How much is car insurance in Gainesville, FL?

Gainesville, FL is located approximately in the center of the state of Florida, home to the University of Florida and the renowned Shands Hospital at the University of Florida. The University and the Hospital are the major employers in the area along with businesses and services to support the individuals who work at these employers.

With an estimated population of over 132,000 insurance protections for automobiles is important.

The State of Florida requires all registered vehicles to have car insurance under the financial responsibility law.

Florida has minimum legal requirements for car insurance as follows:

• Bodily injury liability – This covers your responsibility for injury to others in an accident. – Limits of $100,000 per person and $300,000 per accident are required.
• Property damage liability – This covers your responsibility for damage to the property of others in an accident. – A limit of $50,000 per accident is required.
• Personal injury protection – This covers you for injury to yourself or your relatives regardless of whether or not you cause the accident up to the limits of the policy. – A limit of $10,000 per accident is required.

Optional Insurance Coverage

You may wish to carry other types of coverage to further protect you and your family. These coverage and a brief explanation are as follows:

• Personal injury protection – Insurance companies often include a deductible in this coverage and you may want to pay additionally to avoid the deductible. This is one reason why insurance companies in Florida ask about your medical insurance. Your medical insurance may respond also in an accident.
• Comprehensive coverage – This type of insurance pays for damage to your own vehicle for such perils as fire, theft, animal damage, weather damage, and glass less a deductible that you, as owner, determine.
• Collision coverage – This type of insurance pays for collision damage to your own vehicle whether or not it is your fault. This, too, is subject to a deductible, which you determine.

Deductibles can vary from $100 per accident up to $1,000 per accident.

The amount of the deductible is determined by what you believe you can afford in the event of an accident and your agreement with the lender from whom you received the money to purchase the car.

Remember, too, that occasionally individuals have accidents that are close together and the deductible applies per accident. This can lead to being assessed a deductible as the result of an accident one month and then another deductible being assessed as the result of an accident the next month.

Insurance Rates

Each state has its own requirements for financial responsibility and you must follow these limits. The differences in rates vary because of the general climate of legalities within a state.

For example, car insurance rates in Maine are less than those in Louisiana because people in Maine do not tend to sue about car accidents. In Louisiana, litigation appears to be a hobby akin to that of pursuing the lottery. It is to be noted that neither Maine nor Louisiana are proponents of no-fault insurance.

Insurance companies file statistics with the states to justify the rates they charge. These statistics reflect the company’s experience with losses in a certain area. The areas are separated by age, driving experience, and other personal variables. These help determine the basis for rates in the state.

Rates in Florida appear to vary also from area to area. Insurance rates in the Orlando area, which has a number of tourist attractions, vary from those in the Gainesville area, which has academic and medical institutions. It would take an exact investigation of the statistics to determine the differences, which is not the ultimate purpose of this article.

PIP or No-Fault Insurance

Florida is one of several states that require Personal Injury Protection or no-fault insurance. These states at present are:

• Florida
• Michigan
• New Jersey
• New York
• Pennsylvania
• Hawaii
• Kansas
• Kentucky
• Massachusetts
• Minnesota
• North Dakota
• Utah

This no-fault insurance provides coverage for injury to the owner or his relatives in the event of an accident without regard to who is at fault in the accident.

The states have individually interpreted this type of coverage limiting the individual’s right to sue depending separately upon the amount of the damage, result of the accident, and whether or not the individual has sustained injury in a certain way, i.e. permanent disability or disfigurement.

The original intent of no-fault insurance was to ensure that the people insured are reimbursed for losses by their own insurance company rather than as part of an adversarial system referred to in law as a tort system.

This is done by making the insurance contract respond to injury to the individual and damage to the property of the individual.

Those in favor of no-fault insurance maintain that auto accidents are inevitable and that at-fault drivers should not necessarily be punished. The point was also made that uninsured motorists were essentially never held responsible for their liability because they are unable to pay for their liability. No-fault insurance would be a benefit to states with high numbers of uninsured motorists.

Those against no-fault insurance, on the other hand, state that dangerous drivers who do not pay for the damage they cause encourages risky behavior. All that happens is that they pay higher insurance premiums, not additional monetary damages for accidents.

Then, too, those against no-fault insurance maintain that legitimate victims with less overt handicaps find it hard to recover costs to pay for their injuries under no-fault.

Comparable Insurance Quotes in Gainesville, Florida

When asking for a quotation, you need to have information available to facilitate the quote. You will need:

• Names, dates of birth, and license number for all drivers
• Driving record for all drivers
• Year, make, and model of all vehicles owned
• Caution – do not leave out drivers or vehicles even if the vehicles are incapacitated. Florida requires that all cars be insured.

Liability limits:

• $100,000 per person/$300,000 per accident Bodily Injury Liability – damage to the person of others
• $50,000 per accident Property Damage Liability – damage to the property of others
• $10,000 Personal Injury Protection – no-fault

Damage to owned vehicle:

• Comprehensive coverage – $500 deductible
• Collision coverage – $500 deductible

Sample Quotes

When requesting sample quotes, it was posited that the insured would be a married couple in which the husband was 55 and the wife 51 years old.

They own their own home and commute 25 miles one way. They drive a 2014 Toyota Corolla, recently purchased and have the coverage above stated. They both have health insurance and clean driving records.

Insurance Company A $966.80 on a yearly basis.

Insurance Company B $920.00 on a yearly basis.

Comparison-Shopping for Insurance

In this particular case, the difference between the costs of insurance for a year is very little. However, applying the actual facts for a quotation may result in credits that may be applied.

One of the companies quoted gives credits if one of the applicants has graduated from a PAC-10 college or is a member of certain associations. Security protection on your car can result in a credit. Defensive driving courses can also give credits.

It is recommended that everyone take precautions to comparison-shop for insurance every year. This will allow verification that the best available rate has been offered for your insurance.