and Property Damage. Every other province sets its own minimums. However, as a broker, I would never, ever sell less than a million, and most people wanted the $2 million coverage. If you’re going to be sued, it’s not gonna be for $200K when it can be more.
Yeah, I have 2 Mil coverage for liability but my deductable for an accident is $1K, pretty high. If your car isn’t worth it (mine is still “new”) then you’ll want to strip what you dont’ need. My last 2 cars (88 bonneville and 92 yoyager) both had minimal insurance because of super-high milage.
Hey GingerOfTheNorth can I ask you something? Do you know when the next insurance cut-off age/time is? I recently turned 25 and so my insurance dropped by half. Is there any better rates I can look forward to as I age? I’m still paying ~$2300 a year for my 1 year old car. Do I need to get married or something before it goes down even more? I have no accidents, ever, and 1 very minor ticket leaves my record in 4 months…will this lower my rates?
I hope to lower my rates enough that I can afford to get a motorbike (insurance on a bike is really cheap compared to a car) and I want my combined insurance to be less than $300 / month. I have really old friends (34+) who pay less than $125 a month for both! I wanna join em 
The rule for ALL insurance is simple: Will the maximum loss bring you financial pain? If not, do not buy insurance. All insurance companies decide what the risk is and add their costs and profits.
Thus an even-money risk is going to be much less than the premium.
In the case of a car, for example, decide whether you can replace the car if it is totaled. If you could, even with financing, then the math favors being “self-insured”.
My apologies, badmana, I didn’t see this until this morning. The last ‘cut-off’ for rates dropping is at 25. Depending on where you live, it’s always going to be high. Toronto = lots of people to hit (literally)= higher risk of liability, theft, hit and run = high rates. Rural Alberta = fewer people = lower risk of liability, theft, hit-n-run = lower rates. It also depends on how long you have been driving, how many tickets you have, what sort of vehicle you have. When we moved from Alberta to Ontario, our rates doubled. Likewise, when I lived in the NWT, I paid $550 a year for full coverage on a 2000 Cavalier; I moved to Canmore (40 min west of Calgary) and ended up with a yearly premium of $850. That is including all of the discounts available to me - multi-policy, clean record, no accidents, employee discount. So, it’s one more thing you’ll have to discuss with your broker.
The whole reason I advocate the broker vs. agent system is simply that they will offer you the best advice. They are there on your behalf, not on behalf of some faceless corporation.