OT: Has anyone else been paying attention to auto insurance premiums?
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My wife's car insurance rose from $277 last October to $313 this April. We have been with this company over 40 years, 1 accident claim over 20 years ago, we get every discount they offer as recognized safe drivers, yet this ridiculous increase happens. When will this stop? We have been on fixed incomes for 19 years and this upward creep of EVERY bill we pay needs to end. Many Amish live in the area, maybe I should inquire about buying a horse and buggy? Our Medicare Part B cost was $265 for both of us together 7 years ago, today it is $578 for both. I dread what it will cost next year. Even with me being healthy enough to work a part-time job to help make ends meet there is a limit to how much that will cover. We will be joining the Revolution WHEN it starts, it's the only answer.
I had some issues recently with Nationwide. My agent said he is now steering clear of them because they have become very difficult to deal with. He has heard bad rumors about their loss exposures and believes that is the problem.
just asking the question. in business we always ask, is the juice worth the squeeze? If not, just eat the fruit. If the feature (say, blind side section) costs more than it saves, what is it's value? I would think that there is some potential safety issues in terms of less chances of getting injured. But, again, that all goes into the risk profile.
BTW, I saw this today too. I am not sure why these increases are higher than inflation but suspect it has to do with supply chain and salary increases.
That's because Food Inflation has been higher then 31%.
Those that don't know I deal in food here are some price changes of items I sell since 2014
2024 2014
Mozz Sticks 48.79 29.41
Soft Pretzel 49.35 32.60
Flour 25# 16.94 11.20
Sugar 50# 45.04 23.00
Cheese Steak 47.80 30.88
Tomato Juice 29.22 21.00
Chicken Tender 39.44 29.13
Heinz Ketchup 74.12 32.76 They've become WHORES
Mayo 42.03 27.25
FF 33.21 18.30
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The Revolution is over. It disbanded while Prince was still alive, and now that he's dead, it's gone forever.
I suspect texting while driving has increased accidents by as much as blind spot monitors and back up cameras have helped reduce them.
Labor costs are up in every industry which includes auto repair.
I have Allstate and I get a discount for using their Drivewise app. They monitor my miles driven, sudden braking, sudden acceleration, etc. I do not get a discount for things like cameras, automatic braking, lane keeping assist.
Don’t forget government intrusion and as always when they stick their nose in it’s going to cost more for the consumer.
I watched a funny but eye opening skit which showed how many taxes are involved with bringing simple products to market just rediculous
Much of the regulation is designed to protect the poor drivers at the expense of the good drivers. Also, if someone gets caught driving without insurance, they get a small fine and are back on the street driving without insurance. A high percentage of a companies large payouts are a result of uninsured motorist coverage. Guess what happens to that other driver with no insurance? Nothing.
The homeowners and auto overlap each other - insurance companies will subsidize a poor performing line with a profitable one bit if both are running hot there is no where to go bit raise all rates. It actually could be worse since many companies do not make an underwriting profit, that is they pay oit more than they take in with premiums but they still make money off the billions they have invested but when those returns go down they have to focus on making an underwriting profit.
Most of their billions is actually in surplus to pay claims and if they have to start dipping into that, then they start having financial problems. It’s not like all their billions are just profit going into executives pockets.
Correct and there are statutory requirements for the amount of reserves you have to have based upon the limits of liability you have outstanding. But some very big Insurance have failed over the years even with regulatory oversight. The personnel lines market is really struggling right now so I would expect Homeowners and personnel Auto premiums to continue to rise and companies continuing pulling out of distressed areas like Florida even though state insurance commissions hate when they do that and loom to punish them.
Or gouging and greed.BTW, I saw this today too. I am not sure why these increases are higher than inflation but suspect it has to do with supply chain and salary increases.
Funny how the “gouging and greed” started when the costs of everything went up, the supply chain went to crap, and the weather patterns got really bad….weird how that works.
Yep, I got rear-ended on the Baltimore beltway a month ago, actually the car behind me got rear-ended and pushed into me. If I didn’t get out of my car to check on the others, I think the person that ran into us would have left the scene. They were someone that was undocumented and of course had no insurance. It’s been quite the ordeal having to, go through all the repair process with the insurance company since they know that there’s nothing they can do but pay it out of their own pockets since the one who caused the accident won’t be asked to pay any of it.
April 10, 2024, 6:29 PM EDT
By Rob Wile
Wednesday's inflation report showed consumer price growth continues to drift higher.
The Bureau of Labor Statistics reported price growth accelerated to 3.5% in March, from 3.2% in February.
Few categories had as big a jump year on year than auto insurance, which soared 22% from March 2023, the most significant year-on-year jump in that category since 1976.
And over the last few years, average auto insurance rates have surged 43%.
As of April, the national average cost of car insurance is $2,314 per year for full coverage and $644 per year for the bare minimum, according to Bankrate.
That works out to about $193 a month for full coverage and $54 for minimum coverage.
A host of factors determine how much insurance companies charge drivers, but the cost of nearly all of them seem to be increasing.
One major factor is simply the rising cost of modern vehicles themselves. Today, a new vehicle costs about $10,000 more than it did before the pandemic. Blame supply-chain issues that drove up the cost of vehicle parts, increased labor costs and customer demand, which has naturally pushed prices upward.
The increasing sophistication of the technology in today’s vehicles also contributes to rising costs, said Robert Passmore, department vice president of personal lines at American Property Casualty Insurance Association. Cameras and sensors, which are used for various driver-assistance technologies, like emergency braking, automated parking and blind-spot monitoring, require parts that are more expensive to replace. They're also subject to higher labor costs, Passmore said.
More complex and expensive repairs are also taking longer, and that shows up as higher vehicle costs, Passmore said. And worker shortages have resulted in higher pay for technicians.
Consumer prices moved higher in March. Auto insurance costs were a major reason.
Drivers in the U.S. are now paying nearly $200 a month on average for full coverage.www.nbcnews.com
OT: Has anyone else been paying attention to auto insurance premiums?
NO
BTW, I saw this today too. I am not sure why these increases are higher than inflation but suspect it has to do with supply chain and salary increases.
Here's a more accurate/realistic graph, one that doesn't use a screwy scale for years.
Unless you looked at my numbers---it tells you food inflation over the last 10 years(last 3 mainly) is a lot more the 31%
Supply chain problems caused shortages which temporarily led to higher prices but those supply chain problems have been resolved for quite some time. I don't see how they are a reason for current high prices.
The greed argument also doesn't make much sense to me. Competition should limit that. BK and Wendy's would take business from McDonald's if they were over charging. Wegmans, Publix, Aldi, and Kroger would be taking business from Walmart if they were over charging.
We know that dock workers and truck drivers got big raises. We also know that companies are paying higher wages to lower skilled workers (maybe $15/hr vs $12/hr). I believe that's the biggest contributor to higher prices. Also fuel prices.
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100%….automatic transmission was the start of this…I made my kid drive a 5 speed. Taught him driver skills and can’t use the phone
while driving…Europeans go thru a lot to get a drivers license as well. They use their turn signals, they get out of the left lane with discipline in the highways etc. I drive a leveled F150 here in SoFla wow the things I see while driving. It’s unreal we don’t have more car accidents. And woman seem to be on their phones a lot more, just saying and they are supposed to be less cost with regards to insurance, those actuariaries might want to relook at their analytics.
That ia another new thing - people more and more flee accident scenes. Look at that KC receiver in a Lambo racing a Vette and wrecked into a bunch of people in TX - he and his buddies casually got
Out of their cars in the highway and walked away. Fortunately someone had them all on video.
Agreed. But they were just stupid. The Vette was registered to him and the Lamborghini was rented to him. He’d have been caught either way with or without the video
100%….automatic transmission was the start of this…I made my kid drive a 5 speed. Taught him driver skills and can’t use the phone
They are less cost because they don't do stupid $hit like drag race which causes fatalities.
Additionally, at least used to be the case before all these beta males, men tend to drive when men and women drive together.
These days I see a lot of the opposite. But could be because the guys lost their license.
The supply chain issue has not been resolved. Many repairs take as long as 6-8 months due to supply chain.
I remember when shipping containers were backed up in California and that's no longer the case. I remember the chip shortage which has dissipated. New cars were unavailable so used car prices temporarily shot up. Almost all of this was due to shut downs that slowed production. Even oil production took a while to ramp back up but companies worked to restore production to meet demand. I don't know the specifics of car parts but I struggle to think of a good reason production would still be down. Somebody hit my car a year ago. It needed a bumper, quarter panel, and electronic parts that took a week to arrive.
I just read a U.S. Bank article that said current supply chain issues are now largely isolated. I looked up auto parts shortages and it said it was mostly Accura/Honda but it didn't say why. U.S. business inventories are at near record levels.
Of course will always have isolated issues. Try to get a roof fixed after a hurricane in Florida. Or a dozen eggs when a large % of chickens got wiped out by the bird flu. But those outliers always exist.
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I wonder if the better and better safety technology in cars just enables drivers to be more and more careless. Surely they keep stats on this. If the accident rate stays the same, (controlling for other things I mean, such as COVID driving people crazy) even with more and more safety features in cars then either the safety features aren't doing anything or else people are driving more carelessly to counteract the assistance of the safety features. And I'm pretty sure the safety features help.
The bottom line is that terrible driving habits are tolerated because a large number of people have them and thus a large number of people would get upset if they were cracked down on. They ought to just say "If you drive like an idiot and you get caught there are going to be serious consequences" and then give a warning period for when enforcement will begin, and then enforce it. If you race through city streets like the football player in Dallas, you lose your license for five years, period. If you did that and enforced it then bad driving would plummet. The guy is so physically talented that he can play in the NFL and yet he's a worse driver than an 80 year old lady. It's ridiculous.
The bottom line is that terrible driving habits are tolerated because a large number of people have them and thus a large number of people would get upset if they were cracked down on. They ought to just say "If you drive like an idiot and you get caught there are going to be serious consequences" and then give a warning period for when enforcement will begin, and then enforce it. If you race through city streets like the football player in Dallas, you lose your license for five years, period. If you did that and enforced it then bad driving would plummet. The guy is so physically talented that he can play in the NFL and yet he's a worse driver than an 80 year old lady. It's ridiculous.
It’s many of the electronic car parts and it’s widespread, not isolated. And there’s still a shortage of new cars as well as used cars. It’s not something that’s just going to go away….it will take time.
Had to replace my 2016 F150 81K miles-both valve cover gaskets were leaking-Ford back order 3 months and there are no after market valve covers. Bought a new F150 didnt want to--but Ford had 1.9% 6 years on 23's
Just got a $2K dollar annual increase in my Home/Auto policy last week....no claims ever "knock on wood"
Food costs are threw the roof--and hey McDonald's unreal.....
I did a search on F-150 parts shortages and an article from 2018 popped up.
I agree 100% about food and insurance prices. They're up a lot more than the CPI would suggest.
Since I cook and do most of the food shopping I know the prices of things.. I am not a cheap person but holy cow... Was at Walmart today and quaker oats rice cakes $3.48 was blown away.. Used to be like $2.24. I shop at Walmart for standard stuff, publix and fresh market weekly..
Can't just repalce valve cover gasket need entire bemmnew valve covers for 3.5....i called around.. I also learned my main bearing seal was going so I said.. Yeah not sinking in anymore money..
Besides Ford dealer telling me and then calling tire plus got same story.. This was in Feb 2024.
www.bbcboards.net
Can't just repalce valve cover gasket need entire bemmnew valve covers for 3.5....i called around.. I also learned my main bearing seal was going so I said.. Yeah not sinking in anymore money..
Besides Ford dealer telling me and then calling tire plus got same story.. This was in Feb 2024.
Ford f150 valve cover supply (or lack of)
Greetings ford owners. Any word on why the 3.5 ecoboost valve covers are out of stock everywhere? Seems like ford or the manufacturer may be holding back the supply.
Also have you noticed things like brakes = they don't put on new pads and turn the rotors they replace the rotora and everything so it's like $750 instead od $250.Since I cook and do most of the food shopping I know the prices of things.. I am not a cheap person but holy cow... Was at Walmart today and quaker oats rice cakes $3.48 was blown away.. Used to be like $2.24. I shop at Walmart for standard stuff, publix and fresh market weekly..
Can't just repalce valve cover gasket need entire bemmnew valve covers for 3.5....i called around.. I also learned my main bearing seal was going so I said.. Yeah not sinking in anymore money..
Besides Ford dealer telling me and then calling tire plus got same story.. This was in Feb 2024.
Ford f150 valve cover supply (or lack of)
Greetings ford owners. Any word on why the 3.5 ecoboost valve covers are out of stock everywhere? Seems like ford or the manufacturer may be holding back the supply.
Are rotors thinner than they used to be? They used to turn them but not any more.
You have that whole scenario completely backwards. PennDOT literature clearly states that STOP signs cannot be utilized for speed control, and a local municipality has to ask permission to even install one on any State route, which PennDOT can and does deny. And traffic lights are $120,000+, and even more of a pain to get authorized.
