Auto/Home Insurance

G-man
Posts
8055
Joined
4/1/2008
Location
Mesa, AZ US
3/3/2021 11:45am
Who do you guys use? It seems each year my Auto policy goes up but this year it jumped up quite a bit.
Currently with Travelers and have used Progressive before (currently have my bikes with them and it is reasonable). I also bundle it with my home and have not had claims at all.

We recently got a new car so of course I understand it would be more but they break it down per car and a 04 Toyota Corolla went up $87 for 6 mo.s along with the other previous vehicles. Makes no sense to me so I asked the rep as she said it was because I added another car. Duh! But what does the new car have to do with the EXISTING ones?

So I said what if I sell one of the cars and the Toyota went up EVEN more for 3 cars! Makes NO SENSE to me and I told her that but she was very rude. So I want to take my business elsewhere.
Thanks

Had this popup on my phone and they have good reviews, anyone use them?

Just Insurance Services

https://www.justinsuranceaz.com/


Thanks
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alphado
Posts
3283
Joined
8/15/2006
Location
Erie, PA US
3/3/2021 11:54am
Erie Insurance
2
Falcon
Posts
10041
Joined
11/16/2011
Location
Menifee, CA US
Fantasy
765th
3/3/2021 1:28pm
Auto insurance is like dealing with snakes. Those guys will raise your rates incrementally in the hopes you won't notice. They'll say it's because of Covid. When Covid is over, they'll say it's because more people are driving again. When someone invents teleportation, the insurance increase will be because drivers are getting into more accidents due to some unrelated teleportation problem. It's all BS. Just switch companies every few years.
4
APLMAN99
Posts
10055
Joined
4/1/2008
Location
Dallas, TX US
3/3/2021 5:50pm
If you are a Costco member and have a decent driving record, I’d grab the brochure for their co-branded insurance the next time you are leaving the store.

They are usually ultra competitive.
3
G-man
Posts
8055
Joined
4/1/2008
Location
Mesa, AZ US
3/5/2021 10:23pm
APLMAN99 wrote:
If you are a Costco member and have a decent driving record, I’d grab the brochure for their co-branded insurance the next time you are leaving...
If you are a Costco member and have a decent driving record, I’d grab the brochure for their co-branded insurance the next time you are leaving the store.

They are usually ultra competitive.
I gave them a call and it worked out real good!
Thanks Smile
2

The Shop

G-man
Posts
8055
Joined
4/1/2008
Location
Mesa, AZ US
3/5/2021 10:24pm
Falcon wrote:
Auto insurance is like dealing with snakes. Those guys will raise your rates incrementally in the hopes you won't notice. They'll say it's because of Covid...
Auto insurance is like dealing with snakes. Those guys will raise your rates incrementally in the hopes you won't notice. They'll say it's because of Covid. When Covid is over, they'll say it's because more people are driving again. When someone invents teleportation, the insurance increase will be because drivers are getting into more accidents due to some unrelated teleportation problem. It's all BS. Just switch companies every few years.
I'm finding out that is good advice.

Thanks 👍
OG725
Posts
907
Joined
4/27/2020
Location
Stanley, NM US
3/6/2021 8:43am
USAA
APLMAN99
Posts
10055
Joined
4/1/2008
Location
Dallas, TX US
3/6/2021 12:27pm
Falcon wrote:
Auto insurance is like dealing with snakes. Those guys will raise your rates incrementally in the hopes you won't notice. They'll say it's because of Covid...
Auto insurance is like dealing with snakes. Those guys will raise your rates incrementally in the hopes you won't notice. They'll say it's because of Covid. When Covid is over, they'll say it's because more people are driving again. When someone invents teleportation, the insurance increase will be because drivers are getting into more accidents due to some unrelated teleportation problem. It's all BS. Just switch companies every few years.
Insurance rates are pretty cyclical.

Company A needs more policies to spread out their risk pool, so either lowers their rates (or more accurately probably doesn’t raise them as much as their competitors!!!!), and hopefully brings in more lower risk policyholders through stringent underwriting. Once they have a ‘better’ risk pool, they can begin to incrementally raise rates knowing that the first policies leaving will probably mostly be the highest risk (and cost) policies. Once the prices rise too much for the lower risk/lower overall cost policyholders (who generally don’t change insurers all that often) to blindly stay with them, it’s time to start the downward cycle phase again.

That cycle usually takes 2-5 years, meanwhile Company B is doing the same thing but in opposite phases.

Some companies don’t have as severe of swings as others do, though.
crowe660
Posts
2005
Joined
8/15/2020
Location
US
Fantasy
3962nd
3/6/2021 12:36pm
APLMAN99 wrote:
If you are a Costco member and have a decent driving record, I’d grab the brochure for their co-branded insurance the next time you are leaving...
If you are a Costco member and have a decent driving record, I’d grab the brochure for their co-branded insurance the next time you are leaving the store.

They are usually ultra competitive.
Thanks for the tip! I’ll be heading there this weekend. I went from progressive to USAA and saved a fortune, but they’ve jacked my rate up the last two years without any change on my end. Bummed as I thought USAA would be the best bet for prior military but it appears they’re just your average insurance company.
APLMAN99
Posts
10055
Joined
4/1/2008
Location
Dallas, TX US
3/6/2021 12:53pm
APLMAN99 wrote:
If you are a Costco member and have a decent driving record, I’d grab the brochure for their co-branded insurance the next time you are leaving...
If you are a Costco member and have a decent driving record, I’d grab the brochure for their co-branded insurance the next time you are leaving the store.

They are usually ultra competitive.
crowe660 wrote:
Thanks for the tip! I’ll be heading there this weekend. I went from progressive to USAA and saved a fortune, but they’ve jacked my rate up...
Thanks for the tip! I’ll be heading there this weekend. I went from progressive to USAA and saved a fortune, but they’ve jacked my rate up the last two years without any change on my end. Bummed as I thought USAA would be the best bet for prior military but it appears they’re just your average insurance company.
Honestly, USAA is pretty far above ‘average’ most of the time, and usually one of the more stable and consistent insurers around. But even they have product realignment from time to time. Homeowners insurance is usually a bit easier to see, when an insurer gets too much of a market share in a certain area (and an over representative risk compared to other companies) they try to lower their risk potential a bit. The easy way to do that would be to stop writing policies in that geographical area, but most states won’t allow that sort of cherry picking.

So the best way to start writing policies is to close the current product to new policyholders and open a new product with new rates. The public doesn’t even realize that the 2 neighboring homeowners with the same insurer and very similar homes can actually be in 2 completely different insurance products, even though everything about their policies, where they send their premiums, etc might look identical.

Auto products don’t generally quite stop and start new products quite the same, but it does sometimes happen.

Tip: Always research those Insurance Commissioner candidates that no one really pays attention to during the election season!!!!! And forget any partisan perceptions about them, just look to see who their biggest campaign donors are. If you see a lot of insurance companies or industry groups, start looking some more. Insurance commissioners should be guarding their constituents from insurance companies, and not the other way around.......

1
crowe660
Posts
2005
Joined
8/15/2020
Location
US
Fantasy
3962nd
3/6/2021 1:12pm
For the last decade, I’ve purchased my policies through the providers website. I’ve found this to be beneficial to me as it saves me time when moving insurance from winter to summer vehicles or if I buy something to drive for a short time. Just the click of a button and good to go.

Has anyone here done the same, and then decided to use a local agent? Is there any benefit to using a local agent to shop policies anymore?
APLMAN99
Posts
10055
Joined
4/1/2008
Location
Dallas, TX US
3/6/2021 6:10pm
crowe660 wrote:
For the last decade, I’ve purchased my policies through the providers website. I’ve found this to be beneficial to me as it saves me time when...
For the last decade, I’ve purchased my policies through the providers website. I’ve found this to be beneficial to me as it saves me time when moving insurance from winter to summer vehicles or if I buy something to drive for a short time. Just the click of a button and good to go.

Has anyone here done the same, and then decided to use a local agent? Is there any benefit to using a local agent to shop policies anymore?
There are some benefits of having a local agent, but if you are talking about $1K a year or more difference between buying from an internet company and a local agent, it may not seem worth it.

Now if you are talking about having a local agent or just an 800 company for the SAME insurer, there shouldn’t be a difference in cost so there shouldn’t be any reason not to initiate the policy with them. You should still be able to do all of the online policy changes, inquiries, etc that the insurer offers.

There could be a difference between how much the agent earns depending upon whether you initiated the policy with them or with corporate, though, but if there is it probably goes away after a couple of renewals or so.

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