Auto Insurance - anyone self insure?

B

Bernard

1,000+ Posts
Does anyone here self insure their autos?

I have a truck that I drive about 15-20 times a year. The trips are usually short (less than 10 miles), low speed (under 40 MPH) and at times of day when there isn't much traffic on the road (Sunday AM and Sunday PM). I'm also pretty confident in my ability not to cause an accident. I'm tired of paying for liability insurance every six months.

I have the financial means to self insure. I just don't know what exactly I have to do. Google searches lead me nowhere. I did, however, find a bunch a municipal court sites saying a "certificate of self insurance" is sufficient in Texas.

The questions is: How do I get a "certificate of self insurance"? Is there a fee?

Bernard
 
Thanks for the link. 'Self insurance" may be for fleets only, but the document says a person can satify the finiancial responsibility requirement with a surety bond.

I guess the next question is where can I get a surety bond and how much will it cost. I'm guessing the whole deal might not be feasible when you factor in the cost of the bond. My truck insurance premium is $173.50 for six months.

Another option is depositing $55,000 cash or certain securities with State Comptroller's office. Not worth the savings.

Bernard
 
Pay the $30 a month and be done with it.
You say you're pretty confident of your ability to not cause an accident, and that's great. But if your confidence is ever, ever misplaced, then you're screwed.

I assume this truck is on the same policy as your regular transportation. If not, and you're insuring it on a separate policy, then move it to your main policy ASAP.

Another option may be to insure it as a classic auto. Guidelines for this kind of insurance are pretty rigid (kept for occasional pleasure use or show use only, kept in a locked garage, and a couple of others), but if it qualifies then you can find companies that will charge about $100 a year (or less) for liability coverage.
 
I've dealt with surety bonds before and in my case it was 1% of the amount of bond. So for $50,000 I paid $500 for the bond term, which was one year.

It was a contractual requirement for me, not sure how that will work for auto insurance.
 
The good thing about insurance is that you have policy limits and most accident settlements don't exceed those limits. I would think that it would be a lot easier for some scumbag you rear-end to clean you completely out if you were self-insured. I don't know this to be true, it just seems logical to me.
 
Chuy-
Every driver self insures above the limits of the policy. If your policy limits liabilty to $50k, you can still be on the hook for another $50k if you hit someone and they get a $100k judgement against you.

$50k (or whatever the minimum is) isn't going to wipe me out. Above $50k, I'm already taking the risk. I'm willing to risk the first $50k to save $347/year. Unfortunately, the cost of the surety bond will negate the savings.

Bernard
 
"I have a truck that I drive about 15-20 times a year. The trips are usually short (less than 10 miles), low speed (under 40 MPH) and at times of day when there isn't much traffic on the road (Sunday AM and Sunday PM)."

Most accidents occur within a few miles from home where speed limits are generally below 40mph. Keep in mind that you can be held responsible for accidents caused by other drivers of your truck and in some circumstances even if they do not have your permission. What if your brakes fail or you have a blowout? Are you confident that you can control mechanical failures that might lead to an accident?

If you are that confident that you will not have an accident where you might be considered responsible, then why do you have liability insurance on your other vehicle(s)?

If protecting your assets is one of the reasons, then I would suggest that you reconsider going the self-insurance route. You aren't going to save much money and showing a certificate of self-insurance following an accident is like begging for a suit.
 
I was going to add what 12thstudstan said... a certificate of self-insurance reads "you're rich" to the suddenly injured person in the other vehicle. Not only that, to a plaintiff's attorney, it will read "he's got non-exempt assets I can foreclose on".
 
Yes, I know that anyone can get a judgement beyond your policy limits. My point is that it's harder to go after someone's personal assets than their insurance limits. I know it happens, but not as often.

If you are self-insured, they are alrweady digging into your pockets and it's really easy to just keep digging deeper.
 
I've read the stats that most accidents happen within x miles of your home. It's usually a large number like 20 miles. I think those stats are misleading. Most people's driving occurs in that same area, so it makes sense that most accidents would occur there too.

The difference between my car and my truck is that I drive my car about 20k miles a year and I drive my truck less than 500 miles per year. The insurance on both vehilcles costs the same. Clearly, I'm getting a lot more value out of the insurance on the car.

A separate issue: If I want Personal Injury Protection or Uninsured Motorist coverage on my car, Nationwide makes me get the same coverage on my truck. Why can't they insure one and not the other?

Bernard
 
All three wrecks I've been involved in have been within a couple of miles of where I was living at the time....
 
There you go. As long as you don't live close to jmatt, you should be just fine.
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The stats do say that 75% of all vehicular accidents occur withing 25 miles from home. A large portion occur within a few miles. Most accidents also occur at speeds less than 40mph. You can rationalize those stats all day long, but self-insurance is a sucker bet at best given the relative small amount of premium and the almost unlimited liablity exposure you would take on.

I don't care how good of a driver you may be, you cannot control all the variables that can lead to an accident. How are you going to control variables such as mechanical breakdown, a pedestrian or bicycle suddenly crossing in front of you, objects in the road, etc. You also mentioned that you would normally drive it on Sundays. Sure there is less vehicular traffic on Sundays, but there also happen to be an increase in pedestrians, bicyclists, kids playing in the streets at the same time.

What about fraud related accidents? The ol' swoop and stop, where some dickweed pulls in front of you and then slams on his brakes.

If you don't want to carry PIP or UM on your truck under your multi-car policy, then you can always acquire liability only coverage from another company.
 
I'd go the recreational vehicle insurance route.

No surety bonds, no deposits with the comptroller, no signals to the other side that you may have deep pockets.
 
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