Sports car hire business and insurance questions

Sports car hire business and insurance questions

Author
Discussion

ant111s

Original Poster:

455 posts

183 months

Tuesday 20th May 2014
quotequote all
Ive read on here (and followed the story of drivesouthwest) and searched the forums about people trying to hire cars, business start ups and problems getting insurance. I have been searching the market now for about 2-3 weeks and have made numerous phone calls and filled out numerous quotation insurance forms with little results..

I may have jumped the gun before looking at insurance as thought it would be a lot easier. I have purchased an Audi r8 and Aston martin vantage which i am looking to hire out, self drive.

I thought there must be a company that covers on a pay as you go basis, bit like day insure but i have yet to uncover one, so i have looked at insuring the cars for hire and the cheapest quote ive had is £14,0000!!! for the year (this did include a porsche 911 turbo) very expensive!

There really doesnt seem to be many companies on the market willing to touch this yet there are a lot of companies specially in the london area offering this so some company must be covering it, or have i missed the boat as a few brokers ive spoken to have said a lot of insurance companies have pulled out of the market.

I am going to be trying to cover the Poole, Bournemouth, Christchurch, New Forest and Possibly Southampton Area. So please also get in touch if you have a sports car that you would like to hire out or if you already run a similar company as tips and pointers would be great!

below is the demo of the website that will be going up sometime within the next week. Any comments or suggestions would be greatly appreciated.


JimmyConwayNW

3,056 posts

124 months

Tuesday 20th May 2014
quotequote all
They hate self drive hire companies don't they.

All I can say is be careful as when I looked into self drive hire 5/6 years ago when I have just literally renewed my motor trade policy (vehicle sales) it was mentioned that I had been linked to that type of business and some companies would not quote me.

Good luck though.

maffski

1,866 posts

158 months

Tuesday 20th May 2014
quotequote all
Have you tried insurance jon? Not sure if it's his sort of thing but he seems to have a good rep on here.

Ossiantoad

263 posts

130 months

Tuesday 20th May 2014
quotequote all
What you need is an insurance broker. It's an old fashioned sounding concept I know and most of us can search the market on car and household insurance but don't try and do the job yourself with something as complex as this. Insurance Jon may be a good place to start but otherwise look for a broker that has a specialism in commercial vehicles or motorsport and ask them to find you something. They will be paid by the insurer and they have far better contacts, buying power and market knowledge than any member of the general public. Otherwise you are just an amateur trying to do the job of a professional in a field you have little knowledge of. The reason you have not come up with much is because the specialists in this field will not deal directly with the public, they will be wholesale brokers or Lloyd's Syndicate that only deal with brokers.

anonymous-user

53 months

Tuesday 20th May 2014
quotequote all
There are some day insure type places but I am not so sure whether they will do the high performance cars. Pay as you use SDH insurance is very very rarely cheaper if you can get the utilisation of the vehicles up to the correct levels, but it does make budgeting easier. You will still need off hire cover.

How many cars does the 14K cover?

As a decent 911 Turbo will hire out at at least £300 a day a 50% utilisation will produce quite a bit of cash. if you can get it up to 80% utilisation then happy days and the insurance will seem cheap.

dacouch

1,172 posts

128 months

Tuesday 20th May 2014
quotequote all
£14k for three super cars self drive hire is not that bad for a new venture.

If you were looking to insure a standardish car eg a normal mondeo for a new business with no experience you would be paying circa £1.7k each so for three mondeos about £5.5k so for the type of cars you have £14k is not so bad.


ant111s

Original Poster:

455 posts

183 months

Wednesday 21st May 2014
quotequote all
Thanks for all your thoughts. I guess it just seems a big outlay, after spending near on 100k for the cars, spending another 14k for insurance seems a bit of a ball acher but maybe something that ill have to just get on and do in order to get the cars making money.. I gues if i rented them both out every weekend for a month that would be over half the cost already! Just a big outlay...

Cheers for insurance john contact.. ill try him now.

insurance_jon

4,054 posts

245 months

Wednesday 21st May 2014
quotequote all
Ossiantoad said:
What you need is an insurance broker. It's an old fashioned sounding concept I know and most of us can search the market on car and household insurance but don't try and do the job yourself with something as complex as this. Insurance Jon may be a good place to start but otherwise look for a broker that has a specialism in commercial vehicles or motorsport and ask them to find you something. They will be paid by the insurer and they have far better contacts, buying power and market knowledge than any member of the general public. Otherwise you are just an amateur trying to do the job of a professional in a field you have little knowledge of. The reason you have not come up with much is because the specialists in this field will not deal directly with the public, they will be wholesale brokers or Lloyd's Syndicate that only deal with brokers.
wise words

insurance_jon

4,054 posts

245 months

Wednesday 21st May 2014
quotequote all
14k is cheap for a new start up. rip their hands off.

NB - the devil is in the detail and who the underwriter is, otherwise the 14k may end up being expensive if they don't pay out.

also a lot of the SDH policies only cover them whilst on hire (hence why it may sound cheap)

have to read over your quote as a PH favour though

insurance_jon

4,054 posts

245 months

Wednesday 21st May 2014
quotequote all
just thinking out loud, shouldn't the insurance have been part of the business plan?

BoRED S2upid

19,641 posts

239 months

Wednesday 21st May 2014
quotequote all
It's 14 % which isn't expensive I've paid more for private car insurance in my youth! And the risk they are taking is huge as people are going to thrash the cars and quite often won't be used to the power.

skeeterm5

3,328 posts

187 months

Wednesday 21st May 2014
quotequote all
As an option, why not allow the person hiring the car to insure it themselves? Might be one way through it.

S

insurance_jon

4,054 posts

245 months

Wednesday 21st May 2014
quotequote all
its very hard to insure something you don't own. most insurers dont allow it.

even the temp cover type companies generally either cap the max value at 15k, or exclude rental cars

Simpo Two

85,147 posts

264 months

Wednesday 21st May 2014
quotequote all
insurance_jon said:
just thinking out loud, shouldn't the insurance have been part of the business plan?
Quite. Not bright buying the cars and then going 'Gur, what about insurance?' IMHO. I hope the rest of the dots join up.

98elise

26,368 posts

160 months

Thursday 22nd May 2014
quotequote all
Simpo Two said:
insurance_jon said:
just thinking out loud, shouldn't the insurance have been part of the business plan?
Quite. Not bright buying the cars and then going 'Gur, what about insurance?' IMHO. I hope the rest of the dots join up.
I'm not exactly a business guru myself, but why would you be starting a business without a viable business plan?

14k seems cheap when you think of the risk involved in daily supercar hire. Essentially you are looking at up to 365 inexperienced people (per car) having their first go in a supercar. What are the odds of something going wrong smile

davek_964

8,796 posts

174 months

Friday 23rd May 2014
quotequote all
There is another thread on the Porsche forum where an established company is mentioned - they're insurance is also 14k it seems for various 911s so it seems to be the going rate.

If you do get it going, let me know - I've been toying with the idea of a Vantage at some point, and I've always wondered what R8s are like to drive - depending on the price I may be interested in a half day with each.

Steve H

1,168 posts

223 months

Friday 23rd May 2014
quotequote all
insurance_jon said:
wise words
+1

KFC

3,687 posts

129 months

Sunday 25th May 2014
quotequote all
Its ridiculous that anyone would start buying cars and building a website without having insurance in place.

Surely this thread is a wind up laugh

DSLiverpool

14,670 posts

201 months

Sunday 25th May 2014
quotequote all
KFC said:
Its ridiculous that anyone would start buying cars and building a website without having insurance in place.

Surely this thread is a wind up laugh
No - it's an advert smile

dacouch

1,172 posts

128 months

Sunday 25th May 2014
quotequote all
KFC said:
Its ridiculous that anyone would start buying cars and building a website without having insurance in place.

Surely this thread is a wind up laugh
I deal with commercial Insurance and you would not believe the amount of times people spend a fortune on a business along the lines of the OP and then try and buy the Insurance at the very last minute. They have no idea of the costs involved which are generally very high for new ventures. To obtain a quote for something along these lines is not normally done in a day, it generally takes a few days.