Dos and Don’ts of Auto Insurance Planning

As with every financial planning endeavor, there is a right way and a wrong way to approach auto insurance planning. Understanding both the dos and don'ts of auto insurance planning will help you get the best policy for your money and avoid creating a plan that crashes and burns.

• Do get multiple auto quotes in order to find the best rates. Every insurance company has its own formula for developing auto insurance rates. While some may look upon certain risks generously, others may overcompensate for them. By getting a wide range of quotes you can ensure that you've explored every possibility and gotten the best value for your money.
• Don't buy insurance based on price alone. Insurance policies are not always created equal. The cheapest quote you get may not offer the kind of protection you need. Evaluate your auto insurance options by comparing the protections that each policy offers and weighing the cost against those benefits.
• Do ask for discounts. Discuss with your insurance agent all the different factors that could go into qualifying you for auto insurance discounts. Talk about any driver’s training courses you've taken, any policies you can bundle, any payment options that offer discounts, any safety gadgets built into your car, and so on.
• Don't misrepresent the facts. Telling little white lies, misrepresenting the truth on your insurance application and leaving out important facts could score you a cheaper insurance quote, but at the end of the day when the insurance company finds that you were not completely honest, your policy could be rescinded and you may be left uninsured.
• Do comply with the auto insurance regulations of your state. Make sure that you get all the required coverages so that you are in complete compliance and face no penalties.
• Don't allow the state to dictate how much coverage you have. While you must, at minimum, comply with the regulations of your state, don't assume that those minimums are actually enough protection for you and your family. Instead, discuss with your agent the financial risks you face after an auto accident and buy sufficient insurance coverage to protect against them.
• Do consider a deductible. An auto insurance deductible is the amount that you are required to pay out-of-pocket after an incident occurs. Auto insurance deductibles offer a great opportunity to help create a manageable premium balanced with insurance benefits that are legitimately helpful.
• Don't take on too much deductible. Auto insurance deductibles are per incident, which means that you must pay them each time you have damages rather than on a cumulative annual schedule. If you agree to very high deductibles and have multiple incidents each year, you could easily find your savings depleted.

There are many things to consider when designing your Killeen auto insurance policy and at Shawn Camp Insurance, we’re here to help you work through the difficult decisions.

The Actual price of Car Insurance Fraud

Fraudulent activities are an unfortunate reality. In the insurance industry, fraud frequently takes the form of overstated claims, the filing of several claims, filing a claim for an accident you weren’t really involved in, illegally registering cars in regions that make car insurance quotes less costly, and more.
Most people assume that when they commit these types of fraud, the only people they are hurting are the insurance executives. Of course, that fact alone is still not a good thing, but the suggestion that only those at the top get harmed by insurance fraud is wrong, because it is all consumers who must pay.

Increased Premiums

The worst fallout of auto insurance fraud is the increased premiums that it causes all insurance customers to pay. In order to cover the cost of the excessive or improper claims, the cost of investigating claims, and the changes in risk that are assumed by the claims, insurers have no choice but to spread the losses by raising the premiums for all policyholders. This means the typical customer ends up paying for the fraudulent activities of others.

Increased Paperwork

When frauds are attempted and found, or committed and later discovered, insurance companies realize that they must change their processes in order to try to prevent them from happening in the future. This means they will take great pains to have applications and claim forms that attempt to weed out potentially fraudulent activity. This increases your work, however, because all of their insurance policyholders will need to use this paperwork. It also creates an extra expense for the insurance company which is, once again, passed on to policyholders.

Increased Taxpayer Dollars

Some claims involve police and arson investigations. When the claims are fake, these investigations result in taxpayer dollars being wasted on paying the payrolls of those who must investigate them. This also ties up law enforcement officers when they could be out preventing actual crimes.
Insurance fraud is a problem that we all must consider, even if we are not guilty of committing it. We should take whatever steps are rational and safe within our own lives to make certain that those we know and love are not encouraged to commit fraud and that potential frauds are reported to the appropriate entities.

Give us a call at 866-851-5220 to get your free, personalized Texas auto insurance quote today!

Loss of Use—A Benefit Worth Keeping

Loss of Use—A Benefit Worth Keeping

Often, when we think about insurance, we think about how it covers many of the damages that occur during a covered peril such as a fire or flood. But there are more consequences to the damages these incidents cause to your property than just the loss of your tangible goods and shelter, because by making your property useless, insurable incidents force you to find a substitute until your repairs are done.

Loss of use is a valuable part of a home or auto insurance policy that can keep you and your family safe and active, even after a total loss.

Auto Loss of Use

If you are in an accident and your vehicle cannot be driven until repairs are made, the world doesn’t stop spinning. You still need to get to work, bring your kids to school, run errands, and more. When you have loss of use benefits in your auto insurance policy, your insurance company will pay for a car rental to get you around while you wait for repairs to be completed. You will be permitted to rent a car that is in a similar class to your own and the rental can generally last until you are able to pick up your own car again.

Home Loss of Use

There are some insurable incidents that do not require you to evacuate from your home or apartment afterward—such as damages that are limited to just one, small area of your home and carry no health hazards through the rest of your dwelling. But sometimes it’s not safe to be home until repairs are done, such as after a fire. When this happens, a loss of use benefit in your renter’s or home insurance policy will pay for a hotel or temporary rental until it’s safe to go back to your house or apartment. Your policy will have limits, restricting the total benefit to a certain percentage of the total limit of your policy.

It’s hard to imagine just how stressful it is to lose the ability to live in your home or drive your vehicle—even if the loss is temporary. Add in the extra burden of having to foot the bill for a short-term replacement and your life has become even more difficult than it needs to be—unless you have loss of use coverage is available. If you aren’t sure whether your home, renter’s or Texas auto insurance policy has this generous benefit or you want to add it to your policy, give us a call at 866-851-5220.

How to plan for insurance attentively

In a 2009 article in Psychology Today, mindfulness was described as the practice of being in the present moment. This means that instead of being distracted, thinking about the future, dwelling on the past, or allowing lots of noise in your head over everything but “the now,” when you are mindful you are fully invested in the current moment and what's happening during that tiny piece of time.

Mindfulness and Insurance
When you buy insurance, it's important that you allow yourself to be quiet and mindful. It’s understandable to feel anxious when working on final expense and legacy planning, when thinking about all the perils facing your home and vehicle, when imagining your future potential disabilities and contemplating all the liabilities and other negative aspects of life that make insurance necessary, but if you want to be properly insured and prepared for the future, you must allow yourself to be fully invested in the process of insurance planning rather than distracted and intimidated by what-ifs.

Mindful Insurance Planning
Instead of being cowed by the unknown, when insurance planning you focus on the known: the risks that any individual in your situation may actually face and the value of the property you want to protect. It’s really as simple as that—and knowing this will allow you to create a much more secure financial future.

Being frightened of a potential future event that has not yet come to pass, or being overwhelmed by the amount of data you must consider as you buy insurance will not help you purchase and amounts you need to protect your family and it won’t make it any easier to select the types of policies that offer you the kind of protections you’re looking for. Instead, it makes you feel powerless during what should be a very empowering process.
When you give yourself the space and permission to be mindful, you allow yourself to approach the task of buying insurance as practically and unemotionally as possible. This makes it easier to be deliberate and reasonable as you assess the practical risks you face each day and assign a dollar value to them, and then make relevant adjustments as you consider your budget and potential premiums.

Your insurance agent can be a big help in keeping your emotions on track and your approach to insurance planning practical. If you are ready to start searching for insurance policies that will protect your family, give us a call at (254) 547-2381 for a Copperas Cove insurance quote.

Does a Home Inspection affect my Insurance?

When shopping for a new home, it's easy to get drawn in by what you may consider the perfect house. Finding the perfect house, in your ideal price range, located in your dream neighborhood can cause you to overlook minor details and run forward to submit an offer and secure this perfect home. But after the shininess has worn off and it's time to get home insurance coverage, you may regret this impulsive decision.

Instead of giving in to the desire to own the home of your dreams, take the time to have a new home inspection completed. Even if your home is of completely new construction, a home inspection can save you time, money, headaches, and risk.

Types of Home Inspections

There are many different inspections that can be done on your new home. In order to get the most comprehensive inspection and the most thorough understanding of the condition of your home, a new home buyer should consider a general home inspection, a termite inspection, a radon test to check levels of this unscented, cancer-causing radioactive gas, a septic system inspection (when a septic system is present), and, when appropriate, an oil tank testing.

Each of these inspections will give you a difference assessments regarding the health of your hew home. You may think that it’s enough to simply get a general inspection, but each of the specialized inspections mentioned above allow for a deeper look at areas that can be the source of major potential problems.


Learn more about the cost and effect of inspections on your home insurance.

To get Killeen home insurance quote on your current home or a quote on the home you are considering buying, give us a call at (254) 547-2381. We can help you discover what your potential home insurance rates might be and assist you in setting reasonable limits based on your risk and budget.

Updating Your Auto Insurance for 2012

Auto insurance policies, when not planned out carefully, can have dangerous gaps in coverage that leave the policyholder at risk for financial problems after an accident, theft, fire or other insurable incident. This year, update your auto insurance policy to consider the following:

Is your limit on pace with car repair costs and value? Auto repair costs don’t always stay the same from year to year; labor, parts and shipping costs can all change drastically leaving you little actual recompense from your policy unless you adjust your limits. Work with your agent to determine what your limits should be based on these expenses and your Kelley Blue Book value.

Do you have enough coverage for the average liability claim? Your automobile coverage will offer you protection from both bodily injury and property damage liabilities, but will it offer you enough? Talk to your agent about a limit that gives you protection based on current-day claims averages and talk about the possibility of adding an umbrella policy for your auto and home liabilities.

Do you need uninsured motorist coverage? You may be insured, but that doesn’t mean every motorist on the road is. Uninsured or underinsured motorist coverage supplements your damages when the person who causes your accident doesn’t have the insurance policy to pay them.

Can you reduce your overall risk exposure? If you’ve just gotten state-required coverage then you’re doing little to protect your own interests in an accident. Without collision and comprehensive you could be exposed to financial losses after an accident, theft, vandalism, fire or other natural disaster.

How affordable are those deductibles? Make sure your deductibles are still practical for your lifestyle. After a job loss, big expense or other life change, large deductibles can become a greater burden than they initially were.

Do you need to add roadside assistance? A breakdown, flat tire, or depleted gas tank can happen to anyone. If you don’t currently have roadside assistance on your policy, don’t wait until you wish you did before you add it.

Should you add loss of use? If you can’t use your car after an insurable incident damages it, how are you going to run errands, get to work and bring the kids to school? With loss of use coverage, your auto policy can keep you on the road by paying your emergency rental car expenses.

We have all the tools you need to compare premiums, set limits and deductibles and choose coverage options. Give us a call to complete your annual auto insurance review and you can start 2012 out on the right foot.

Call us today at (254) 526-0535 to make sure your car insurance in Killeen Texas is up to par or visit our office.

Buying Used Motorcycles

Buying Used Motorcycles

Motorcycle enthusiasts sink a lot of money into their rides by adding extra equipment, personalizing and modifying them. One way to help reduce the overall amount that you spend on your bike is to start with a used motorcycle that you can customize the way you want.

Before you Buy: Get the Bike’s Story

While buying a used motorcycle is, in theory, a perfect solution, insurance doesn’t cover the damages that come when you purchase a bike that is mechanically unsound, so you need to take care in getting the whole story about the bike’s history.

·         Ask if this is the bike’s original owner: If you are buying the motorcycle from its original owner, then they will know the bike’s whole history. If not, there may be skeletons sitting in the bike’s closet.

·         Ask if the bike has ever been in an accident: If the motorcycle’s been in an accident or has been dropped, it’s possible there is irreparable damage to its frame. You can also enter the bike’s VIN number into the Carfax system to get a report.

·         Get the maintenance records: A properly maintained bike can be a good buy, but a bike that has had no tune ups and little attention paid to oil and other fluids could be a nightmare.

Contact us at (866) 851-5220 for a free Texas motorcycle insurance quote or visit our office. Read the entire “Buying Used Motorcycles” article.