Two years ago, I shared 9 tips to save on insurance (home, auto, medical, dental, life, etc.) and I believe those tips are all still very relevant today.
However, after a recent email conversation with our home/auto insurance company, I thought it was worth reiterating how ridiculously easy it can be to save money on insurance… simply by asking a few questions every now and then.
I am certainly not the type of person who calls our insurance company weekly (or even monthly) but I will email or call with specific questions every now and then. AND, I always make sure to check in whenever we have a major “life change”.
Anytime we do a major home renovation that could change the value of our home.
Anytime we get a new/different vehicle (this one is probably obvious!)
Anytime we have another baby.
Anytime our jobs change (I got a significant reduction in my car insurance when I started working from home).
Anytime we reach a new age milestone (Dave is FINALLY over 35, so his car insurance went down).
You might be surprised how much you can save by making a few changes to your deductible or how much better coverage you can get for only a few bucks more.
Just last week, after only 2 emails back and forth, Dave and I were able to save almost $100 per year on our home insurance, and we doubled the value of our auto insurance for only $12 extra per year.
I know it probably doesn’t seem like much (and hopefully we’ll never have to use it) but I’m certain we will be happy we made the change to our auto insurance if we do ever get into a car accident.
For the record, Dave and I know very little about insurance.
We just know enough to ask questions (like… “is there anything we can do to lower our yearly payments?” or “do you have any suggestions for getting a better price?”, and we trust our insurance provider to give us honest answers.
And for the record, we use Meemic Insurance because they offer amazing discounts for teachers!
There are SO many ways to save money on insurance — a little bit here, a little bit there — but it all adds up over time.
Even something as simple as the fact we pay our bill in-full every year (instead of in monthly payments) saves us abut $100 a year — which, as Dave would say, “That’s $100 we could spend at Culver’s!”
In my opinion, insurance is one of life’s necessary evils — we have to pay for it to cover ourselves “just in case”, but there are definitely plenty of simple ways we can save too!
All you have to do is ask!
Looking for more ways to save? Make sure you go back and read the 9 tips to save on insurance I shared a couple years ago!
.
Debbie says
When we recently traded my old car for a newer vehicle we expected our insurance will go up a bit. When we called for a quote that’s what we got, but I did ask if there’s anything we can do to bring the premium down and they told me there’s nothing more we can do. We were already getting the “good driver” discounts, etc. We recently switched and I was shocked at how much bigger our coverage is and how much our premium went down. I learned the lesson to not always trust what my current insurance company tells me and shop around to compare.
Rhonda says
Similar goes for DirecTV…I call them every six months and ask about “dropping” some of our channels, and they willingly give me $20 off per month for six months. I’m thinking of trying it out on our (expensive) internet satellite provider!
Jenny says
To me, it’s super-important to have a very reputable insurance company and a great agent and staff who know us and our situation. It’s worth paying a little bit more to have that. We’ve had terrible experiences twice where the people who “injured” our family had terrible, cheap, uncaring insurance companies which refused to pay, had lawyers fighting us to not have to pay us, just didn’t even answer us or the lawyer we eventually had to hire, and so on. It was very painful for us and the people we sort of ended up having to file a lawsuit against. I pay for insurance so I don’t have to suffer unnecessarily. Of course, since we have such a wonderful insurance guy, it’s on us to keep him aware of our needs, which, as Andrea says, means just a periodic phone call.
Andrea says
yes! definitely!
it stinks that you had so much trouble with the other people’s insurance company — those are the folks who give all insurance reps a “bad name”
Susanne says
Seriously, we just added a one million dollar umbrella policy to our homeowners (recommended because we will soon have a teenaged driver). We raised our deductibles slightly and our premiums went DOWN and we now have MORE coverage!
Andrea says
oh wow — that’s great!
Lorrie says
Great post. Dave sounds like me; I often think of saved money in terms of how much extra we can eat out! 🙂
Andrea says
haha –exactly!
Chris says
Do you mind telling me what questions you asked on your house to lower the insurance? Thank you.
Andrea says
really nothing special — just basic questions like “can you give me a lower rate” “are there any changes we could make to reduce the price or increase our coverage for the same price”
Kristan says
Just be sure to ask if discounts take away any coverages. Example: sewer back up is typically an add on for homeowners, but I would not go without it, even if it saved me a few dollars.
Chris says
Thank you, both.
Andrea says
yes! good point!!