One of the more interesting features of insurance is the degree of trust the insurer shows in what you say. Unless you are asking cover for something expensive and unusual, no insurer is going to ask to see whatever it is. You are allowed to add the vehicle or top-of-the-range electronic gizmo to the policy without question. But, if it later turns out you were less than honest, the insurer is allowed to cancel the policy and leave you without any cover. So the insurer is always protected and you pay the price of facing any claims without a policy to pay. Yet, while this has been standard in the insurance industry as a whole, there’s been a reluctance to trust drivers to report their mileage honestly. Younger people claiming unusually low annual mileage have been greeted with skepticism. To qualify for a discount, people have been forced to drive to the local office of the insurer to have someone verify the odometer reading once a month. This has been inconvenient and not so many people have taken up the discount offer.

With new technology, all this is changing and insurers are now moving into the pay-as-you-drive market with more enthusiasm. In part, there are also environmental reasons for this change. No matter what you think of the climate change debate, there’s no doubt more cities are being affected by smog. So whether this is big picture or the number of people lining up with asthma attacks at the local emergency rooms, there’s a move to encourage people to drive less. Accompanied by improvements in the mile-per-gallon performance of new cars and better emission controls, there’s now hope the air will stay breathable for longer. The pay-as-you-drive option gives people a direct incentive to drive less. Fewer miles driven means fewer accidents. If the full technological capabilities are introduced, it will also be possible to monitor whether drivers keep to the speed limits. Any vehicle reported stolen can automatically be tracked and recovered.

The first real signs of activity are coming in California. State Farm Mutual and the Auto Club of Southern California are introducing new policies in February 2011. Drivers will be given the choice of independent verification of their odometer readings or fitting a data transmission device. State Farm is estimating that people driving less than 2,000 a year will see their premiums fall by 45%. Using this as a base, State Farm is aiming to sign up at least a quarter of their current policy holders. Everyone who drives modest distances will save with rates set in 500 mile steps. Auto Club has four steps of 2,500 up to 10,000 miles and then the premium rises in 5,000 mile steps. At present, the Californian Insurance Commissioner is protecting drivers’ privacy, so no general data will be collected by insurers.

So, if you live in California, your auto insurance quotes should include this option come February 2011. While this is not a revolution, it’s certainly a change for the good, protecting the environment and encouraging better driving. Auto insurance is going green.

Having a teen driver in your house is certainly a cause for being agitated. First of all, when your teen takes on the responsibility to drive a car it’s a serious step towards independence, and that alone is a time of trial for most parents. Besides, driving a vehicle is a potentially dangerous activity and when there’s a lack of experience in the domain the risk of ending up in an accident is rather high. So the responsibility is definitely quite high when there’s a teen driver in the house. That’s exactly why insurance companies charge younger drivers with the highest rates possible.

If you have ever tried to insure a driver who is younger than 25 then you definitely know that their rates are among some of the highest between all age groups. This is explained by the overall number of insurance claims filed by this group of drivers. Lack of experience and general risk taking behavior is what teens are infamous for and that’s exactly what insurance companies are not fond of. When there’s a high risk the price for insuring something will be higher and that’s the case with teen drivers. Still, this doesn’t necessarily mean that teens should always have problems with having affordable auto insurance.

There are several effective methods for teen drivers to obtain affordable insurance coverage with their cars. And if you manage to apply a couple of them at the same time there will definitely a good cut in premiums for the younger driver. Here are some of the things you can use to cut your teen’s rates.

Keep the young driver under your policy. Quite often parents share the same policy for their vehicles but choose to buy a separate policy for their teen. It’s a common mistake that leads to additional expenses. By including the teen driver to your policy you will get a slight increase in premiums but the overall amount will be lower if compare to the sum of separate policies.

Buy a cheap and used car first. All parents like to be generous with their children and when there’s a possibility to buy an expensive car they do it without considering the consequences. And the most apparent consequence of buying an expensive new vehicle to a teen driver is ending up with a very costly auto insurance policy. Instead, buy a cheaper vehicle for the start and accumulation of experience that will cost less to insure. And when the driver becomes more mature – get the better vehicle.

Encourage good grades. Being a good student gives a teen the possibility to opt for a good student discount, which is available with most insurance providers. It requires the student to provide a copy of their grade report periodically with an average of B and higher. If you manage to encourage your kid to do so you’ll kill two birds with one stone: promote better education and save money on auto insurance. Sounds really interesting and promising, doesn’t it?

Even if you read your policy very careful, you might still be surprised these 10 things are not covered.

#1: Currency

Some people think keeping money under their mattress is safer than keeping it in a bank. At least money in banks are insured! If you have cash lying around, under the mattress, or even in a safe or lock box, it will probably not be reimbursed under the terms of your homeowners or renters insurance.

#2: Water Damage from Backups and Floods

Unless you have flood insurance, nowadays insurance companies won’t cover water damage caused by flooding or storms.

What most policies do cover burst pipes and damage from accidents or non-flood disasters.
Don’t expect sewage backups or other pipe backups to be covered standard though. What you need is “sewer backup coverage”.

#3: Trampolines

Depending on your state, you might not get coverage for your trampoline. Obviously, no trampoline repairs, but the bigger concern is your liability from injuries incurred during trampoline use. Over 100 thousand injuries happen each year due to trampolines.

In some places and with some companies, you might be disqualified from getting any property liability coverage at all if you put in a trampoline. And don’t think about not telling your insurer, because they can void your whole contract if they learn about it.

You should also be concerned about the damage to your home or others that a trampoline can cause if it is blown away in a storm. At the very least, bolt it down.

#4: Much Ado about Pools

While screened pool enclosures are great for making sure you can use your pool whenever, free from bugs and other things that might drift in, they are also super expensive, vulnerable, and usually uninsured. This is especially true in coastal states in the South, where enclosures and tropical storms are both common. Enclosures are extremely vulnerable to hurricanes and high winds, when objects flying through the air can crash into them and cause thousands or even tens of thousands of dollars in damage. Don’t even bother with the claim, because they are not going to pay it.

Don’t have a fence or “cage” around your pool? Make sure you check your state law, because many states require them. Many insurers do as well, if you want them to cover liability. If a person should drown in your pool, as thousands of children do each year, you could be charged with criminal neglect; most home insurance providers will not help you without a fence.

Water slides and diving boards are really joys for children, but absolute nightmares for home insurance providers. That’s why many home insurance companies will not provide liability coverage for pools with either, and some won’t even offer you a policy at all if you have a slide or board.

#5: Pit Bulls and Other “Aggressive Breeds”

In no way is it scientifically proven that certain breeds of dog are more dangerous than others, but that won’t stop insurance companies from denying you liability coverage. Because of statistics, certain breeds might not be offered coverage.

Dogs categorized as high-risk breeds include:

Pit bulls
Akitas
Chow chows
German shepherds
Wolf hybrids
Doberman pinschers
Presas

When you plan to buy a vehicle, it’s fairly obvious what the insurance issues are. To some extent, you can do the buying on auto-pilot (pun intended) by finding an online search engine and then simply seeing what quotes roll in. But when buying a policy to cover your life, you enter a rather more complicated area. We have to start with a distinction between life and auto insurance. It’s possible to drive for years and never make a claim. This means the insurer can slowly reduce the premium rate, or hold it steady even when inflation kicks in. This reflects the total amount you have paid in without anything being paid out. But no one lives forever. So the calculation has to be rather different. You begin by estimating how much money you want available to your family. This amount is then divided by the number of years the insurer thinks you will live. This gives us a fixed premium during your life that, together with investment income generated by the insurer, pays out the minimum guaranteed amount plus any investment benefits when your life ends.

You have probably noticed the news that average life expectancy has been rising steadily. People born one-hundred years ago expected to live into their sixties. People born today are expecting to live not less than eighty years. This makes the task of estimating how much you will want to leave in your will very difficult. You may be asking the question in your twenties or thirties. No one can say with any certainty what life will be like in fifty years time. By then, the children will be grown and in good jobs. It will be for them to make provision for their children (your grandchildren or greatgrandchildren). So, before you commit yourself to buying a big policy, ask yourself why you are doing it.

A part of the answer is provision against possible bad luck. Averages can be deceiving. For every person who reaches one-hundred, there’s a person who leaves before sixty. That’s what makes the average at around eighty. So even though you might think a large amount is not of much use in the distant future, it would be very useful if you were hit by a truck in ten years time. That’s the time when your family will most miss your earning capacity. That’s why many people take the decision to buy term insurance to cover the family when they are most at risk. This means looking at your current liabilities. How much would it take to pay off your mortgage and any other big debts? How much do you estimate your children might need to pay their way through college? How much a year would be needed to keep your family going if they lost your income? These questions give you a basis for setting the amount.

Now comes the really big question. Is this life insurance policy only a safety net for your family short term, or do you want to leave a big cash sum no matter when you pass on? There are other issues but, in its simplest terms, this is what you must decide. It’s a big investment over a long period of time. Why do you want this life insurance? Who is it for?

Unfortunately we live in an economy where more Americans than ever before are struggling with bad credit. Sadly this is affecting many areas of their lives, as credit history and scores are used frequently when evaluating someone for a job, insurance, or even an apartment. Today the insurance industry has been using credit scores more frequently than they have in the past because the cost of accidents on the road are costing insurance companies billions of dollars a year. So they want to know that you can pay for your insurance so they can meet their obligations as well. Unfortunately for many Americans their credit score is not an accurate reflection on how responsible they are, but this isn’t how some insurance companies will view it. If you are having a tough time getting car insurance due to your credit history, here we will talk about how to overcome that.

Today car insurance is mandatory, and hope is not lost even if you have bad credit. It is inconceivable to think that every driver on the road has an immaculate credit report, so knowing this should give you comfort if you are looking for car insurance. Many insurance companies are getting more flexible about credit history reflecting on their customer’s premiums. Although it will take you a little bit of work, you can still get car insurance even if you have bad credit.

Finding out why bad credit affects your insurance record will be important before you begin looking for quotes. Insurance companies use claims studies to evaluate prospective customers, and they have simply found that over time, people with bad credit have a higher rate of insurance claims. So, while it may not be your credit score specifically that is keeping you from insurance, but the claims history on other poor credit customers that is affecting your scores. This means then that even if you do have bad credit, if you have no claims on your record, you are already seen as a good customer to your insurance company.

Statistically speaking people with higher credit scores cost insurance companies less overall, and this is why cheap car insurance is tougher to get for those with bad credit. The good news is that credit records can change with time, and you can start cleaning up your credit report for future rate decreases. In the meantime, you will need to shop around to see what insurance companies are willing to work with you. You may be eligible for a bad credit policy to start off with, or you may find an insurance company that does not use credit scores as an evaluation tool.

The only way to find out which insurance companies will be the most flexible for your situation will be to shop around. It’s important to realize that having bad credit does not mean you can’t or won’t get car insurance. It simply means you need a little more work shopping around to see who can offer you the best car insurance quotes. Even people with good credit need to shop around for low car insurance quotes, and you are no different. Doing your homework and getting a number of car insurance quotes from different companies will always be the best way to lower your premiums, no matter what your credit situation actually looks like.

There’s never really anything new in the world of marketing. The same ideas that sold three bottles of wine for the price of two in ancient Rome still work today. We all like to think we’re getting good value for money. The most usual approach is to offer volume for a discount. The more you buy, the less you pay. In the insurance world, we see bundles on offer. Pay less if you buy both an auto and home insurance policy. There will be further discounts if you insure multiple vehicles or several different “homes”, e.g. when your teens go off to college and need cover for their possessions. This is simple commercial sense. Unless your family is particularly unlucky, you are paying an increasingly large amount of premium income to the insurer which turns into more profit when you make no large claim. That earns a discount to reward you for your loyalty.

Well, here comes a new experiment from the motor industry. General Motors is flexing its muscles now it’s recovering from the Chapter 11 reorganization. During the last ten years, its reputation has taken a beating and sales of its brands has been declining year-on-year. The last financial year, 2010, was the first time it showed a profit since 2004. It has also shown a slight increase in sales volumes – the first increase after ten years of losing market share. To boost sales this year, it’s offering one year’s free insurance if you buy one of the eligible models. Before you all get too excited, this only applies to the good folk who live in Oregon and Washington, and the offer expires come September. But we can assume more of these offers will be made if sales in the models shows significant increase. So why is this potentially a good thing for you?

Not everyone manages to drive for years without getting into an accident. Once you have a claims record, rates tend to rise. The rates will also be high if you fall into a high-risk group, e.g. you are a teen or have the misfortune to pick up a conviction for DWI/DUI. This offer of auto insurance is “as of right”. If you buy the vehicle, you are insured. Although there are questions asked by the insurer, this is not to refuse you cover. All insurers like to know who you are. GM is also promoting the plan as “good” for other drivers. We have an increasingly large number of uninsured drivers on the road. GM says this is “free” insurance and the number of uninsured drivers will fall. Well, that’s less than honest because most everyone who can afford to buy a new vehicle can afford to insure it. Most of the uninsured drivers cannot afford the high premium rates, even for basic liability cover. That said, this is a convenient way of buying a new vehicle. It’s one-stop shopping. At the end of the year, the insurer will send you a renewal notice. Whether you renew is up to you. It’s at that time you should get auto insurance quotes from as many companies as possible. That way, you’ll find out whether the renewal offer is a good deal or not.

Any car owner that has ever dealt with auto insurance will surely tell you that most insurance deals are there just to rip you off. And while such exclamations tend to be far from the truth, still the question of optimizing insurance costs remains to be pronounced for a lot of car owners. Paying too much for insurance while there are other more important things that need their portion of the family budget isn’t a good bargain for many households these days. So is there anything that can be done in order to get more competitive auto insurance quotes in the first place and reduce the premiums afterward?

Fortunately, there are different ways for getting affordable insurance for your car and you don’t have to break the law in order to succeed. In fact all these methods are very easy and only require you to learn a bit more about insurance for vehicles. So here’s what you can do to get competitive auto insurance quotes:

Analyze your actual needs

The most common mistake customers make when buying insurance for their cars is that they don’t even know how much and what types of insurance they really need. Most people simply choose to buy the first policy they are offered right at the dealer’s office just to save themselves from additional shopping. And this rarely reflects the actual needs a customer can have. For example, if you’re driving a fairly used car it’s really unlikely that you will benefit from having a fully comprehensive policy. Or you may be overpaying for uninsured motorist coverage simply because there aren’t any in your area. So try to define your needs first and only then start looking for a policy that actually meets your needs.

Consider the discounts

You may be unaware of many discounts the insurance provider may offer but this doesn’t mean that you can’t opt for them. It only takes some time to ask what discounts are offered to different groups of customers. There’s a set of commonly featured discounts that many providers seem to share and there’s a chance that you may comply with some of them. If you want competitive auto insurance quotes the following discounts can give you exactly what you need: low mileage, good student, defensive driving course, good driver, multiple car, multiple policy and others. Just ask around and if it happens that you can actually opt for any of these – don’t hesitate to do so.

Get an insurance-friendly car

And if you want a radical change in your insurance rates there’s just no more effective measure than buying an insurance friendly vehicle. Drivers often forget that the cars they own are the main factor influencing insurance rates. So it’s logic to buy a car that’s cheaper to insure in the first place. In order to get an idea which cars are insurance friendly consider those that have low repair costs, are rarely stolen and do not end up in accidents too often. Sports, muscle, luxury cars and SUVs don’t make part of that list.

One of the most common problems when it comes to marketing is deciding on the pricing strategy. At one end of the scale, you can use the Rolls Royce approach, i.e. by setting the highest possible price you suggest your product is the very best money can buy. Indeed, you imply that your willingness and ability to pay makes both you and the product special. At the other end of the scale, you pitch the price and slogans to sell the idea that this is good, wholesome and excellent value. This is what you find with store brands where the marketer saves the cost of promoting the brand and passes this on to the consumer. Put another way, many products and services are priced at the lower end of expectations, and still represent good value for money. But there comes a point when you get what you pay for. Being honest, the reason why some products are cheap is because they are very poor quality. As a consumer, you must always take care to investigate the product before you buy. That way, you shade the odds in your favor and buy the best possible value. As the recession starts to fade away, we are still all looking for economies to balance the family budget.

If you look around the internet, you’ll find many articles promising you can find cheap insurance. This is just an invitation for you to come look around the store and see what’s on offer. If you follow these links from google always remember there’s never any obligation to buy and it costs you nothing to look. Keeping this real, the sites run by single insurers are the least likely to have anything really cheap. Without competition from any other insurers, the prices will be pitched higher. But if you come to a site like this where a search engine delivers quotes from multiple insurers, all the premium rates will be pitched slightly lower so that, on a one-for-one comparison, they are all in the same price range.

So how do you get the best value? It all starts with shopping around. Get auto insurance quotes from as many different sources a possible. Only when you can compare and contrast prices can you get a feel for what might be good value. Now comes the harder work. Until you actually read the small print of the policies, you cannot know exactly what cover you’re buying and, more importantly, what’s not going to be covered. If all you do is compare prices, you’re gambling that, if you make a claim, it will be paid. Always find that part of the policy dealing with limitations and exclusions. That way, you’ll discover the real value of the policy. Some of the English can be difficult to understand. Attorneys never like to write anything using ordinary words. Remember, before you buy, insurers will be nice to you and answer questions. Pick up the telephone and ask. If their representatives don’t want to explain what their policies mean, this suggests they know they are poor value. So when you get the auto insurance quotes, read the policies. Cheap is no good unless the coverage is what you need.

With the living costs crawling higher and higher each day saving some money on health care is definitely something that a lot of people will find useful. The good news is that it’s not so hard to do it if you put some effort to it. You’ll just have to spend some time on adjusting your current plan and with the following tips you will certainly get the desired results without too much hassle:

1. Do your research first

A lot of buyers don’t like to waste their time on comparison shopping and often buy the first plan they are offered. They tend to believe that all insurance is the same and there’s no point in shopping around since you get the same conditions everywhere. Of course, it’s not true and you can save a lot by doing some research first. See what the local providers have to offer, investigate all the plan types and focus on those offers that appeal to your insurance needs. Even when shopping around for the same plan type you might find significant differences in rates across companies. So do your research before buying anything.

2. Minimize risky activities

Insurance companies deal with risks and if we’re talking about health insurance there are a lot of activities that can put you in the high risk zone and raise your premiums considerably. If you do not want this to happen consider cutting your risky activities that may endanger your health. That’s why things like skydiving, racing, mountain biking, extreme fishing and other activities that can cause serious harm to your health or even death should be put in the end of your to-do list.

3. Drop bad habits

We get to hear about healthy lifestyle a lot these days and for a reason. Such widespread habits as smoking and drinking are very serious negative health factors that are known to cause a wide range of health problems such as heart diseases, different types of cancer, hypertension and many others. If you succeed in abandoning any of bad habits you may follow this will automatically put you into a lower risk group and make your health insurance rates drop.

4. Stick to managed care plans

Managed care plans are definitely the most competitively priced form of health insurance available on the market these days. And it also makes a difference which plan type you choose. HMOs are the most affordable but you’re subjected to a set of limitations on where you can get services. PPOs and POS plans are more flexible as you may get covered both inside and outside the network of providers to different degrees but you will get higher rates for that. Consider which plan type appeals to you the most and get it.

5. Review your insurance needs periodically

People often forget that their health insurance needs change with time and the plans have to be adjusted accordingly. If you get married, give birth to children, change workplace and domain of activity, develop a health condition and so on your need for health care will change and so should your insurance coverage. So make sure to review your needs periodically and adjust the plan if required.

According to James Truslow Adams, life should be an opportunity for everyone to become successful regardless of social status. It sees our great nation as a meritocracy. If the Constitution starts with the idea that all are created equal, then all should have the opportunity to grow richer and more prosperous. It’s seen as a reward for hard work and a commitment to self-improvement. Although we have somewhat grown out of the simple view that some streets are paved in gold, there have been enough rags-to-riches stories to make the myth of the Dream appear reasonably true.

In the early part of the last century, we tended to follow the European model and the majority of people rented their homes. But as prosperity spread, more people began to include home ownership in the Dream. It was still a challenge for the majority but, as credit grew more easily available, banks and other sources of lending began to see the mortgage market as a good profit center. Barriers to lending began to drop. Instead of asking for large cash deposits, lenders grew more flexible. When the self-employed asked if their lack of stable income was a problem, lenders were prepared to listen.

The result was a revolution as a majority of people found they could finance home ownership. Indeed, once there was a property in your name, you had security for yet more borrowing. As property prices continued to rise, it seemed you could ride the wave of increasing value up the resale housing market until you had the most desirable home imaginable. Well, that’s always the dream, isn’t it? It’s a shame we have to wake up but, when the housing bubble burst in 2008, many realized they were overextended. A flood of foreclosures has followed. Even now, we may not be at the bottom of the housing market with resale values continuing to fall. Why are those values still falling?

There are two answers? The first is that lenders have raised the barriers back up and are now demanding higher cash deposits and provable incomes again. This makes it more difficult for even the most creditworthy of people to buy into the market. The second is more interesting. There seems to be a change of opinion on the value of home ownership. When rents are, on average, about half the mortgage repayments, you think twice about buying. Then when you add in the other costs, ownership becomes even more daunting. As the owner, you are responsible for paying the property tax – although some landlords do pass on the liability to their tenants whether directly or indirectly through the rent. Then there’s the question of insurance. As the owner, you are looking at a full homeowners insurance policy with full value on rebuilding. As a renter, you usually only pay for contents and not structure – a big saving.

When you add up all the costs, it’s asking first time buyers to make big changes to their lifestyles if they are to commit to buying. If some people were resisting mortgages when the lenders were not asking for any money down, why should they come forward when lenders are asking for a 20% deposit? The Dream is no longer so obviously including ownership. Home insurance policies for renters are growing ever more popular.