Insurance

[DaddysBus]

Another vote for USAA (routed to Progressive) here. Had them for our Interstate and will be using them again for the 27FB trailer coming.

[FlyFishinRVr]

Originally Posted by joe rv guy

$1020.00 per year.

My complaint is with claim service. I need the windshield replaced, well first of all its "safelite" or nothing. Well I wanted a quality installation from a shop that does many Sprinters. I did not feel the safelite shops locally were up to it. National General was only willing to pay for safelite replacement after my $500.00 deductable. That would be $242.00 that they were willing to pay.

maybe it's just me, but that's not right

Without knowing details re. your policy (coverage limits, deductible, etc) it's hard to compare, but I will say that I have a 1yr newer coach and live in an area where insurance is extremely high and I'm paying 30% less than you through USAA/Progressive. You may want to check them out if you or someone in your family can get you into USAA. They are a terrific company and even though the policy is through Progressive, if any shenanigans happen with a claim, USAA can bring a lot of pressure to correct the situation.

[c21bill]

I have been with Good Sam for several years but at the last cycle their prices were rising too much so I shopped around. I moved my other cars + a house to Progressive and got a smoking good rate. I left the AI with Good Sam (National General) due to their provision for turning collision and liability coverage off when not using the coach. Because of the way we use our coach (4 or 5 trip per year) it saves us a bundle. We usually wind up paying them around $300/year total. I was concerned that by eliminating my multi-car discount from National General the premium would spike but it barely changed. You do have to judiciously manage your insurance on/off times because they require it to be on or off a minimum of 30 days at each change. One caveat, some states get their panties in a twist when you turn off the Liability and Collision and they start sending you letters. We'e insured in Oregon and they have no issues with it. I have my 2 wheeled vehicles insured with yet another carrier (Geico).

[Ron_CA]

Originally Posted by joe rv guy

$1020.00 per year.

My complaint is with claim service. I need the windshield replaced, well first of all its "safelite" or nothing. Well I wanted a quality installation from a shop that does many Sprinters. I did not feel the safelite shops locally were up to it. National General was only willing to pay for safelite replacement after my $500.00 deductable. That would be $242.00 that they were willing to pay.

maybe it's just me, but that's not right

I doubt if your new insurance company will be excited about paying for previous damage.

[Ron_CA]

Originally Posted by c21bill

I have been with Good Sam for several years but at the last cycle their prices were rising too much so I shopped around. I moved my other cars + a house to Progressive and got a smoking good rate. I left the AI with Good Sam (National General) due to their provision for turning collision and liability coverage off when not using the coach. Because of the way we use our coach (4 or 5 trip per year) it saves us a bundle. We usually wind up paying them around $300/year total. I was concerned that by eliminating my multi-car discount from National General the premium would spike but it barely changed. You do have to judiciously manage your insurance on/off times because they require it to be on or off a minimum of 30 days at each change. One caveat, some states get their panties in a twist when you turn off the Liability and Collision and they start sending you letters. We'e insured in Oregon and they have no issues with it. I have my 2 wheeled vehicles insured with yet another carrier (Geico).

Too much work for me plus I use my van all the time.

[UKDUDE]

This is how my AI Good Sam Insurance with National General escalated over the years:
$770.00 > $832.00 > $854.00 > $903.00 > $1191.00 (which I turned down)
Quote for $1338.00 with Cincinnati (which I also turned down)
Back to Good Sam for a quote for $834.00 with Progressive (which I accepted).
These are Arizona rates, all with similar policies.

[Ron_CA]

My National General Insurance has been $754 years 1,2,3 and year 4 which I just paid.

My van is garaged so not sure how that affects rate.

[uncle_bob]

Hi

As you are poking around on insurance for the AS, consider the value of what you have with you. Some of us don't haul much others seem to have all kinds of very cool toys. In some cases your homeowners policy covers this stuff. In other cases there is a gap.

Bob

[InterBlog]

Old thread, new information.

Our Interstate insurance just went up by 30% in a single year. Agent contacted me and said (paraphrased), "It's not due to any fault of yours - Progressive just had a rate revision. We checked around and you are still getting the best deal."

(As I noted on other threads, we use agent Ron Jarvie for our policy, even though we already had Progressive on LB_3's vehicles - on the RV side, it was just too hard trying to negotiate with Progressive as a private individual).

We have an Agreed Value policy which may be part of the issue. With the added investment we put into the van, I can't see us backsliding to a generic policy. We'd lose our butts on a loss claim.

But the rate is getting ridiculous. I haven't decided whether to research this further or not bother at this point.

And it's not like the rate didn't go up previously - this is +30% ON TOP OF previous years' increases.

[InterBlog]

OK, somebody just shoot me.

I haven't had a single accident or insurance claim of any kind in **38 YEARS** of driving (similar longevity record for my husband), and our Interstate insurance went up by 30% in a single year. And because of the policy I have applied (agreed value full-timer), it wasn't cheap to start with.

After talking with two agents, I finally got to the bottom of what happened. HARVEY!!!! I was assuming that because we neither live nor garage our unit where the flooding occurred, the effects on our policy would be minor. The rule of thumb around here is that if it didn't flood during Harvey, it ain't never going to flood.

Wrong assumption. The Harvey flooding event was used as justification for SWEEPING changes to the rate tables. It doesn't matter where we are, or how high we are. It's still Galveston County.

The rest of you who live in coastal counties better take note. There's a good chance you'll be next to get hit with this stuff.

[Tincampers]

Originally Posted by InterBlog

OK, somebody just shoot me.

I haven't had a single accident or insurance claim of any kind in **38 YEARS** of driving (similar longevity record for my husband), and our Interstate insurance went up by 30% in a single year. And because of the policy I have applied (agreed value full-timer), it wasn't cheap to start with.

After talking with two agents, I finally got to the bottom of what happened. HARVEY!!!! I was assuming that because we neither live nor garage our unit where the flooding occurred, the effects on our policy would be minor. The rule of thumb around here is that if it didn't flood during Harvey, it ain't never going to flood.

Wrong assumption. The Harvey flooding event was used as justification for SWEEPING changes to the rate tables. It doesn't matter where we are, or how high we are. It's still Galveston County.

The rest of you who live in coastal counties better take note. There's a good chance you'll be next to get hit with this stuff.

We have agreed value through Progressive at $617 per year here in TN. But, we paid less than you did and don’t have all that extra stuff. We insured it for our purchase price of $46k.

[Alex AVI]

Originally Posted by InterBlog

The rest of you who live in coastal counties better take note. There's a good chance you'll be next to get hit with this stuff.

INTERBLOG - Yes BUT it's not only the coastal folks that will get hit. The coastal folks will bear the brunt of the increase attributed to the flooding payout, but because they will not be able to bear the 'full' payout impact, every insured in the nation will get an increase (even if small by comparison). Same was true during Loma Prieta earthquake when I lived in Cal. Same will happen later after they figure the total toll from Puerto Rico disaster. So how do I know this for sure? During my 30 yrs. in HP, I serviced State Farm Corporate computing needs in Bloomington, IL physically on site & remotely. I have made many friendships from their Programming & Actuarial division. By virtue of my exposure to debugging a lot of their catastrophic systems failures, I know how their software works (or at least up until I retired), so much so that I still have State Farm insurance. No, I am in no way endorsing State Farm; as many people are fast to argue their experiences are bad. I only say that the insurance industry as a whole will cost-average the payouts across their entire customer-base (some higher, some lower). No one gets to escape big national natural disasters unscathed.

Bottom line - if you live in earthquake country, my rates will be affected even if I live in LV. If you live near the coast, I will get a miniscule increase even though I live at 4,000 ft asl. If a big sandstorm destroys my house & the Las Vegas Strip (haboob - can occur in desert summers), everyone else's rates will be affected. This is also supported by how my rates always fluctuate a couple dollars up/down almost every 3-6 months, even when no change has occured to my personal status, age, location, or usage. This should not come as a surprise. I am not and never will be a big fan of constantly increasing rates. Heck, my 40 yr. trendline never goes down. But these natural disasters are not justification for sweeping rate increase. This is the underlying principle behind any type of insurance.

[InterBlog]

Let's give folks a tiny glimpse of why their insurance rates are currently on the rise, shall we?

This below is only one of multiple flood car storage lots. This one was quite far from Houston - others were closer-in. In fact, I was amused to see that the powers-that-be had temporarily appropriated a massive storage lot that I heard through the grapevine had been set aside for the failed Keystone XL pipeline project. It was to be over a thousand miles long, that segment - they had huuuuuge lay-down yards established for it. That space came in handy. And there was another doozie of a yard here in Galveston County. I don't know how many there were in aggregate.

But this footage was shot near College Station. This is a small fraction of the total one million-ish cars that were flooded and totaled. Ca-ching!!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UagU2-L0Qe4

[InterBlog]

Originally Posted by Tincampers

We have agreed value through Progressive at $617 per year here in TN. But, we paid less than you did and don’t have all that extra stuff. We insured it for our purchase price of $46k.

You also have a standard pleasure-use policy. Mine is a full-timer policy because of the multiple ways I use it.

[Alex AVI]

Originally Posted by InterBlog

You also have a standard pleasure-use policy. Mine is a full-timer policy because of the multiple ways I use it.

INTERBLOG - Yes, huge difference. We took full-timer too at least for 1st and maybe to 2nd/3rd yr. because this is when we anticipate placing many shakedown miles on it.

BTW, that 1-million car Harvey total and that footage is just mind boggling. I wonder how Florence would stack up. Doesn't look good.

[InterBlog]

Originally Posted by Alex AVI

INTERBLOG - Yes, huge difference. We took full-timer too at least for 1st and maybe to 2nd/3rd yr. because this is when we anticipate placing many shakedown miles on it.

BTW, that 1-million car Harvey total and that footage is just mind boggling. I wonder how Florence would stack up. Doesn't look good.

Florence will be almost a non-event compared to Harvey. Orders of magnitude in the difference.

To my knowledge, nobody has disclosed the exact total of Harvey cars. Some sources said 0.5 million, but another source said that figure represented only the Geico total. USAA and Progressive are also huge insurance players here. The 1 million estimate seems far more realistic to me.

The only figure I know with some certainty is number of Chase bank's safe deposit boxes flooded in Houston - seven thousand (they told me). I've always kept 2 boxes - in different watersheds, and different bank chains. The box that was in the "safer" watershed flooded, and it took me 2 months to get my contents back. The box in the "higher risk" watershed did not flood. Quotes because I obviously don't believe in those risk definitions, and neither does Mother Nature.

Who the hell rents safe deposit boxes in different watersheds in the first place?!



Answer: Any decent geoscientist living anywhere on the Gulf Coast. We have no illusions about where we are, or what it means to be here. Education is a powerful thing.

[Alex AVI]

Originally Posted by InterBlog

Who the hell rents safe deposit boxes in different watersheds in the first place?!

INTERBLOG - That actually pretty smart stragegy regardless of where one lives (of course even more so in certain areas, specially earthquake country). We don't have enough 'valuable' physical stuff (jewelry, bonds, cash, etc) to need 2 safe deposit boxes. But we have (as most people now) lots of digital stuff that has disk backups, 2nd, 3rd, & more redundant backups of backups. 1 set stays in house, 1 set stays in safety deposit box, 1 set stays in CO daughter's house, and another set stays in my parents house in CA. Never had to use them, but as we always say in long distance multi-day cycling regarding bringing rain gear - "better to have it & never use it, than needing it & not have it."

Heck, if I was doing the work you do, it may be worth even having a 3rd one wherever your hurricane escape town/route is. That's what we did when we lived in SF Bay Area - a cheap 10'x20' storage place 8 hrs. east of the San Andreas fault, kinda like a safe house with cash, cots, old clothes, old furniture, old appliances, and dad's old but in tip-top shape Corolla. We almost used it in 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake.

[InterBlog]

My business is almost paperless. I have quadruple digital backup. One copy stays on the cloud. I don't rely on the cloud - just use it for storage, so that I have four physical locations in play.

[Alex AVI]

Originally Posted by InterBlog

My business is almost paperless. I have quadruple digital backup. One copy stays on the cloud. I don't rely on the cloud - just use it for storage, so that I have four physical locations in play.

INTERBLOG - I consider at least 4 digital backups a must. Yet, I encounter many people who don't even have 1 backup of their phone, tablet, etc.

[DreamStreamr]

Our progressive policy cost rose 30% last year. We protested, shopped it around. Turns out they were still competitive for that coverage (full-timer agreed value). And considering the disappearing deductible (which we were unlucky enough to use some yrs ago) we realized this was still our best deal.