4 Ways to Reduce Your Monthly Insurance Costs

Reducing your monthly insurance costs can seem daunting, but it doesn't have to be! There are many things you can do to lower your payments without sacrificing coverage. Keep reading to learn four easy ways to reduce your monthly insurance costs.

Review Your Policy Regularly

Your insurance needs can change over time, so it's important to review your policy regularly and ensure you're still getting the best possible rate. 

If you've made any major life changes (like getting married or having a baby), let your insurer know so they can adjust your coverage and give you an accurate quote.

Compare Quotes From Different Insurers

Don't just go with the first insurer you talk to. Get an insurance quote from a few different companies so you can compare rates and coverage options. 

Make sure you're comparing apples to apples, though; some insurers may offer seemingly low rates but skimp on coverage, so be sure to read the fine print before making a decision.

Raise Your Deductible

One way to lower your monthly payments is to raise your deductible or the amount you would have to pay out of pocket if you made a claim. 

Just be sure not to set your deductible too high, or you could have trouble affording it if you ever need to use your insurance. 

Make sure you feel confident that you will be able to pay your deductible out-of-pocket so you don't find yourself in financial trouble down the road.

Take Advantage of Discounts

Many insurers offer discounts for things like being claims-free, having multiple policies with the same company, or installing safety devices in your home or car.

Ask about any available discounts or options for bundling your insurance coverage when shopping around for new coverage, and make sure you're taking advantage of all the money-saving opportunities available.

Reducing your monthly insurance costs doesn't have to be difficult. By following these four simple tips, you can save money on your coverage without sacrificing protection. 

Reviewing your policy regularly, comparing quotes from different companies, raising your deductible, and taking advantage of available discounts are all great ways to keep more money in your pocket each month.

How You Benefit from Auto Insurance as a Good Driver

While some drivers repeatedly are ticketed for moving violations and are in accidents every few years or even more frequently, others have not received a ticket in years and may have never been involved in an accident. If you fall into the latter group of drivers, paying a regular auto insurance premium may seem like an unnecessary waste of money. 

In fact, you may have paid auto insurance premiums for years without every filing a claim against your coverage. While auto insurance may seem unnecessary, it actually provides every driver with these benefits.

Legal Compliance

The most basic type of auto coverage is liability auto insurance. Each state has unique minimum auto insurance requirements, but liability coverage is required by law in most areas. Without meeting your state’s minimum requirements, you may not be able to drive legally. While maintaining the minimum amount of coverage required in your state, it may make sense for any driver to purchase additional coverage.

Protection against Financial Loss

Even the safest drivers can be involved in an accident. Bad weather conditions as well as incidents with other drivers who are not quite as skilled behind the wheel can result in tremendous damage as well as medical expenses. You may need coverage to pay for your vehicle repairs as well as medical expenses for yourself or for other people. 

You are required to pay for damages you cause regardless of whether you are insured or not. Insurance provides you with a convenient and affordable way to cover those expenses. Keep in mind that you may still be required to pay off an auto loan even if your car is totaled and must be replaced.

Peace of Mind

While accidents are one cause of automotive loss, theft, bad weather and other issues could also cause loss. A comprehensive policy provides you with peace of mind that your losses from any type of automotive event may be covered. Your safe driving abilities and clean record behind the wheel may qualify you for competitive auto insurance rates, but driving history and skills are not enough to ensure that you will never have a loss.

It makes sense to avoid buying things that are not necessary, but you can see that auto insurance is essential for any driver regardless of your history on the road Because of your great driving history, you may qualify for competitive rates. Shop around to compare rates and to find a great deal on your coverage.

Should We Live in Fear of Natural Disasters?

We live in a great country, which has afforded many people the opportunity to excel and to make goals which have a realistic chance of becoming reality. On the flipside, so to speak, we in live in a country that appears to have more than its share of natural disasters. It seems that every few months, if it's not an avalanche in one of the mountainous regions in the West, it is tornadoes wreaking havoc in the Plains; add to that wildfires out in the West and, somehow without exception, hurricanes hitting the Eastern seaboard, often targeting Florida and the rest the Gulf States. It's almost as if the calendar is set up so that every few months, we get hit with some unpleasant natural phenomena.

How Have We Been Doing?

Perhaps not surprising for a country which prides itself on law and order, as well as statistics, there have been those that have been keeping track of the types of disasters that we have been subject to, how many people been involved in even the economic cost related to them. Everyone recoils in horror when they see on the news the latest information about a hurricane or a tornado. But the numbers are actually quite startling when one starts to compile the big picture, so to speak. Ready?

A Quick Tour through the Last 30 Years

It is worth bearing in mind that sometimes, the damage and suffering caused from events such as hurricanes are not just the initial impact of the winds themselves, which can obviously level entire buildings. The ensuing flooding takes its additional toll that can often be far worse than the initial event itself. One comprehensive study identifies 640 individual events in the last 30 years. Of these, almost 400 of them were related to storms. The next most frequent disasters are floods, which occurred over 130 different times. In third place, perhaps somewhat surprisingly, are wildfires, with only 24 major recorded occurrences. What's really surprising is the fourth-place contestant: earthquakes. Earthquakes? One hardly ever hears about them on the news these days. It would be interesting to know exactly where they are occurring, and who is affected by them.

The Real Cost

Understandably, the main concern is loss of human life. The same study indicates that over 12,000 people were killed by natural disasters during the last three decades, which is a shockingly large number. Perhaps also surprisingly is the number of people affected by these disasters: 27 million! The other metric which many would find relevant is the economic cost to the US economy. Here the numbers really start to jump off the charts, with the total economic impact estimated at over $540 trillion. No wonder we pay ever greater attention to the weather reports: there's real danger lurking out there.

Keeping Your Home Protected

It's worth bearing in mind that a closer look at the statistics above indicate that over 70% of the damage caused over the last 30 years has been related to storms or floods. This is why it is very important that residents in Florida have the very best Florida homeowners insurance coverage possible. Unfortunately, it's not really a question of if, but more of when the next natural disaster will strike. A responsible homeowner will want to make sure that their insurance adequately covers their property and all their possessions at their full replacement value.

In the best case scenario, such an insurance policy will not have to go into effect, but given the statistics, chances are it will at some point. It's better to be prepared than sorry.

Taking Full Advantage of Senior Savings with the More Obscure Car Insurers

Edward Oberg has retired from the insurance game and now spends his time reading cheap genre novels, shaking his head in dismay at the state of movies these days, haunting yard sales and hunting for the monster brook trout that delights in mocking him. He has vowed to defy the accepted wisdom regarding boring insurance reps by being extremely interesting.

I have a friend who told me recently that the best thing about getting up there in years is the assumption of wisdom people attribute to us, the finely-aged. Age-bringing-wisdom sounds good to me so I certainly won’t be disputing that particular assumption any time soon. Especially because sometimes that kind of thinking is worth more than the joy it brings us when we get to tell younger people The Way Things Are; sometimes it has practical benefits- like saving you money. Car insurance is a perfect example. For the particulars, read on.

Things Everybody Should Do

Some of the most pragmatic money-saving solutions are more universally-applicable than age-specific.

· Shop Around. Doing research to determine the best car insurance for you seems like a no-brainer, right? But sometimes people are swayed by the convenience of provider’s enrollment process or by the impressiveness of a talking gecko, streak-haired woman with a price gun, etc. Age has also given us patience, or so they say, so look around a little bit. There are a number of good search tools and smart-device apps that can aid you in your search.

• Don’t be Insurance-Complacent. I can’t count the number of times on the job I’d talk to people who stuck with terrible auto insurance coverage for years because that was the insurance they’d always had, and/or that their parents, friends, siblings, whomever had had. Even (perhaps especially) if you have insurance and have had the same policy for years, it can’t hurt to do some comparison browsing.
• Prevention and Preparation. If an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure, a nickel of insurance is worth a dollar of out-of-pocket. Go over your insurance package, even if it’s one you’re content with, and look over your coverage choices. Do you have rental insurance? It’s almost never worthwhile, particularly if you don’t plan to rent a car. Do you have towing insurance? That can come in handy but if you’re also a member of AAA, can change a tire in a flash and you keep your vehicle in tip-top shape- in the event of a crash, towing is almost always covered anyway.
• Request a Higher Deductible. This one can be a gamble but the higher your deductible, the less you pay a month. Of course, if you do have to file a claim, you initial out-of-pocket is more. But that can pay for itself pretty easily if you go ten years without a crash and have paid in less each month for you insurance.

Consider Using Pay As You Drive Coverage

Depending on your driving habits, looking into a pay as you drive (PAYD) policy, also known as “pay as you drive”, can save you a good deal of cash. Since (some of) us older folk have slowed down a bit and (some of us) probably won’t be cruising the main, bar-hopping, drag-racing or in some cases, not driving to work every day. Some PAYD policies not only lower your monthly rate the less you drive, it also tracks driving habits with an internal driving-habit-recording doohickey. If you don’t drive all that often and/or drive carefully when you are out and about- PAYD might be for you.

The Senior Discount and the Less-Known Insurers

Those earlier-mentioned huge insurance houses with their anthropomorphic geckos and disaster-personified spokespeople and whatnot have a huge share of the market. They’ve also gotten some bad press recently for their customer service and rather calculated, sometimes outright cruel-seeming habit of doing what it takes to pay as little as it takes. Some of that is just the nature of the beast- when you're one of the top three huge with millions of clients between you, it’s hard to pay attention to the needs of that many people.

That’s good for you though because some of the well-established but lesser-thought of insurers have responded by appealing to more niche markets… like us! I’ll give you an example: although The Hartford isn’t exactly an unknown insurance house, they’re not often thought of for auto policies. However, they consistently rank as one of the top providers. In 2012 they topped JD Power and Associate best car insurance provider list and came in at number three on MSN Money’s ranking, plus ranked among the top five on virtually every other list of the kind. Most often cited was their pricing and the helpfulness and amiability of customer service people.

What’s most relevant to us though is their teaming up with the organization previously known as the American Association of Retired Persons to provide hybrid AARP insurance. Again, that’s just one example but feel free to look into this stuff yourself if you’re interested in keeping more cash in your pocket for expensive meals at great restaurants and fine wine… er… and by that, of course I mean Lawrence Welk albums Matlock DVDs.