Insurance Costs…House, Car, Whatever

Parent Cafe
1

I thought I would start a thread about insurance costs for everything and what folks are doing or have done. I’ll start.

We still use an insurance broker who annually checks and compares costs of hour homeowners/car/umbrella which are bundled to see if there is anything with a better cost and the same or better coverage. Some years, she can’t really find anything. This year, she did so we switched. Coverage is actually a little better. Cost is a lot lower for some reason. We haven’t had a homeowners claim in 30 years, and we haven’t had a car claim in over 15 (and that driver is no longer on our policy).

2 Likes
2

You may be focusing on the wrong end of insurance. While premium and coverage are important, paying claims fairly and promptly is just as important–possibly more important.

7 Likes
3

We use an insurance broker also. They also found a better and less expensive option this year. So we switch and appreciate that our agent has many different companies to compare.

We had a claim in 2017, a major storm that came through our neighborhood, straight line winds. Lots of trees down, some on the house.

We don’t have many claims but things happen. That’s why you have insurance.

2 Likes
4

Ty. I feel like we are on a “set it and forget it” approach.

2 Likes
5

Our agent is amazing. On the few claims we have had, she just processes them for us…and quickly…and in the case a LONG time ago, got us way more than the book value of a totaled car because of recent repairs and things like brand new tires. She is an excellent advocate (we have had a few different agents within this company and all have been great).

It’s a local company too. And we support shopping local. DH and I do check companies like Progressive which the agent can’t do. But I will say, my DS finally got his claim resolved, but it took a message in social media to get Progressive to finish processing his claim. The agent ghosted him.

We consider all the things we need to have associated with our insurance coverage.

1 Like
6

Interesting posts so far. We’ve always had an agent - 3 total over 30 years, so not a lot. We’ve had very few claims, but not one has ever been our ‘advocate’ . Even when asked questions after an incident, they often had few answers. None has ever reached out to us regarding changes either. We’ve always had to do the legwork to compare costs. Maybe time to look :wink:

1 Like
7

Insurance is one of those blind items - you’re not entirely sure why one charges $1,000 for the same thing another charges $4K.

In my case, my premium on homeowners doubled this year - and the roof deductible went up to 2% - where I live everytime it rains hard the roofers are out with - what I think is an insurance scam - so…

Where it’s hard is if you don’t file claims you never know. A few things on the above:

  1. Progressive sells through brokers and independent agents. Mine sells them.

  2. I did not know that brokers can handle claims - so that’s news to me. I’ll have to ask mine. They are simply repping 15 or 18 lines as far as I know. They made a call for us - but didn’t handle a claim.

  3. Most people buy on cost I assume and it’s true you never know about claims - we had a company for many years - Donegal - no idea if they’d be good - never filed a claim.

  4. We switched to a new company (per the broker, they came into TN and had a much lower cost) - and my son had a claim - and they were slow but communicated well. He’s also had two windshield claims, including one an on insurance loaner - and that was easy. I had no idea but I pay $100 per year for no deductible, windshield coverage. I guess I wasted $100 all those years (not sure if I had that with other companies) but this year it paid off. It’s on comprehensive for anyone who wants to inquire.

  5. Sometimes you have to pay more. For example, my insurer lets me garage cars away. Not all do. I may switch to another carrier to save money - but then not be able to renew or get coverage elsewhere - so you have to look at nuances like that - especially if you have college aged or early professional kids.

  6. I know others love em (from this website) and they’re this biggest but we had nothing but hassles on a claim with State Farm. They were the insurer of someone who hit my son. Took 4 months or so but ultimately they came through. Both body shops I talked to said add two weeks for them - and a few of my dealers won’t do any work with them. They want you to go to their place (legally they can’t force you) and if you go to your place, they threaten that you have to pay the difference from what their place will cover vs. what it’ll cost where you want it to go. Actually sent us a letter stating this.

At first, on my son, they wanted to buff out a headlight vs. provide a new that was in the 4 digits. When my son moved states (they slow walked so we had to start again, the new adjuster agreed it needed replacing).

They are slow, body shops hate them - and yes, they ultimately came through - but it was a horrible experience so I’d never insure with them.

I say that - but my kids renters insurance is all through them - because they are much cheaper than the rest!! Like $100 a year for an apartment.

Finally - Farmers - I wouldn’t spend a nickel with them. They may be fine but in the 90s my dad had a flood - mold and all. They wanted to put new drywall up - like $8K. Fortunately, my dad had a friend who was a private insurance investigator - the kind of guy plaintiffs higher to gather evidence. My dad’s house was so bad that when he sued, the judge awarded more than the max of the policy for Farmer’s acting in bad faith.

More importantly, they caused him years of stress and anguish - and I would never give them another nickel.

I do think insurance is personal - and everyone has different thoughts and opinions.

The main thing is - hopefully we never need to use it.

Oh, and whatever is in the title - then there’s medical - how many claims do they not pay because your doctor mis coded or they deny because it’s expensive - I’m going through that now on something - medicare covers, United Health covers - but Blue Cross…nope.

Insurance is a tough subject :slight_smile:

2 Likes
8

Our old independent agent was married to a prominent attorney and well aware of how well (or poorly) different companies handled claims. She only found us policies with companies who worked well with claims. Unfortunately she retired and I have a new agent. She is working ok with us but not the same as our prior agent.

Fortunately, we have not had any claims in many years but pay premiums for peace of mind.

9

So how does one evaluate the effectiveness of a broker? We have always (at least since we built our current home (25 years ago) used a broker. She steered us to Chubb and Chubb covered us until we made the claim ( HVAC issue) in June 2020.

After Chubb dropped us (they still cover our vacation place and cars) our agent said she shopped around, but couldn’t come up with anything except LLoyd’s of London, which doubled the price of our home owner’s.

Do agents work with specific insurers? Can any agent work with any insurer?

10

Yep, love State Farm. I know my agent well and this year our car got repaired with little hassle. :slight_smile:

Be thankful if you don’t have to purchase professional liability insurance! What a pain. I have to fill out a long application form every year. I have to break down the types of projects (commercial, residential, office, industrial, etc.) by percentage billed. Then I have to find our 10 largest projects and give them all sorts of information - that’s tough because sometimes I don’t KNOW the construction cost. Fortunately, we have a good broker and he goes to bat for us. Our premium this year I think is the lowest it’s been since 2000! Maybe it helps that we’ve been in business for 25 years and haven’t had a single claim. The insurance attorneys have helped us in a couple of sticky spots, but that doesn’t count against us.

3 Likes
11

I believe most agents can work with a wide range of companies. Unfortunately, insurers are getting more wary of properties that have had any claims against them.

My realtor is having to sell a condo because her tenant had water overflow and damage 2 units below her and a claim had to be made and paid. Insurer threatened to stop covering realtor, so she’s selling that unit.

1 Like
12

In our experience, agents can shop any coverage with most companies. I’m guessing they have preferred vendors they use, but I don’t know for sure.

Our insurance agency is locally owned, and for a while was in our very small town. This agency really has done well servicing the folks in our community, even after a merger with a larger company, and a move to a neighboring town (really, no big deal…most of what we do is via email or phone).

When we were looking, we used word of mouth recommendations.

1 Like
13

As I understand it, an “agent” works with one company. Like our State Farm agent. A “broker” shops around. That’s how I’ve always heard it explained.

3 Likes
14

That’s correct.

A broker reps mulitiple - and now some companies are eliminating some brokers (i.e. having less selling points). My state is one where insurance companies are leaving - but not pulling out altogether.

But there are insurance companies pulling their book of business from certain brokers - brokers who are located in certain areas or i imagine whose book of business is filing more claims.

So their analytics can go to whatever level they need.

I’ve read about it locally - in fact, my broker lost two insurers - but has added another one. I was asking him about it after reading the article.

Everyone is looking to optimize their risk profile. - as the claims, especially with weather events, have exceeded revenues.

So they are trying to fine tune that.

1 Like
15

It’s been interesting to me that we’ve jumped around from one insurance company to another for our PL insurance. One company is cheaper one year, another is cheaper the next. And our volume/type of work doesn’t change much year to year.

1 Like
16

Agents sell insurance, they don’t handle claims. That’s what adjusters do. Once there’s a claim, which I think I’ve called my agent and they refer to the company that insures us. Other than maybe some basic information, the agent is done.

We’ve had some issues this year with our health insurance. My husband had a procedure done in January. The procedure was pre approved, I saw the approval when we checked in, a similar procedure was covered the year before.

The hospital was approved :sweat_smile: but insurance denied the anesthesiologist and the surgeon. We appealed the decision but it was denied again, the hospital even recoded the procedure.

But I’ve only received a bill from the anesthesia group, not one from the surgeon who is employed by the hospital. I may one day receive a bill.

According to someone who has knowledge, I shouldn’t receive a bill from anyone. It was pre approved and the bill I got is called a “surprise” bill. I ended up paying because I don’t want to have the bill go to collections.

Unfortunately it’s a procedure that should be done in the future but idk if we will be able or willing to go through this again. And I’ll pay the surgeon if they send a bill, hoping that by now it’s been written off.

2 Likes
17

Getting ready to research switching insurance for home/auto after more than 30 years loyalty to one company/husband not wanting to switch. So I can get a broker and they will research best option for me? Cons of that approach?

We had an agent for the current company and he insisted we go through him rather than 800 number for national office, but he rarely returns our calls/emails and gave us incorrect information. I let national office know he gave us the wrong info so another reason we need to switch.

1 Like
18

My agent handles the filing of claims if we want her to. And we have asked this of her once. Usually we can do this online or via phone with the insurance company.

But our agent most definitely handles filing. She has done ALL of the windshield replacements. We have never done those ourselves. It’s just easier to have her do so as it’s a two step process…company and glass replacement company.

1 Like
19

In my convoluted way, I think I said that.

Maybe

1 Like
20

If I am stating the obvious then ignore this post. When insuring your property make sure you are not over insuring. As an example, if your house is valued at $1 million, the land is worth $300k and replacement of the house is $700k, there is no need to insure the land value unless for whatever the property may be deemed worthless and not rebuildable. I own an apartment in NYC. I only insure the cost to replace my interior because the building has its own insurance to replace the exterior structure. It really cuts down on my premium.
My mom lives in a rental. She is not responsible for the apartment at all. All she is insuring is her personal belongs.

7 Likes