Today, my wife, Sheri, and I are driving from Dallas to Tuscaloosa, Alabama to celebrate and support my niece as she marries one very lucky guy! It will be a great time celebrating their love and cheering them on, not to mention the family entertainment that usually accompanies a gathering like this.
I ended the day on Tuesday talking with a woman in Houston about car insurance for her and her adult daughter that lives at home. Our discussion covered the typical points I need in order to provide her with a quote; names, dates of birth, year, make and model of the cars, who is she insured with now, when does her policy renew, etc. What was interesting was, she asked me why I asked my last two questions which were…
I’m asked this question on a regular basis. It usually comes up when someone’s paid off a car, their insurance is renewing and they’d like to lower their premium, they’re buying a cash car or they just have an older car. It’s an excellent question and the answer depends on two factors. Once those two factors are addressed, then it’s truly up to the client to determine what’s best for them and their financial situation, as well as what their risk they’re willing to tolerate.
Car thieves don’t always steal the whole car, sometimes it’s only a part. My son drove a Ford Probe when he was attending Lake Highlands High School. One night, the car was parked on the street in front of our house and it was broken into. I did not discover it until the next morning when I saw wires poking out from the dash where the stereo had been. It was a cheap stereo to begin with but I was angry someone had taken it and had to confront feeling violated.
When I was 12, I was enthralled by a neighbor’s classic car. He’d restored a 1920’s Model A pickup and painted the body a deep green color with black fenders. The interior had been completely restored with new leather and all new wood for the bed and side rails. The rounded head lights were chromed along with the radiator, single tail light and horn. It gleamed in the light as he’d drive it around the neighborhood on the occasional weekend jaunt.
Last spring one of my clients in the Lake Highlands area of Dallas called me. There’d been some pretty strong winds that had swept through north Texas, similar to what we’ve had this spring, and a section of his wood fence had blown over. It had happened to be the section that separated his back yard from his neighbor’s back yard. We discussed options on how to handle this with the first option being whether or not he should file a claim.
In August of 2012, Preston Carter, a Los Angeles centenarian (he was 100 years old at the time of the accident), injured nine children and two adults when he backed his car onto a sidewalk. The injuries were serious but thankfully, no one died. Mr. Carter simply misjudged what he was doing. He thought he was turning onto a street instead of backing onto a sidewalk full of parents and children buying snacks from a sidewalk vendor. According to the Los Angeles Times, Mr. Carter had a valid driver’s license and a clean record. The LA Police Department did not file any charges but they did look into his competency to keep a driver’s license.
My youngest son, Jonathan, and his girlfriend, Olivia, were driving in the Lake Highlands areas of Dallas two weeks ago. The rain was coming down in sheets when they approached an intersection. Coming from the opposite direction, was a Jeep being driven by a high school student. He did not see Olivia and Jonathan and made an unprotected left turn in front of them. Olivia slammed on her brakes which kept her from hitting the Jeep head on or along the driver’s side. She was unable to miss the back corner and ripped his bumper off while wrinkling the hood and passenger front fender of her car. The good news is no one was hurt!
ast week we looked at the insurance lessons we could learn from the fertilizer plant explosion in West, Texas on April 17th. The explosion destroyed the plant, killed 15 people, injured 200 and damaged or destroyed 350 homes, a school, an apartment building and a nursing home. Preliminary estimates of the damage and destruction were pegged at $100 million.
I was 14 or 15 at the time and sitting in the back seat of my dad’s 1972 Pontiac Grand Am. My two younger sisters were on the back seat with me while my youngest sister sat on my mom’s lap in the front passenger seat. No one had a car seat back then and most of us rode in our cars without buckling our seat belts.
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