Well, I seem to feel a bit cursed these last couple years.

I wanted to take a moment to give a quick public service announcement.

I was recently involved in a car wreck. First time in 35 years, it was my fault. Full airbag deployment all around (I think 14 of them total), severe damage and total loss on the vehicle. I walked away with a cut on my hand and a bruise on my shoulder from the seat belt.

Now the bad news... it was a new car and total loss. And I did not have the proper insurance coverage, so I will be out somewhere between $3-5K out of pocket. So if you have a new vehicle, and you are upside down, make sure you have GAP insurance. It works out to about $5-7 per month..!

Second, make sure you have sufficient coverage for property and persons. I was alone and the other damage was minimal, but had the collision occurred against an expensive car, I was only covered to $15k!! So make sure you have more than the minimums! The increased insurance premiums is minimal at best!!!

Ouch! Good advice to check your insurance coverage. 15K? That wouldn't cover a Rent-A-Wreck around here. I do know that NY automatically requires gap.

-Hal

Every vehicle I own has at least a million liability. That's the minimum, I would recommend these days.

I am curious. What kind of car was this that had 14 air bags?

As a contractor, I have to carry $1 mill coverage. It's not trivial. My new policy is $1200 or so, with $900 being for the mil coverage. A second vehicle would add $900 to the policy.


Carl

Holy Moses! $1,200 a month or year? My insurance is $18,000 a year with $5 million umbrella. Vehicle liability coverage is $2.5 million and then the umbrella kicks in.

When we worked at the mines, our coverage was about double that. Some years, it seemed like we worked just to pay the insurance and taxes.

My advice: Get as much liability as you can afford and don't ASSUME anything. If you don't understand what the policy provisions are, ASK! Insurance companies, horse thieves and used car salesmen all run in the same circles.

Rcaman

That's what I like about where I live in Canada. the Provence of Manitoba owns the auto insurance system (i.e. only one insurance company for basic coverage-theirs) so they run it on a break even basis.

There is an independent review board that looks at any proposed rate changes and can order modifications. About 5 years ago they ruled the insurance company made too much money so the review board ordered them to refund more then was proposed to over 750,000 policy holders. If it had been a private company the shareholders would have done good that year.

For those that use a personal vehicle for business, make sure you have "business use" rider on your personal policy. Otherwise you'd be on the hook for any lawsuits from any business related injury. In Maine, personal vehicle insurance policies are limited to $500k max. Commercial vehicle policies don't have those limits.

You left out politicians and lawyers

I just increased my auto insurance from 250K to 1M a few weeks ago it cost $36.00 more for the year.

Oops, no, my commercial auto is $1197 annually or $317.50 quarterly. My commercial liability is about $1000 per year with a killer marine floater option.