Establishing Insurable Value

[fromage]

How are most establishing the value of their early 911 with insurance companies. I have had my head in the sand about the increasing value of our cars. Recent offerrings and sales have had lofty prices. Project cars are selling for much more than their original sticker. No one wants to lose their car, but stuff can happen. I don't want to leave money on the table should something go wrong, ( hypothetically ) knowing that I could have sold it for 150,000 yesterday, yet have an adjuster offer 4999 for the 40 plus year old car today.

[jim amato]

i have "agreed value" insurance, the more that is "agreed: the higher the premium, i would go with a company that specializes in collector car insurance,ie; hagerty,american collector,j.c. taylor, or leland west, i know of a car that was in an accident and covered by j c taylor,i dont know the details but in the end the owner was satisfied with outcome,ther are alot of variables, such as mileage,do you commute with it,and different deductables,also you should have a current valuation of car from a third party,pca does this for free for members

[beh911]

Hagerty Insurance web site has a section that shows what individual cars are being insured for. It has a key to help you determine what classification your car may fall into, but as mentioned above, there are many variables and tradeoffs.

I recently upped the insured value on my car due to feedback from people in the know and my own sense I was becoming underinsured. Hagerty obviously asked me for justification for the requested increase but were a pleasure to work with.

There are other threads on this site regarding insurance that are useful.

[hoffman912]

+1. I have hagerty and they insure at a stated value. its the only way to go

i have a friend who uses grundy. when his 356 was totaled when a van coming from the opposite direction plowed him, they paid full value, no questions
when that same friend had his 912 roll over after letting a friend drive it at a 912 event (his friend lifted in a turn, got squirly, spun, hit the side of the hill and flipped), grundy again paid full agreed value, no questions.

I have heard hagerty is the same way. no questions asked...

[Sepia911S]

Hagerty! When the car was insured in May 2010, it was agreed upon value ... which was low. At that time, I didn't know the value of the car. After the St. Charles Parade, the car was appraised much higher through PCA. Hagerty accepted the appraisal immediately. The insurance will be reviewed every year. The car needs to be insured appropriately.

[fromage]

Hagerty value estimater... everyone not current on the value should take a look at their value estimater... it shows 5 levels of value... has a graph of price trend
over the last few years... it's not absolute or specific but gets the general idea of value... it also offers a insurance quote... in my case it confirmed that I was underinsured and the best part is it showed that I was paying too much for insurance through a normal channel insurance agency...

buying or selling a collector car... definitely take a look, you will get a general guide on value which then can be fine tuned...I checked some values I was current on and they were in line with my thoughts...

beh911... good call on the value estimator, it sometimes is hard to get a consus value on a collector car...

[MountainRoads]

I'll give a thumbs-up to "agreed-value" and to Hagerty, as well. Not a plug - doubtless others are good too. All dealings (thankfully not claim-related) have been professional and courteous. They've always given me straight answers to any questions I had. For examle: Why do my premiums go up every year when I haven't filed a claim and the car's value is fixed?" Answer: "Because not all claims are totals and these cars are getting more expensive to fix." OK, that makes sense, I guess. Also, they provide a multi-car discount.

I also did the PCA-member evaluation report too, as a sanity-checker.

- MR

[geshaghi]

I have several classic cars insured with Hagerty and they've been very easy to deal with and reasonably priced. Thankfully, the only claim I've ever had to make was for a cracked windshield, which they paid quickly and without any issue.

[69Sman]

Recently switched from Hagerty to Chubb, Chubb much easier to raise agreed values.

[MountainRoads]

Recently switched from Hagerty to Chubb, Chubb much easier to raise agreed values.

Interesting. I just raised the agreed-to on my '71E and they didn't ask any questions. One additional thing I'll throw out about Hagerty is they draw a distinction between "stock" and "modified". Stock = minimum hassle. "Modified" means additional questions and documentation requirements. In my case it was a matter of a non-stock engine. Thankfully I was under the +50 bhp limit for stock. Otherwise it would have been"modified" classification for me.

- MR