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Comment by anthomtb | Hacker News Reader

About $1900/year, for two ICE vehicles (no liens), 300k/500k liability (per person/per incident maximums). Maxed out deductibles for Collison/Comprehensive on both. I just added a $1,000,000 umbrella policy at $500 a year though it would be nice to double the coverage there.

I use Geico and they give a breakdown of the cost per vehicle. My full size pickup is double the cost of my wife's mid-size SUV, which I cannot argue against.

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When you say maxed out deductibles for collision and comprehensive, do you mean you picked the highest deductible? Or lowest deductible which would mean max coverage but also premium? I’ve always wondered about the value of collision and comprehensive, since it seems to be one of the more expensive parts of car insurance

Maximum deductible is taking on more of the risk yourself.

The first dollar in any claim is always paid, the last dollar hardly ever, so the first dollar is worth more. Maximum deductible also reduces the chance you’ll involve insurance at all. Why report a $200 fix when your deductible is $1000?

Comprehensive insurance is for when you CANNOT afford to lose the car. If it would be painful but you’d survive, you probably don’t need it.

> I’ve always wondered about the value of collision and comprehensive, since it seems to be one of the more expensive parts of car insurance

As a general rule - You should buy insurance on something when you both 1) have to have it and 2) can't afford to replace it.

Once you can afford to comfortably absorb a loss equal to the value of your car, you should consider dropping collision and comprehensive. For me that's when the car is worth less than around $5k.

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