<p>Hoping a parent can help me out as my own parents are currently living out of the country.</p>
<p>I obtained my license when I was 18, and have never been in an accident, gotten a ticket (even a parking ticket) or been pulled over. I moved to Massachusetts after graduation and have started the process to get the car title transferred into my name, get a Massachusetts license, etc. The car is an 04 Camry with 80K miles and I commute 10 miles each way to work every day. </p>
<p>Previously, my insurance has been under my parents and the car title is in my dad’s name. In Massachusetts, I don’t need his signature to transfer the title to my name (obviously I have his OK) since it is intra-family. </p>
<p>However, when I look into auto insurance, the costs seem extraordinarily high - or perhaps I just don’t have perspective. I’m really not sure what levels of coverage I should be purchasing.</p>
<p>I have a friend back home (California) and I asked her what she is paying for car insurance - she said $120/mo, and she has been in 4 accidents and gotten two speeding tickets since she got her license. Her car’s functionally similar to mine (04 Civic, similar number of miles). $140/mo is the lowest I’ve been quoted. Is she getting a really good deal, or am I getting a really bad one? Are there any ways to lower a premium in Massachusetts? I don’t qualify for a good student discount, as I just graduated, and I don’t think you can use past transcripts as evidence…</p>
<p>Anyway just hoping for some advice as I navigate the car insurance industry… sigh.</p>
<p>Sorry, MA insurance rates are very high, particularly for an individual policy for a driver under 24. Are you certain that your CA friend isn’t on her parents’ insurance, even if she has the car? That’s really the only way to lower the rates.</p>
<p>Nope, she definitely just purchased her own policy. I double checked because I was fairly shocked.</p>
<p>I don’t believe it is possible to stay on my parents’ insurance now that I have moved to a different state and started a new job, but I could be wrong.</p>
<p>Call the insurance company who your parents are presently insured with, or were insured with before they moved out of the country, and ask them this question. I’m sure they would be happy to assist you since it can potentially mean an additional driver or policy.</p>
<p>Parents were (still are actually, as they’ve kept the cars in storage) insured with Farmers - when I spoke to our family’s agent, he said Farmer’s did not insure in Massachusetts.</p>
<p>I could keep the car registered in my dad’s name and drive in Massachusetts under Farmers Insurance but the agent was concerned about doing this now that I am not a college student - was fine doing it while I was an OOS college student, but now that I moved, says it makes more sense to register the car in the state where it will be located.</p>
<p>he said Farmer’s did not insure in Massachusetts. </p>
<p>That’s surprising… </p>
<p>By the way, the reason that girl has cheaper insurance than you may be because she is getting a “multi-car” discount and/or “multi-policy” discount on her parent’s insurance. There’s big savings to be had with having more than one car or policy with the same company.</p>
<p>No, she’s not on a multi car or multi driver policy. I double checked this with her as I was curious as to why her rates were lower than mine. She purchased an individual driver policy.</p>
<p>Is she still a student with decent grades? Good student discounts are also substantial. Female drivers pay less in all states. You may also want to forego the collision insurance and just carry PD/PL, medical, etc. That will save you some money. Make sure your liability limits are generous in the event you get sued, god forbid. I have a separate umbrella policy on my policy now that my S is driving.</p>
<p>Insurance is by states
Different coverages means for different rates
Male/Female affects rates
Driving history
Make and Model and year affects
Where the car is isnured
If the car is garaged</p>
<p>I don’t have any specific numbers, but in the past I have gotten the best rates from direct sellers of insurance (rather than going through an agent). I would recommend trying 21st Century or GEICO. If you or your parents have been in the military, I would highly recommend USAA. They have very good rates and fabulous service.</p>
<p>As others have said, make sure you have sufficient liability coverage. If you cream somebody’s Porsche or god forbid cause serious bodily injury, the state mandated minimums (20,000/40,000?) are woefully inadequate.</p>
<p>In general, insurance is for something you couldn’t afford to pay for - like buying somebody a new Porsche. Your Camry may be worth $10,000 or so. Only you can decide if that’s a big enough nut that it would be really hard to pay for should the car get totalled. If so, you should probably buy collision and comprehensive. If you are OK with the risk, you can drop collision and comprehensive and only get the liability, personal injury, etc. I generally don’t drop the collision and comprehensive until the value of the car drops below about $5,000, but YMMV.</p>
<p>You may be comparing apples and oranges - the cost of the insurance will vary with the coverage. For example, (in Cal at least) it’s only required by law to have liability insurance (which covers damage to other cars) - not collision (which covers damage to your car), comprehensive (which covers fire, theft), not rental car coverage, etc. The cost of the collision insurance will vary depending on the deductible - i.e. a $200 deductible will cost more than having $1000 deductible. </p>
<p>On top of the differences in coverage there’s also a difference in location (rural is cheaper than urban), gender of the person getting insured (male is more), number of years licensed, accident/ticket history, type of car, etc.</p>
<p>The best thing to do is to contact multiple companies and get quotes for the exact same coverage and compare them. Make sure you get quotes for the same coverage or else you’re back to the apples/oranges comparison. Then you can make a decision about which one to go with regardless of what your friend in Cal says she’s paying.</p>
<p>The rates are different depending on states – you need to shop around - you can begin by getting quotes through a web site like esurance.com – then contact the companies that came up with the lowest quotes directly. </p>
<p>Car insurance is expensive! Depending on where you live and where you attend school… you might want to reconsider as to whether you really need a car or would be better off relying on a combination of public transportation and a service like zipcar for the times when you do need access to a vehicle.</p>
<p>Unfortunately I cannot reconsider having a car as I work a twenty minute highway drive from home in an area essentially inaccessible by public transportation unless I wanted a two hour (each way) bus commute every day. I am no longer in school (graduated in May) - I arguably didn’t need a car last year in school at all, except that my parents were moving out of the country so it made sense to take the car.</p>
<p>It is true that she may have different numbers for amount of coverage that I didn’t think of. I’m just frustrated and venting, I suppose. I could live with a high deductible plan as, in an emergency, my parents could get funds to me. It just frustrates me since I’m a very safe driver (people make fun of me because I always stick with the speed limit/come to a complete stop at stop signs) according to the agent I spoke to, being a safe driver in Massachusetts makes no real difference until you are 25. I’m female, my car isn’t particularly nice, I had great grades in school (and am going onto a prestigious grad school after a 2 yr deferral)… sigh. Suppose I’ll just have to eat that cost.</p>
<p>I have contacted many different insurers in the area (though it does seem that Massachusetts has fewer insurance providers than other states, but maybe I’m imagining it) so I’m on the right track. Keep plugging and chugging my way to adulthood, I guess.</p>
<p>Massachusetts insurance rates are very high. Ours went down by half when we moved from MA to CA, and then down another 1/3rd when we moved from CA to WA. (Our next move, from WA to OR, was about level.)</p>
<p>You can make your insurance costs more manageable by getting the highest possible deductible. Then put the money you save directly into an emergency car fund to cover the deductible, should you have an accident.</p>
<p>I can tell you…insuring my kids on my policy is NO BARGAIN either. The older kid is $1600 a year…just for him. I can’t imagine his individual policy will cost more than that when time comes, especially since he will lose that “youth driver status” on his 26th birthday. Woohoo…and the rates will go down. </p>
<p>Part of the reason for your high costs is that you are probably considered a youth driver and they have higher rates. Once you hit your 26th birthday (maybe this varies by policy) that goes away and your insurance costs will go down (assuming you don’t have any accidents or tickets in the meantime).</p>
<p>It wouldn’t surprise me. When we moved from CA to FL 20 years ago, we had to find a new insurance company because Farmers did not write car insurance in Florida.</p>
<p>My daughter was able to a break on her insurance by getting our insurance company’s agent to write a letter stating that they hadn’t had to pay any claims because of her for the past 3 years. That got her over the hump of not having a 3 year history.</p>
<p>It is probably quite true that MA has fewer insurers than other states. I don’t know if it would cheer you up to know that there are places that are worse…like New Jersey!!</p>
<p>You may not be out of luck with the good student discount. My insurance policy took my son’s last grade report and proof of graduation (from college) and now apply the good student discount until he is no longer a young driver.</p>
<p>Mass rates are pretty high… but do look at what kind of coverage you are quoting. I am in PA and I have Erie… I don’t think they are up in MA but I would highly recommend them to people in my area… Check around and see if the companies have any funky policies that could benefit you… for example my policy has something called a “diminishing deductible”… I technically have a 500 deductible, but for each consecutive claims free year you have with them, they reduce your deductible by $100. Mine’s down to Zero. I could even take a higher deductible to get my premiums down, but I like the idea of it currently being zero.</p>
<p>Also, call and talk to a real person. Ask them how much the premium changes if you adjust things on the policy. You might find that going from say a 100 comprehensive deductible to say a 250 deductible will save you more then 150 a year, etc.</p>
<p>I bought my car when I was 21… I think I used to pay about 80 a month under my parents plan. My company reduces your rates at 24… it went down to about 60 a month and I moved to my own plan… I now have my homeowners with the same company and for my car I pay about 500 a year… I’m 27 now.</p>