If you are looking for a short term car insurance policy theres a good chance that you may not even need it…
Is short term car insurance required when you are renting out a car?
The rental service will offer you some combination of liability insurance, personal effects coverage, accident insurance, and/or a loss damage waiver (more commonly known as LDW). If you have your own auto and have the respective car insurance, you are most likely covered for each of these 4 insurances. As such, getting even one of them is likely a waste of money. You just have to make sure that you are using the car for recreational and not business use.
Below you’ll see a list of the aforementioned 4 insurance options and the reasons why they are probably not needed…
Liability coverage: The liability insurance that you already have pays for any damages, which you are found to be liable for.
Loss Damage Waiver (LDW): Collision & comprehensive insurance (if you have them on your car), makes this coverage superfluous. Your collision insurance pays for damages to your auto regardless of who is at fault in an accident. Comprehensive insurance protects you from damage or loss caused by everything from the weather to burglary.
Personal accident insurance or accident coverage: If you already have either Personal Injury Protection, Medical Payments Coverage, or health insurance, you can skip on this additional insurance.
Personal effects insurance: This rental car coverage covers any stolen items. You should know that if you already have renters or homeowners coverage, this insurance is unnecessary because both cover stolen property not just inside your house, but outside of it.
If you want to be 100% sure that your homeowners, renters, and/or car insurances carry over, call them or read the policies for yourself. If you pay for the rental using a credit card, the card company may automatically give you some coverage, so its worth calling them as well.
What if you’re not renting, but borrowing somebody’s car?
If you already have your own auto insurance, you don’t have to worry. Also, the car insurance of the lender will transfer over to you. What if you want to borrow someones car and don’t have your own insurance?
If you don’t have you own auto insurance coverage and want to borrow someone else’s car, liability coverage may come back to haunt you. Although the lenders liability will transfer over to you, if it is not enough to pay for damages, which you are responsible, you have to pay the difference. If you don’t have a car you can make sure this doesn’t happen by getting a nonowners policy. Of course, if you’re not guilty in an accident, the other persons liability coverage will pay for the damages (although this may not be the case in some states).
But whose going to pay for damages done to the car that was given to you? The owner of the car will pay if they have comprehensive and/or collision coverage. Or you may pay if you have these two coverages.
Tags: auto insurance, car insurance, insurance, short term car insurance, temporary car insurance