When you buy auto insurance, you have to create a marriage between your budget restrictions and the risks you face for liability, injury and property damage. This isn’t always easy to do, but one thing that can offer some assistance is to become familiar with average auto insurance claims.
It’s impossible to know what kind of auto claims experience you are facing in the future. By looking at the average claims of other drivers, you can at least get a sense of what the norms for the country are. While there are always outliers, claims amounts that are above or below the averages, at least by following averages you have a realistic gauge for setting your own policy limits.
The Insurance Institute for Highway Safety and Highway Loss Data Institute recently posted data about average claims, both number of claims and amounts, for drivers. They break the data down into average claims for collision, theft, comprehensive, property damage liability, personal injury protection, medical payments and bodily injury liability. They break the numbers down further by vehicle class, size and model year, and offer even more data by driver age.
These numbers provided by the Institutes may not predict or limit the amounts of your potential future claims, but they do give you a starting point for creating your own auto insurance policy. For example, did you know that overall bodily injury liability losses for pickup trucks and luxury SUVs manufactured between 2008 and 2010 actually increased along with vehicle size? That means if you go with a larger luxury SUV or pickup, you might want to consider lower deductibles (since they are per incident) and higher limits. As for collision losses—for vehicles manufactured between 2008 and 2010--super large station wagons and minivans had the lowest claim severity, while 4-door cars had an average claim severity with an average claim amount of $4,047.
Using this data can not only help you set your insurance policy coverages but also help you pick better cars in the future; such as cars with lower average claims experience and costs.
If you aren’t certain how to interpret this data, or you want statistics more focused on your state of residence, give us a call. With this information, we can help you build an auto insurance policy with meaningful benefits and a premium you can afford.
Contact Henrich Insurance Group today at 713-349-0400 to get your free Houston auto insurance quote.