Insurance anomalies - ideas?

[vit4]

Evening all, bit of a boring semi-"what car" type post I'm afraid

My Astra needs a bit of work doing, which really amounts to more than I would like to spend, but not enough to render it totally pointless if I can't find a replacement. So I start browsing the classifieds, punching reg numbers into the insurance sites to weigh up my options and I've come to this conclusion; I don't have any options

I'm currently paying almost exactly £2000 for my insurance, with 1 years NCB, and that doesn't look like it's going to go down come renewal either. I'm yet to find a car, any car of any size, that won't be at least £600 more to insure To make matters even more fun, the Astra really is the smallest car I could get away with; I carry a fair bit of music gear regularly which fills it to the rafters with the seats down. Not that getting a smaller car would be cheaper to insure; the gf's 1999 Fiesta 1.25 would be £3500



Essentially, what I need is as follows;

- Large-ish loadspace, either large hatchback where the seat will go all the way back with the back seats folded down, with a wide & low loading gap, or preferably an estate

- No less than 35 mpg average, this is a bit less than what I get at the moment and I really can't afford any higher consumption than this for the miles I'm doing currently

- Bloody reliable, and cheap to fix when things do go wrong (never had a bill of more than £250ish, and that was full service, MOT, some welding and a couple other little bits)

- Age is irrelevant as long as parts are easy to source & cheap

- Budget of £1000, absolute max, and that's pushing it


But above all, an anomaly with insurance in the same way my Astra is
I will repair it if it needs it; there aren't any major jobs, but it's a case of lots of little things that are adding up. I'm just yet to find a car where I'm better off buying that than repairing (short of another Astra, but it only seems to be 'Merit' spec that gives freakishly 'cheap' premiums! And they're not exactly tenapenny...). I've tried anything I can think of, from Saabs to newer Astras to Vectras to Mondeos to Escorts to ZX's (figured if it was a small increase I could save the difference with veg oil, but nope, £1900 more ). Any ideas, anyone?

[PaulB81]

Look at some things you wouldnt expect to be cheap like Jags, 5 series, Old land rovers, actually other old 4x4's too, classics are another option. Morris Minor has a decent load space by the looks of it Bet that would be cheap to insure.

[NadiR]

Try estate versions of normal hatchbacks, such as: Skoda Fabia Estate, VW Golf Estate, VW Polo Estate, Honda Civic Aerodeck etc. See where these will get you for insurance, I reckon the Fabia is your best bet as the 1.4 is group 2 insurance and it has alot of space for what it is.

[kiethton]

How many people do you need to carry?

Often small commercial vehicles can be rather cheap to insure - ford ka/fiesta vans vauxhall corsa equivalent etc.

Other than that what about things more suited to OAP's, yaris verso or Honda jazz are basically vans with windows when the seats are folded down

[StottyZr]

You're st at finding insurance quotes. This is your problem. I've just found a good friend a quote for £1300 on a 1.6 Astra with No ncb in high risk area.

[TwigtheWonderkid]

StottyZr said:

You're st at finding insurance quotes. This is your problem. I've just found a good friend a quote for £1300 on a 1.6 Astra with No ncb in high risk area.

I've read thru the original post and the OP doesn't give his age. He doesn't say if he has a clean record, he doesn't give his occupation. He says he carries music gear around so maybe he's a musician, that could put the price up.

I'm interested how you can make the assertion that he's st at finding insurance quotes on the info provided.

[StottyZr]

TwigtheWonderkid said:

StottyZr said:

You're st at finding insurance quotes. This is your problem. I've just found a good friend a quote for £1300 on a 1.6 Astra with No ncb in high risk area.

I've read thru the original post and the OP doesn't give his age. He doesn't say if he has a clean record, he doesn't give his occupation. He says he carries music gear around so maybe he's a musician, that could put the price up.

I'm interested how you can make the assertion that he's st at finding insurance quotes on the info provided.

I spend a worrying amount of time looking for insurance quotes.

Edit: Your point about his record is valid. If he has 9points and a ban on his record he's very good at finding quotes

[AnotherGareth]

NadiR said:

I reckon the Fabia is your best bet as the 1.4 is group 2 insurance and it has alot of space for what it is.

For an old cheap car I'd suggest a Skoda Felicia, either hatch or estate. Almost certainly cheaper to run with a 1.3 MPi engine.

[NadiR]

AnotherGareth said:

NadiR said:

I reckon the Fabia is your best bet as the 1.4 is group 2 insurance and it has alot of space for what it is.

For an old cheap car I'd suggest a Skoda Felicia, either hatch or estate. Almost certainly cheaper to run with a 1.3 MPi engine.

Yep, should be pretty much bombproof as well.

[Classic Grad 98]

Bombproof may be a slight overstatement and I'd take the VW-provided 1.6 engine over Skoda's own pre-historic pushrod engine. They are characterful little things though and even the hatchback is very practical owing to very good folding rear seats.
The 1.3 is a wet liner engine so they can blow gaskets; to compound the problem, the temp gauges are never accurate! they are chain driven though and very tough with the cooling system maintained and the valve clearances set correctly.
The 1.6 has a cambelt but it's infinitely smoother.

[Yachtworker]

get an insurance quote on a Morris Traveller, it will be pennies in comparison.

probably hard to find a good one for 1k but might be possible, certainly easy to keep running, cheap on fuel and plenty of space.

[vit4]

StottyZr said:

TwigtheWonderkid said:

StottyZr said:

You're st at finding insurance quotes. This is your problem. I've just found a good friend a quote for £1300 on a 1.6 Astra with No ncb in high risk area.

I've read thru the original post and the OP doesn't give his age. He doesn't say if he has a clean record, he doesn't give his occupation. He says he carries music gear around so maybe he's a musician, that could put the price up.

I'm interested how you can make the assertion that he's st at finding insurance quotes on the info provided.

I spend a worrying amount of time looking for insurance quotes.

Edit: Your point about his record is valid. If he has 9points and a ban on his record he's very good at finding quotes

Finding insurance quotes is something I pride myself on Very high risk postcode, 19, under a grand so it's 100% the postcode Occupation isn't music, that's just a hobby. We've had a couple of accidents on our stretch of road & 3 cars nicked in the last few years Even if I lived a couple of streets away it would be ~£400 less

AnotherGareth said:

For an old cheap car I'd suggest a Skoda Felicia, either hatch or estate. Almost certainly cheaper to run with a 1.3 MPi engine.

This might be a good shout actually, I'll run that through when I get home


Old 4x4 would be perfect, but I do too much motorway driving for a Series Land Rover, I'm not quite hardcore enough Frontera is about the cheapest I could afford that wouldn't be a basket case, but regards to insurance they're too expensive for the even the 2.3 diesels (although not as much as I thought), and I couldn't afford the fuel bills of a petrol (haven't checked insurance but I'm pretty sure they're cheaper, how much I don't know)

[vit4]

StottyZr said:

TwigtheWonderkid said:

StottyZr said:

You're st at finding insurance quotes. This is your problem. I've just found a good friend a quote for £1300 on a 1.6 Astra with No ncb in high risk area.

I've read thru the original post and the OP doesn't give his age. He doesn't say if he has a clean record, he doesn't give his occupation. He says he carries music gear around so maybe he's a musician, that could put the price up.

I'm interested how you can make the assertion that he's st at finding insurance quotes on the info provided.

I spend a worrying amount of time looking for insurance quotes.

Edit: Your point about his record is valid. If he has 9points and a ban on his record he's very good at finding quotes

Finding insurance quotes is something I pride myself on Very high risk postcode, 19, under a grand so it's 100% the postcode Occupation isn't music, that's just a hobby. We've had a couple of accidents on our stretch of road & 3 cars nicked in the last few years Even if I lived a couple of streets away it would be ~£400 less

AnotherGareth said:

For an old cheap car I'd suggest a Skoda Felicia, either hatch or estate. Almost certainly cheaper to run with a 1.3 MPi engine.

This might be a good shout actually, I'll run that through when I get home


Old 4x4 would be perfect, but I do too much motorway driving for a Series Land Rover, I'm not quite hardcore enough Frontera is about the cheapest I could afford that wouldn't be a basket case, but regards to insurance they're too expensive for the even the 2.3 diesels (although not as much as I thought), and I couldn't afford the fuel bills of a petrol (haven't checked insurance but I'm pretty sure they're cheaper, how much I don't know)

[kiethton]

As i said try a Ka van and a toyota Yaris Verso....you will be pleasantly surprised....

yaris - http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/2002-TOYOTA-YARIS-VERSO-...

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/2002-FORD-KA-VAN-WHITE-1...

[nixon1]

Get a trailer!

[vit4]

kiethton said:

As i said try a Ka van and a toyota Yaris Verso....you will be pleasantly surprised....

yaris - http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/2002-TOYOTA-YARIS-VERSO-...

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/2002-FORD-KA-VAN-WHITE-1...

Gear definitely wouldn't fit in a Ka van, I'll give the Verso a try though. That's a depressing thought I'll update once I get home

Edit: Verso came in at £3051.90 I'm sort of relieved.

Edited by vit4 on Wednesday 15th February 23:46

[vit4]

AnotherGareth said:

For an old cheap car I'd suggest a Skoda Felicia, either hatch or estate. Almost certainly cheaper to run with a 1.3 MPi engine.

Fabia (estate, hatch wouldn't be big enough) was coming in at £2800ish for the 1.4, a bit more for the 1.2
Felicia at £2600
Favorit though... Same price as the Astra
On the downside there's one for sale in the country, on ebay, and that particular car's registration isn't recognised, so finding one may be a problem

[matthias73]

try other websites, change the renewal date ect. have you had the renewal on your astra yet, it might have gone up.

[clarkmagpie]

Get something bigger, try an estate of some sort...
Volvo
Mondeo
Omega

[vit4]

clarkmagpie said:

Get something bigger, try an estate of some sort...
Volvo
Mondeo
Omega

Tried all of them, presuming you mean the old Volvos? Mondeos were first thing I looked at, one of them would be perfect, but all well over 3 grand

Does changing the renewal date make any difference? Do it pretty much at random and seem to get the same prices for the same cars.