Does California Liability Auto Insurance Covers Car Repairs?
Reader’s Question:
Hi there. I got in a bit of trouble last night and bumped the car into a tree. Will my automobile insurance pay for the repairs to my car? How can I ask them to pay? I have liability insurance.
George
Long Beach, CA
Hi George, I hope you are all right after your accident. First of all, you will need to look at your automobile insurance papers or call your agent in California to find out if you are covered for the damage to your car. If you bought just the minimum automobile insurance required by the state, I’m afraid you might not have the right coverage as most states only require liability insurance which will pay for damages to other people or property.
In order for your insurance company to pay for the damages to your vehicle, you must have first signed up for collision insurance. However, they will not pay for the full amount of the bill. You will still have to cough up your share of the deductibles before they will pay for their share of the bill. Before you file a claim, first evaluate whether you actually need to. If the damage is minimal, and you can afford to pay for it, it may be better to take care of the damages yourself. If you do file a claim, know that this will be placed into your record and may affect your automobile insurance rates in the future. If you still wish to proceed, I suggest you ask your agent about your automobile insurance companies’ process for filing a claim. This will most likely involve some paperwork where you will be asked for details of the accident.
Low Cost California Collision Auto Insurance Coverage
Reader question:
What is low cost California auto insurance collision coverage?
Mandy
Thanks for your question, Mandy.
Many people only buy the minimal low cost California auto insurance coverage for their vehicle, because they think that they are fairly good drivers and would never get into a car insurance accident, at least not one that is their fault. Any accident, they assume, that they would get into would be covered by the other driver’s liability coverage. However, there are many cases where, despite how you feel about your own driving skills, you are required to add collision coverage to your low cost California auto insurance policy.
The main reason for which you would do this is when you are buying a brand new car. Most loan providers would require that you have collision coverage on your car until you have finished paying them for it, so you will have to add it to your low cost California auto insurance policy.
In some cases, they may not require it, but it is still a good idea to get it. If you are buying a new car, usually while you are paying it off you will at some point owe more for your car than it is actually worth. In these cases, should you total your car and you only have collision coverage, you will only get paid for the worth of your car, leaving you with several thousand dollars of loans to pay off. In order to avoid this, you must get gap insurance. But in order to get gap insurance, you have to have collision on your low cost California auto insurance policy.
Collision covers damage in an accident in which you are at fault, be it with another driver or just you backing into your second car in your driveway. Unlike liability coverage, collision comes with a deductible from your low cost California auto insurance policy. If you get into a car accident, then before you can get the check from your insurance company, you have to pay the deductible. I suggest that you make that deductible at least five hundred dollars in order to get low cost California auto insurance rates.
But how do you know if you need collision coverage, if it isn’t required? I would say that if your vehicle is worth less than one grand, don’t even think about it. It would just be a waste of money, even if you totaled your car. However, if you have a relatively new vehicle and you don’t have a stellar driving history, then I would seriously think about adding collision to my low cost California auto insurance coverage.
Cheers,
Fashun Guadarrama.
Types of California Car Insurance – Which is Best?
There are several types of car insurance that you will need in California, an at-fault, tort car insurance law state. While not all are necessary, in order to abide by California car insurance law, you must have at least the three basic types of liability coverage, which can be bought either at the state minimum or at a number above this. California car insurance law requires you to have a minimum of five thousand dollars of property damage liability for when you get into an at fault accident. It isn’t much, and most California car insurance companies suggest that you get at least fifty thousand to prevent problems with being underinsured.
What is California car insurance property damage liability?
When you get to into a car accident that is caused by your own negligence or intent, most of the time this accident will involve someone else. Unless you get into the accident on your own driveway, your California car insurance company will probably have to pay out a property damage liability claim. What this type of coverage takes care of is the damage done to whatever you hit–be it a house, a mailbox, or even, most commonly, another car entirely. There is a separate type of coverage for injuries to another person.
What property damage California car insurance coverage does not take care of is any damage inflicted on your vehicle, even if you crash your vehicle into some part of your own property, such as another vehicle of yours. If this happens, you will have to depend on collision car insurance.
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