Car Insurance For Low Mileage Drivers

How To Save With Low

Owning a car can be pricey. Theres the potential car payment, gas, and repairs as well as auto insurance.

If you dont drive much, you might be overpaying for auto insurance. We found that traditional auto insurance is unfair for many drivers, leaving a whopping 65 percent of drivers overpaying for coverage. So what can you do? One place to start is to look for low-mileage car insurance.

Heres everything you might want to learn about insurance for low-mileage drivers, what it means, and where you can find car insurance for low-mileage drivers without breaking the bank.

How To Get Cheaper Car Insurance With Discounts

Now that you’ve determined how much car insurance you need, shop around between insurers and apply all discounts possible.

Once you know how much coverage to buy, it’s time to compare car insurance companies. Even when you opt for the exact same coverage levels with two different insurers, one company could be much cheaper for you than another based on how it calculates its rates.

It’s easier than ever to compare cheap insurance quotes using online quote tools. But you may want to talk to an insurance agent to ensure you get the most accurate quote possible.

By talking to an agent, you can see if you qualify for discounts that may not be applied in the online quote tool process. Car insurance discounts are generally broken into four categories:

Will Low Mileage Auto Insurance Help Me Save

Low mileage insurance entirely depends on how much you are driving. If you are someone who works from home or uses public vehicles more than your private car then this can be beneficial for you.

But if you are dependent on your car for everything like work, grocery shopping, Sunday outing, picking up your kids, etc. Then low mileage insurance can not help you to save money.

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What Is Annual Mileage For Car Insurance

In very simple terms annual mileage is the distance a driver covers by his or her car throughout the year. You might be using your car to commute to work, go on road trips, pick up your kids, and even for shopping.

Throughout the year we do all the above activities several times and each time we cover some distance it gets included in our annual mileage. Your car insurance company will then check the annual mileage to decide your insurance rates.

How To Compare Car Insurance Quotes

First of all, every car insurance rate quote you receive should be free, whether its from Geico, Farmers or a small insurer youve never heard of. Some auto insurers require a down payment to start your policy, but a simple quote estimate should always be free. Heres how to start comparing quotes.

1. Gather your information

To quickly and easily compare car insurance quotes, have the following on hand:

• Personal information: The address, date of birth, occupation, drivers license and marital status of everyone you want included on the policy.

• Vehicle information: Mileage, date of purchase and Vehicle Identification Number for each car. Or, if you havent purchased the car yet, have mileage, make, model and year handy.

• Driving history: Include all claims, violations and tickets youve had over the past five years, plus any completed driving courses.

• Current or previous insurers name for anyone on the policy or in your household. Some insurers wont cover you without some coverage history, and if you want to exclude anyone living with you from the policy, youll need to prove theyre covered elsewhere.

2. Choose the right liability car insurance coverage levels

Types of liability coverage

They come in thousand-dollar increments, so when you choose 100/300/100 limits, youre choosing:

Understand car insurance requirements in your state

3. Decide if you need full coverage car insurance

Comprehensive vs. Collision Coverage

4. Collect and compare car insurance quotes

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Cheapest Car Insurance For Safe And Low

If you drive less than average or are generally a safe driver, a usage-based or pay-per-mile auto insurance company such as Metromile may be the cheapest insurance for you.

Metromile was one of the first companies in the U.S. to determine car insurance quotes largely based on mileage. How much driving is too much when shopping with Metromile? Generally, for Metromile to be a good deal, you should drive fewer than 10,000 miles per year.

Usage-based insurance is often cheaper than standard car insurance because your rates are largely based on how often and how well you drive. It’s a good option for people who are generally safe drivers but can’t find cheap rates elsewhere because they’re young, have poor credit, live in a congested city or have other risk factors that raise their insurance rates.

That means Metromile could offer cheap car insurance for people who are retired or work from home, students who live on campus and young drivers with a clean driving record.

The biggest downside to Metromile is that it’s only available in eight states: Arizona, California, Illinois, New Jersey, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Virginia and Washington. If you don’t live in one of those states, consider other telematics programs that offer discounts for less driving or safer driving, like Nationwide, Liberty Mutual or State Farm.

How Does The Geico Low Mileage Discount Work

As with other car insurance companies that offer similar discounts, the GEICO low mileage discount works by offering lower rates to drivers who drive less. When applying for a policy, you are typically asked to self-report your estimated annual mileage, and those who claim a lower number are likely to see lower monthly rates than those who drive more frequently.

This might lead to some confusion surrounding the word discount. The savings you may see as a result of low mileage are not necessarily the result of a special deal like the GEICO safe driver discount or GEICO affiliation discounts. Rather, you are simply quoted lower rates if you report lower mileage. Most people refer to this as the GEICO low mileage discount even if it isnt technically a discount.

You may also be able to get a low mileage discount through GEICO by enrolling in the insurers DriveEasy program. This program offers another way for occasional drivers to save by tracking mileage with a telematics device. GEICO touts savings of up to 20% through this program, thus offering another potential route for discounted rates in exchange for low mileage.

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What Is Considered Low Mileage

Car insurance companies consider people who drive less than 7,500 miles per year to be low-mileage drivers, generally speaking.

Dont take this as gospel, though. Some companies consider anything under 12,000 miles per year to be low mileage. Others consider anything under 10,000 miles to be low mileage. And yet others only consider you a low-mileage driver and reward you for it with better rates or a discount if you drive less than 5,000 miles per year.

The only way to know for sure if an auto insurance provider will lower your rates or give you a discount for low mileage is to contact them and find out.

How Can I Drive Less

Are you on the cusp of a low-mileage discount, and you want to put fewer miles on your car? There are a few common strategies to get your mileage under 7,500 miles per year. You can use public transportation or a rideshare service to get where you need to go. You could also walk or ride a bike, which gives you the added benefit of exercise.

You can arrange for carpooling with coworkers or classmates. Or you can opt to work from home more often if your job allows you to. When running errands, group your tasks together and try to do them all at once.

These tips may not turn a high-mileage driver into a low-mileage driver, but they can still reduce the number of miles you drive. Remember, driving less has a ton of benefits:

• You lower your maintenance costs.

• You lower your fuel costs.

• You pollute less.

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Best Car Insurance Companies For Low

What is considered low mileage for car insurance?

Most insurance providers consider drivers who put fewer than 7,500 miles on their car per year low-mileage drivers. However, some insurance companies will consider drivers with any annual mileage of fewer than 13,000 miles to qualify for a low-mileage discount.

After reviewing thousands of quotes, we found that the best car insurance for low-mileage drivers were not necessarily the most well-known insurers. Smaller companies, like First Chicago, offered the cheapest car insurance rates based on usage.

Below are the five cheapest insurers, on average, for low-mileage drivers.

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Companies That Offer Pay

Many companies offer discounts for not driving far. These four companies, however, offer actual pay-per-mile car insurance.

The companies, and the states they currently operate in, are listed below. If your state isn’t listed, you still may want to check with the company these things are constantly changing. Its worth noting that ByMile, Liberty Mutuals pay-per-mile program, is no longer listed on the companys website.

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We’re Miles Ahead When It Comes To Rewarding Low

Progressive rewards infrequent drivers through our Snapshot® program. Snapshot personalizes your rate based on your ACTUAL driving, and it’s available in nearly every state. Snapshot rewards drivers on a few key factors: How, how much, and when they drive. If you’re a frequent driver, you can still earn a cheaper car insurance rate with Snapshot, especially if you drive safely and limit driving during higher risk hours. The highest risk hours are between midnight and 4 a.m.

See more on how you can save with Snapshot. You can also give it a try without switching from your current insurer by signing up for the Snapshot Road Test®.

Looking for more information about auto insurance? Our car insurance resource center has you covered.

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Why Do People Shop For New Car Insurance

Shopping around for car insurance can result in savings, but many car owners renew their policies each year without checking prices from other insurance companies.

A March 2022 Forbes Advisor survey of 2,000 drivers asked what would motivate them to shop for a new car insurance policy. More than half said any of these three reasons would get them to shop around:

• A bad experience with a car insurance claim
• Looking for a better price
• Current company doesnt have the coverage types I want

Older drivers chose price as the No. 1 reason to shop around, while bad claims experiences and coverage types were tops for younger drivers .

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Chances Are You’re Overpaying For Your Insurance Policy

Once you know how much coverage you need, the best way to find cheap car insurance is to compare quotes from multiple companies.

ValuePenguin analyzed nationwide insurance rates and found that a driver looking for a state-mandated insurance policy the minimum coverage required overpays by an average of $384 per year. Extrapolated across the country as a whole, this means Americans are overpaying for car insurance by almost $41 billion per year.

This can be done online, as most companies have quote tools that can be used to get car insurance rates. Additionally, if you prefer to work with an actual person when looking for car insurance, you could talk to an independent insurance agent who can help you compare rates from multiple companies.

How Does Mileage Affect Car Insurance

Quick Answer

Car insurance companies use your annual mileage to set your premiums. If you drive above the average annual mileage, you may incur higher car insurance costs.

In this article:

• Other Ways to Save on Car insurance

Mileage is one of many factors car insurance companies use to set your premiums. Since drivers who spend more time on the road are statistically more likely to have accidents, higher annual mileage can mean higher insurance costs. Fortunately, there are steps you can take to reduce your insurance costs.

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Insurer Estimate Of Mileage

Another way to get low-mileage auto insurance is to allow your coverage provider to monitor or track how much you drive per year. Sometimes this is done using a telematics device that plugs into your vehicle at other times, its done using an app downloaded to your phone. In both cases, your insurer uses the device or app to track your driving behavior and habits. Older cars are usually incompatible with these devices.

You may receive your low-mileage rebate or discount via an insurance companys pay-per-mile program or usage-based program. Although the goals of these programs tend to differ, the result is the same especially for your auto insurance rates.

Not all companies have usage-based or pay-per-mile programs, though. And those that have them usually dont offer them in all states. So you may need to shop around a bit to find low-mileage car insurance like this.

Its All About You We Want To Help You Make The Right Coverage Choices

Advertiser Disclosure: We strive to help you make confident insurance decisions. Comparison shopping should be easy. We are not affiliated with any one insurance provider and cannot guarantee quotes from any single provider.Our insurance industry partnerships dont influence our content. Our opinions are our own. To compare quotes from many different insurance companies please enter your ZIP code on this page to use the free quote tool. The more quotes you compare, the more chances to save.

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Heres What You Need to Know

• Low mileage car insurance costs $1,400 per year
• The top three low mileage car insurance companies are Metromile, USAA, and GEICO
• Metromile and Nationwide offer the best pay-per-mile insurance programs

Do you have a short commute, take public transportation, or work from home? Then, you may qualify for cheap car insurance rates with low mileage car insurance.

While the average driver puts between 13,500 and 14,500 miles on their car per year, low mileage drivers can save around $300 or more on car insurance if they drive 6,000 miles or less annually. If you drive even fewer miles, you may want to consider pay-per-mile car insurance.

Depending on your needs, you may be able to earn discounts with your current company or reduce your rates by switching to pay-per-mile insurance.

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Ways To Save On Car Insurance

Now comes the most important section of our blog how you can save some money while purchasing car insurance? Below are some tried and tested ways you can try:

We all need multiple policies like life insurance, homeowners insurance, renters insurance, car insurance, etc. By bundling all the different policies you can get into the list of VIP customers of the company and they will provide you with much lower rates.

There are different types of discounts available for every driver based on his or her profile. You can get a good drivers discount, students discount, low mileage discount, military or federal employee discount, and many more. By combining two or more discounts to your policy you can get even lower rates.

Your talks a lot about your profile. Drivers with good credit scores get lower insurance rates as compared to others. So all you have to do is pay all your bills and loans on time.

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Cheapest Car Insurance Quotes For Military Members: Usaa

USAA covers drivers in all 50 states and Washington, D.C., but only active military members, veterans and their families may be eligible. However, as the fifth-largest auto insurance company in the country, it serves almost as many drivers as other big names like Progressive and Allstate.

USAA stands out for more than just affordable rates: It also has one of the best customer service reputations in the industry. The company takes the top spots in J.D. Power’s Auto Insurance Claims Satisfaction Study every year. USAA also has a low complaint index from the National Association of Insurance Commissioners , which means customers don’t have many complaints about support or claims.

What Is Milewise And How Does It Work

Milewise is an auto insurance product that gives you more control over your insurance costs and gives feedback on your driving. Choose the Pay-Per-Mile vehicle option, the Unlimited vehicle option, or a combination of both. With the Pay-Per-Mile option, you pay a low daily rate and Per-Mile rate when you drive. Unlimited vehicles are only assessed a Daily Rate, regardless of miles driven.

Both Milewise options offer the same convenient billing process: when your account reaches its minimum balance, it’s automatically replenished via the credit on file. Milewise works with an easy-to-use mobile app and/or website as well as a small device that plugs into your vehicle’s diagnostic port, which is usually under the steering column. The device detects how much you drive for the most accurate Pay-Per-Mile cost and ensures Unlimited vehicles experience the full benefits of Milewise like trip info, account details and Allstate Rewards points.

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