Reader question:
I’m a 19 year old student in Rhode Island and I was thinking of getting off of my parents’ policy and getting my own. Should I?
Reese
Maybe so.
Once you’ve graduated high school and are out of the house, you tend to want to do everything humanly possible to separate yourself from your parents. That’s understandable. For the first time in your life, you’re not seeing them so much, and it’s up to you to prove your independence and you’re ability to survive on your own as your own human being. For this reason, and for others, many young people want to get their own insurance policies once their on their own. This can be a good idea, but it the it can be a bad idea. How do you figure out which it is?
The first thing to keep in mind is that you are under the age of 25. Your insurance will be high, so one of the main things you want to do anyway is anything possible to keep your rates reasonably low. Now, insurance premiums who have multiple cars and drivers listed on the same policy tend to have discounted costs, so if you’re on the policy with Mom and Dad, already the three of you are benefiting, whereas if you’re on a policy all by your lonesome, you aren’t.
Just because you’re on a policy with your parents doesn’t mea you can’t be considered independent. You can still (this isn’t the fun part) go on paying your part of the premium to your parents, and there’s nothing wrong with that.
Then, of course, in some cases it’s not a good idea to stay on with your parents. They might have a history of claims, bad driving records, or bad credit and all of that will impact your portion of the pay. If your parents are already over the deep end when it comes to car insurance, it’s better to just strike out on your own and see what you get. But first shop around and get quotes from various companies, checking to see what you would pay on your own and with your parents. Follow the link at the top of the page for an easy way to get quotes from a bunch of companies at once.
Cheers,
Fashun Guadarrama.