Insurance rate hikes

In the past month or so I have been looking closely at my insurance, both farm/home, as well as vehicle, as my farm/homeowner policy will be up for renewal in May. Last year since I was late in the game I choked down the increase, and renewed for another year with the plan of going over the policy early, and probably doing a bit of shopping around in 2016. I can go online and review my payments over the past 5 or 6 years, the average increase is approx $100 a year. I understand that I also have the policy set up to automatically increase for "inflation protection", however I am not so sure that the value of my property has increased nearly as much as their rates have. And roughly 25% increase in premium over a period of 5 years or so is way too much in my mind, Looking for others experiences, and if anyone has any expertise in this arena? I have read many times that insurance companies provide a much better price/rate for new customers to attract new business, then slowly grind it in with renewals as might be the case here. While I do not like the idea, I am not beyond swapping companies every year or two, basically flip flopping the company to keep better premium if it saves even $100 a year. The last time I shopped I did end up switching and dropped my bill a fair amount for similar coverage, but just shopping is painful, and time consuming, and now I am right back where I was then some. To keep this tractor related, I do insure my ship which houses my tractors and tools.

Last sentence should have said "insure my shop" not ship....

I was wondering if you actually had and old ship made into a building like with a cargo container.

I imagine you keep your tractors in a shop, not on a ship!

My solution to that is a local, independent agent. He shops for me. He usually knows before he shops what the outcome will be anyhow.

The automatic increase on my house was getting to a ridiculous level. I don't even remember what he did. I know last year I finally did something I should have done before- and that was get an umbrella policy. That gave him some work- as my other policies had to be jogged around to have the same maximum. And this coincided with a vehicle update. He squirmed a little! Turns out his commission is less!

In the process of changing companies now. Found out the have a 25% discount for multiline at a competing company. Their quote on a farm pickup was also 1/4 the price of my existing company with less restrictions.

A 50$ a year policy on another line of insurance qualified me for multiline cutting 1000$ a year off my bill. New agent also found my existing company was insuring tools in shop as if they were in a contractor trailer travelling around, her quite was 300$ less expensive for the tools.

Actual farm liability and auto policies were almost dollar for dollar to existing before the multiline discount.

Darned spelling and grammar mistakes from phone autocorrect.

Just changed home and auto, you have to shop them, I had the same agent for 25 years they don't care just try to get every dollar they can. For the time spent on the phone/e mails it becomes very well worth it.

Don't worry about the value of your property increasing, worry about the cost to repair or rebuild new.

Where's Lou from WI?
I'm sure he would have some thoughts on this subject

My son that was in the business says to shop. They all do the same thing with inflating your bill as time passes. Go with the best deal and you'll probably end up back with the same company at some point in the future. They won't take it personal,(they're doing it to you), it's business. gm

Finď a good independent agent and have them run a comparison of several companies policies for same coverage. You may be suprised.

I do worry about cost to repair or rebuild, and want to keep adequate coverage, however I am not comfortable with paying for coverage I could never use. Example....they keep increasing coverage on the house until they are covering it for $250,000, yet the value is only $200,000 (just hypothetical numbers). Would they pay $250,000 if the home was a total loss? My bet is no, but I guess I need to ask the question to my agent. To me paying for coverage you can never use is about as bad as under insuring as you are throwing money away. If I pay for $250,000 coverage on a structure and it is a total loss, I want the check to reflect that amount. I feel that is not too much to ask since they collected premiums on that coverage.

My real estate taxes went up 100% this year. My insurance company raised my vehicle rates 200 bucks because I drove more miles last year than the average person. They knew my 2014 truck had 32000 miles and said the average person drives 12000 to 15000 per year, thus the increase. I told him to cancel it and he called back a few minutes later with a quote from a different carrier that was 450 bucks less than I was paying.I don't know how anyone keeps up with this stuff. An old farmer I know said he cancelled all his fire and building insurance, said he could afford to loose a building.

I second what Bob B and Ray said: I've been with an independent agency for 40+ yrs. It's changed hands from the original owner but they shop insurance for me and we switch carriers every few years based on what they come up with. I'm pretty satisfied. I sometimes used to comparison shop against what they recommended but I quit doing it because they always came up with the best package (house, cars).

That higher premium for driving more miles is BS. I have GEICO and they charged me extra for my 32,000 mile per year commute. Now I drive about 5000-6000 miles per year and I called them on it and they wouldn't reduce my premium.

Don't tell the lizard but they're getting replaced in 3-4 months.

I think EVERYBODY should shop all their insurance every 3-5 years. Worst possible thing you can do is get too friendly with your insurance agent!

What is odd is my ins. company has never checked mileage on any of my vehicles. I never noticed until this week that my daily driver is insured for 7500 miles/year, and due to a change in what I drive and where I drive to work, I now drive it roughly 30,000 a year. To my knowledge, they have never asked what the miles are on any of my vehicles either when I insured them, renewed them. I have about decided to average them all down to 7500/year and pay lower rates and be done. I am yet to hear of a claim being denied due to driving over the insured miles per year. Just another method to get more premium.

Several years ago I asked my insurance agency to do a re-write my car policy. I saved $600 a year for the exact same coverage with the same insurance company. Some companies do not offer re-writes.
It won't hurt to ask. Agents don't like re-writes because it hurts their commission.

Property and pickup insurance just came due, am switching companies again. I had Allstate for nine years here and a lot of years in my other house up north. They were good at first but kept increasing the value of my house every year. I paid a little over a hundred thousand for this place, they were trying to tell me that it would cost two hundred thousand to rebuild the house, this was just after the housing crash when contractors were desperate for work and prices were cheap. Every year I made them reduce the quoted value of the house so that I could afford the premium, finally got tired of their game and said bye. Independent agent found another company with less premium for house and half price for truck, OK. New company sent an inspector a month after I bought the policy, TOLD me to build a deck and some other changes to keep them happy, I told them the policy is paid, the property is paid(no mortgage) and I am not required to have insurance. Agent called last week, company wouldn't renew so she found me another national company with good rates but higher, I called the Allstate agent for comparison, my agent is still way lower.