Why's it more expensive to insure someone else's car?
Discussion
Here's the situation...
- Mother buys car from new;
- Mother gets new car;
- Son buys old car from her;
- Son decides not to change the ownership, no need, it'll stay a 1x RK car and maybe be more desirable come time to sell;
- Son gets insurance quotes;
- Son can't understand why it is £300 more if you say you're not the RK on the vehicle but if you tell them you own it then it goes back to a normal price.
Value of car may be affected by £300 now with 2 owners rather than 1 yet if it's kept for a couple of years the insurance savings will probably outweigh any damage to resale value.
Insurance is in son's name, him as main driver, no other drivers, 5 years NCD, clean license, no accidents etc.
Quote jumps from £800 to £1,100...
The bizarre workings of an insurance company.
- Mother buys car from new;
- Mother gets new car;
- Son buys old car from her;
- Son decides not to change the ownership, no need, it'll stay a 1x RK car and maybe be more desirable come time to sell;
- Son gets insurance quotes;
- Son can't understand why it is £300 more if you say you're not the RK on the vehicle but if you tell them you own it then it goes back to a normal price.
Value of car may be affected by £300 now with 2 owners rather than 1 yet if it's kept for a couple of years the insurance savings will probably outweigh any damage to resale value.
Insurance is in son's name, him as main driver, no other drivers, 5 years NCD, clean license, no accidents etc.
Quote jumps from £800 to £1,100...
The bizarre workings of an insurance company.
DanDC5 said:
Amount of owners makes little or no difference to a cars value, change the ownership and get the cheaper insurance. He'll be a lot better off financially that way.
It depends on what the car is. I would choose, between identical cars, a 1 owner car against a 2 owner car. And it does affect value. You just have to look at the classifieds, or try and trade a car in with a high number of owners!!!rash_decision said:
DanDC5 said:
Amount of owners makes little or no difference to a cars value, change the ownership and get the cheaper insurance. He'll be a lot better off financially that way.
It depends on what the car is. I would choose, between identical cars, a 1 owner car against a 2 owner car. And it does affect value. You just have to look at the classifieds, or try and trade a car in with a high number of owners!!!
I would think of it as one and a half owners perhaps !
OllieC said:
I would look at this differently if it were two owners within the same family ? or is that just me
I would think of it as one and a half owners perhaps !
I know what you're saying, but it's starting to accumulate, and come sale time/trade in time, it's always frowned upon by the dealer or prospective purchaser to have more owners. I would think of it as one and a half owners perhaps !
rash_decision said:
It's not fronting if the main driver is insuring it in his name!!
Definitely not fronting. It's in the young lads age with him as main driver. In his mum's name it was about £300 per annum all in (when she owned it).Same insurance company insured the lad in a more powerful car previously so know he has driven faster and more sporty cars.
Bizarre, but I said I'd put it to my chums on PH for deliberation knowing there's a few insurance bods who frequent.
Same happens if you ever try and insure a lease car - as its owned by the lease company.
The reasoning is that if the car is not your own property, statistics say you will not treat it with the same regard as you would your own.
This is of course twaddle, but anything the insurance company can do to charge more...
The reasoning is that if the car is not your own property, statistics say you will not treat it with the same regard as you would your own.
This is of course twaddle, but anything the insurance company can do to charge more...
rash_decision said:
I know what you're saying, but it's starting to accumulate, and come sale time/trade in time, it's always frowned upon by the dealer or prospective purchaser to have more owners.
... and in this day and age where its hard enough to sell a car, especially a mainstream, mass produced diesel box then buyers can afford to be picky.I'd just like to see the statistics, or be told about them, that says someone who is named driver of a car registered in someone else's name is more likely to crash!
DiseasalDriver said:
Definitely not fronting. It's in the young lads age with him as main driver. In his mum's name it was about £300 per annum all in (when she owned it).
Same insurance company insured the lad in a more powerful car previously so know he has driven faster and more sporty cars.
Bizarre, but I said I'd put it to my chums on PH for deliberation knowing there's a few insurance bods who frequent.
I don't think I'll ever understand how insurance companies come up with their premiums! My insurance is cheaper by adding my Dad and a mate to it, by £280!! Figure that one out! My second car is cheaper by having only my mate on it, Dad pushed it up!! Weird! I think it depends on the targets for that month! Lol. Same insurance company insured the lad in a more powerful car previously so know he has driven faster and more sporty cars.
Bizarre, but I said I'd put it to my chums on PH for deliberation knowing there's a few insurance bods who frequent.
rash_decision said:
It depends on what the car is. I would choose, between identical cars, a 1 owner car against a 2 owner car. And it does affect value. You just have to look at the classifieds, or try and trade a car in with a high number of owners!!!
Never something that's bothered me to be honest, I know a lot of people who get bored of cars quickly. Look at how many people on here do it. I've hd no problem at all trading in cars with what could be classed as a high number of owners, think my Civic was on it's 5th or 6th including me and the garage who had it off me put it straight back onto their forecourt. As with everything the only time it's an issue is when a garage wants to give you less cash.
DanDC5 said:
Amount of owners makes little or no difference to a cars value, change the ownership and get the cheaper insurance. He'll be a lot better off financially that way.
Er, yeah, it does. Plotting a cars history to the n'th degree is something I'll always aim to do and value accordingly.Personally, I'd put him down as the registered owner. If he's in a shunt then just get the paperwork off to the DVLA quick. He is, in principle, the owner and insurers have no issue about this in general. I was on the V5 as the owner of our Astra when it was written off and the insurers never questioned why my GF was the policy holder as it was effectively the same family
Some insurers won't quote for that situation, especially if the owner/registered keeper and policyholder aren't spouses. It's likely that they have bad claims experience with this kind of business, but it also seems to me that anything which reduces the pool of insurers you can get a quote from is likely to make the quotes you do get less competitive.
DanDC5 said:
Never something that's bothered me to be honest, I know a lot of people who get bored of cars quickly. Look at how many people on here do it. I've hd no problem at all trading in cars with what could be classed as a high number of owners, think my Civic was on it's 5th or 6th including me and the garage who had it off me put it straight back onto their forecourt.
As with everything the only time it's an issue is when a garage wants to give you less cash.
If I'm honest, it doesn't really bother me with certain cars, as I tend to change after a year myself, but it is frowned upon by the majority of folk I speak to, both public and trade.As with everything the only time it's an issue is when a garage wants to give you less cash.
As an example, I was looking at a 2003 Ferrari 360 recently, with 6 owners. Cars of this ilk tend to have higher owners as it's generally car buffs that move them on quick to get the next car on the dream list. As these cars are generally owned by passionate car fanatics (usually!), they are looked after, but some family saloon type cars get rattled about, abused, and when problems appear, they then start changing hands too many times.
Can’t help with the original question except to echo the same guesses.
As far as number of owners goes I do have some direct experience.
I’ve recently sold a 10 year old S2000 and a 3 year old BMW 135i.
In both cases 80% of the people who called asked about the number of owners.
Both cars had a relatively high number of owners for their age, and in both cases some buyers asked for that to be the reason for a large discount or lost all interest when I told them.
I think that people see a car with lots of owners and assume there’s something wrong with it, and the owners just keep selling it instead of fixing it.
As far as number of owners goes I do have some direct experience.
I’ve recently sold a 10 year old S2000 and a 3 year old BMW 135i.
In both cases 80% of the people who called asked about the number of owners.
Both cars had a relatively high number of owners for their age, and in both cases some buyers asked for that to be the reason for a large discount or lost all interest when I told them.
I think that people see a car with lots of owners and assume there’s something wrong with it, and the owners just keep selling it instead of fixing it.
otolith said:
Some insurers won't quote for that situation, especially if the owner/registered keeper and policyholder aren't spouses. It's likely that they have bad claims experience with this kind of business, but it also seems to me that anything which reduces the pool of insurers you can get a quote from is likely to make the quotes you do get less competitive.
That's what we found, mum bought car from new, when dad retired they only needed one car and were going to lend her's to her dad. Couldn't get insurance in his name without changing registered keeper. They didn't want to do it that way initially as they weren't sure how long he was going to continue driving, but had no choice in the end. She's now having the car back as he is giving up, so will have to re-register it into her names, now a 1 owner car has become a 3 owner car.
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