Which Cars Keep Your Insurance Rates Affordable

Which Cars Keep Your Insurance Rates Affordable
Provided By: CarInsurance.com Auto Insurance Articles
Last updated 1:56 AM Feb-18-2009

Do you consider the cost of insurance before you buy your dream car? You should. The Highway Loss Data Institute (HLDI) analyzes the cost to insurance companies from theft, collision, and injury claims as they relate to cars. They look at the color of the cars, how many doors they have, and even break them down type.

The Highway Loss Data Institute is a nonprofit public service organization. It is closely associated with and funded through the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety, which is wholly supported by auto insurers. HLDI gathers, processes, and publishes data on the ways losses vary among different kinds of vehicles.

Four door cars have a 93% less chance of having a claim related to theft than their sibling 2-Door cars. Buy a Buick LeSabre and have relatively no chance of a theft loss. Compare that to the convertible Chevrolet Corvette that has over 5 times the average theft rate. You may have known that. However, did you know that the Toyota Celica has a 67% higher chance of theft than the Toyota Camry?

One of the factors that come into play with insurance claims is the cost of repairing a vehicle and the safety features a vehicle has that can keep down the bodily injury claims. To find out which cars are considered “Top Safety Picks” you can check with the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS).

The IIHS top safety picks category recognizes vehicles that do the best job of protecting people in front, side, and rear crashes based on good ratings in Institute tests. Winners also have to have electronic stability control (ESC), which research shows significantly reduces crash risk. Crash tests like the ones conducted by the IIHS have driven major improvements in the designs of all kinds and sizes of passenger vehicles and thus making cars safer for motorists.

The IIHS’s list of top picks for safety performance is something to check out when going to buy a car so that you can see not only if your car is rated in crash tests but what kind of damages are done to give you an idea of insurance. Each year the IIHS releases their information which is available to the public. As a motorist searching for the right car to keep insurance costs down, keep in mind that the more damage that is done is a crash, low impact to high, the likelihood insurance rates will be higher since the insurer knows it will cost more to repair that vehicle.

You may be surprised at some of the results. For example, the Porsche 911 has a 67% less chance for injury claims than the norm. Go figure. The Mitsubishi Lancer has almost double the injury claim rate over the norm.

Where does your car fit for injury theft and collision? What about your dream car? You need to check out the latest statistics on theft for a vehicle before choosing a car to buy. There are various sources you can search to find the most common vehicles stolen. One source is the National Insurance Crime Bureau (NICB) which has studies showing the top 10 stolen vehicles in each state. While the list of top vehicles stolen may change each year there are some vehicles we continue to see on the list and are continual favorites of thieves. These cars include the:

* Honda Accord
* Toyota Camry
* Ford F-150
* Acura Integra
* Nissan Sentra
* Toyota Corolla
* Toyota Pickups

Then the list of ones that have the most expensive theft claims include such vehicles as the:

* Cadillac Escalade
* Chevrolet Corvette Convertible
* Lincoln Navigator

Vehicles with the least expensive theft claims include some of the following and as you may notice some are older vehicles:

* Buick LeSabre
* Volvo V70 Station Wagon
* Mercury Grand Marquis 4-four

The NICB encourages everyone to follow what it calls a "layered approach" to auto theft protection by employing simple, low-cost suggestions to make vehicles less attractive to thieves. The four layers include common sense, a warning device, an immobilizing device, and a tracking device.

The Highway Loss Data Institute gives information on what vehicles have the most and least expensive claims for injury and collision claims. According to HLDI, the lowest injury claims are from large vehicles - cars, pickup trucks, and sport utility vehicles (SUVs). Small two and four door cars have the highest injury claims. Small cars also are among the highest in collision costs, along with sports cars.

Models in recent years that have had some of the most expensive claims for injuries include:

* Suzuki Esteem 4-door
* Kia Rio 4-door
* Mitsubishi Mirage 2-door
* Kia Spectra 4-doors
* Vehicle Models with some of the least expensive injury claims include:
* GMC Sierra 2500 2-wheel and 4 wheel drives
* Chevrolet Silverado
* GMC Yukon XL 1500 4-wheel
* Chevy Tahoe 2-wheel

Models that are among the least expensive for collision claims include:

* Ford Excursion 2-wheel drive
* GMC 2500
* GMC Safari 4-wheel drive
* GMC Yukon XL 1500 4-wheel drive
* Vehicles that are most expensive for collision claims include:
* Subaru Impreza WRX 4-wheel drive 4-door
* Lexus IS 300 4-door
* Porsche 911 coupe
* Acura RSX

As you can see the cars on the list for having expensive collision claims include many sporty or high performance vehicles. Insuring a high-performance car can easily cost two or three times the insurance amount for an ordinary model due to the high cost of repairs if they are damaged.

If you have the time and energy to do research on theft rates, cost of collision claims and bodily injury claims on a vehicle you can determine what the most affordable car is to insure for your needs. If you do not have this time than you can research the lists that come out each year or so from sources such as the IIHS, HLDI and NHTSA on the most and least expensive vehicles to insure where they take into account many factors such as the ones we mentioned. The lists can vary since the statistics and reporting tools they use in their research vary.

Typically when one is going to buy a car they have an idea of what type of vehicle they want - sedan, SUV, truck, sports car, etc - and one easy and efficient way to decide on the vehicle that will be affordable to you is to figure out what class of vehicle you want and then narrow done your choice to few models. You then can check the research to make sure they are not on the “worst” list for theft, claims, etc. In addition, maybe with luck they will be on the “best” lists. If not they may fall in between which is fine if the car is going to suit your needs the best.

Once your choice is narrowed down to a few vehicles to find out which is the most affordable of these vehicle to insure, just simply get online and search for auto insurance quotes on the various vehicles. Insurance companies or Insurance Marketplaces, such as CarInsurance.com, will allow you to get as many quotes as you need to determine which vehicle you thinking of purchasing is the most affordable. Once you decide on a car to buy it is easy to then just to go ahead and purchase your insurance policy online.

Disclaimer: This article is for information purposes. It should not be interpreted as a recommendation to buy or sell any insurance product, or to provide financial or legal advice. This information is provided for information purposes only.

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