Insurance Recommendations Options

[ThinAir]

Seems like there was a thread about 914 insurance, but I can't find anything by searching.

So I'm looking for recommendations on insuring my 914. It's a 73 2.0L that is "garaged" in my carport (not a locked garage). I drive it 8 miles each way to work each day.

My search online came up with nothing but places that require a full locked garage and/or that the car not be a daily driver. Does anyone know of any options for someone in my situation? This is the first 914 I've owned that is worthy of more than just liability coverage.

[kdfoust]

If you can comply with the restrictions then try a collector car policy.

I'd hate to give Allstate my business given they way they are treating my son regarding the value of his 73 that their driver totalled.

The problem with regular insurance is that they go by blue book or whatever book values. If you have a 914 in exceptional condition you need to either submit an appraisal to your insurance company (and then pay a higher rate based on real value of the car) or you're going to get screwed when you file a claim.

I use State Farm. They have the lowest rates for my wife and I (we're in the lowest possible rate classification: no tickets, no claims, good credit...) They've never had an issue insuring any of our cars (everything from 1954s to 1997s). My coverage on the 914 is limited mileage which means less than 5k miles/year and I do have full coverage with no appraisal (I did tell them what it's worth at the time of purchase). I could have insured the teener as a daily driver, but, that's not how I use it so I save the money.

I have recent experience (in Feb 2003) in dealing with insurance companies in the event that a "collector" or older car is in a wreck:
My wife was in the HOV lane of SB405 north of Long Beach when a moron in a Mitsubishi Gallant lost control of his car striking my wife's car deirectly in the passenger wheel and passenger rear quarter panel (my wife's friend riding in the passenger seat screamed as the Mits basically demoed on impact, pieces of plastic flying everywhere). Our car, a mint '83 Mercedes sustained significant damage but did it's job well protecting my wife and her friend from injury. The moron was clearly at fault. The insurance company, American Family Insurance, based in MN has a local claims adjusting company, Crawford and Co. handle the claim since apparently SoCal is a pretty specialized market.

Crawford and Co. "conduted a market survey" to determine the value of the Benz. It turns out that I had no argument with their valuation as it was relalistic and we were able to locate another car in similar condition as a replacement for a similair amount of money. I did get feed back from the adjuster at Crawford that American Family expressed surprise at the value of the Benz, however, for those of you living in SoCal you know the popularilty of the marque. When I relayed this to my my bodyshop guy he told me that the California State insurance regulation agency (I forget the exact name) had ripped nearly every insurance company doing business in CA a new asshole the year prior because they had been screwing people on third party claims (the type of claim I'm describing here) and like Mark Henry described earlier.

For collector or specialty cars the "book value" has little relavence to the market value. Had the appraisal/market survey turned out to have been out of sync with the actual value of my wife's car I was prepared review the receipts documenting the level of maintainence and cost of all work/parts put into the car as well as values of similair condition cars with the insurance adjuster. Failing that the next step would be to file a compliant with the State insurance oversight agency. The downside of the complaint process is that I'm sure that the timeframe for resolution is measured in months so you'd have to be prepared to endure financially by continuing to rent a car or by buying a car without the insurance help. Fortunately I didn't have to get into it.

One more thing that a friend taught me is to make sure that you are always applying pressure on the insurance company during the claims process by:
1. Having a rental car which they will have to pay for that is comparable to the car you've lost. (costs them $$$/wk even if they try to ignore you)
2. Calling regularly (I called once per week) to check the progress of the claim.
3. Document every conversation.

Good luck,
Kevin