<p>For us, having D dropped from Our policy so we had 2 cars and 2 drivers dropped our policy about 50% so we pay about $600/year for maximum coverage now (no collision). Our D’s policy is $700/6months for her alone in CA because she has a car now and collision coverage on her newer car.</p>
<p>We carry collision and full coverage…when our kids were in college our policies were about $200 less a year.</p>
<p>But how about this? Our daughter was in the Peace Corps for 27 months, so I wanted to take her off our policy. The company said NO…because we had three cars. Excuse me! She was in Africa, not here driving any of the three cars. I had to go up the food chain quite a bit to get them to agree to take her off the policy. Again…it saved us a about $200 a year.</p>
<p>Every penny counts, I guess.</p>
<p>Our insurance company would not let us remove the kids while away at school.</p>
<p>They had to pay the full amount, even when they didn’t have a car at school. DD got a tiny percentage off because her school was more than 100 miles away.</p>
<p>Switching companies is not really an option, we have a complicated insurance situation. It sucked for the years they didn’t have cars at school.</p>
<p>Insurance is different in each state. And most companies also have different guidelines for different circumstances, within the parameters of the state law. </p>
<p>The company I work for allows a 20% discount for students away at school without a car. </p>
<p>We also will not exclude a driver solely for rating purposes. As ChicagoBear stated, you never know when your kid might drive someone else’s vehicle. Here, the insurance on the vehicle itself is primary, but if the friend’s car only has liability coverage, and your kid wrecks the friend’s car, the friend would expect your kid/insurance to pay for the damage to friend’s car.</p>
<p>I think the most confusing thing about car insurance is whether you’re insuring the driver or the car or both and in which circumstances. When they first added my son to my insurance, they added him to my car instead of the car he would really drive. My car has collision but the car the kids share does not. Why would I be having him drive the nice new car while I drive the piece of crap? I called and they switched things around but told me both kids couldn’t be on the same car. That made no sense to me. There is a mom car and a kids car which they share. Why could they not both be on the same car, especially when my D was in the “distant student” status? </p>
<p>You have to watch every little thing…</p>
<p>I searched for this thread because D and S are both about to get their DLs. My current insurance company says my premium will go up from $36 to $336 a month. I was like WHAT?? That’s 10x more.</p>
<p>So I started looking around and found a company that wants only to double it, to around $70. That prompted a call to the original insurance agent, who is a real person that I deal with locally, and a second look for them.</p>
<p>Is such a huge jump normal? I realize it all varies by state and coverage and car but wow.</p>
<p>When we told insurers that we were having kids get driver’s permits and then licenses, they said, “Fine, no problem. No changes, as long as the kids didn’t have their OWN car.” Then, S had an accident and suddenly, they wanted him to have his own car & policy. We said this is really odd, since that’s not what you said and they said it was BEFORE he had an accident.</p>
<p>We finally found an independent insurance agent and had her find us policies that would not give us different answers and quotes every time we turned around. She switched us to a very reasonable policy, that covers H & me and our old cars for about $600/year, at maximum coverage. S bought his own policy for his own car in VA–I have no idea what the coverage cost, but believe it was MUCH more expensive for much less protection. For D, I pay for her insurance for her vehicle in Los Angeles. It is about $700 every 6 months for maximum coverage, which I think is pretty good (especially since she’s been driving less than 3 years and had one ticket). We expect her premiums will continue to drop with good behavior from her, as will S’s, since he is older (will turn 26 later this year & has no tickets and only one accident on his record, many years back & no injuries).</p>
<p>We like having an independent insurance agent coordinating all our policies so there are no gaps in coverage and we can turn to her if we have questions or any problems with claims. She’s quite competent and worth it, to us, as she’s saved us in premiums and we have excellent customer service.</p>
<p>Different auto insurance companies have different rating and underwriting guidelines. Don’t forget most auto insurance companies will give a ‘good student’ discount–keep your grades up in college! Some companies will even let new college grads keep the ‘good student discount’ for a couple of years after completing college too. Check with your agent for any discounts you can get. If the student gets discount for being at college over 100 miles from home…the car has to stay home.</p>
<p>Good to know. We have only one car - mine - at this time neither kid is getting one. There’s no premium change for learner’s permits, only once licensed. </p>
<p>The agent also told me that I HAVE TO insure both of them once they’re licensed, I can’t just not let them drive my car and be excluded. Seems odd.</p>
<p>Looks like I’m probably switching.</p>