Dave’s Garage (RIP 159, Bye Bus and Hello Mercedes)

2400 for insurance? How much did the car itself cost?

Yeah in many countries insurance premiums are much much higher the younger you are and the less experience you have. It’ll drop pretty rapidly if you remain claim free and don’t get DQed for driving offences (if you do, well, that’s another story). In Australia there’s a specific premium for (male) under 25s as they comprise the vast majority of significant claims. My insurance premiums basically halved after that point.

It was £450, we haggled £50 off :joy:

It is the same here, insurance dramatically changes at 25, up until then I just have to build up my no claims and hope I don’t do anything stupid :grin:

Either way, for somene who hasn’t proven themselves to be an unsafe driver, that’s highway robbery.

Exactly, but I suppose that’s where the telematics box comes in to play

Young drivers insurance in the UK has become extortionately expensive.
My 1st car in 1990 was an '86 Fiat Uno 45s, the insurance was £350 (Fully Comp).
In todays prices that should be between £710-£902 (according to https://www.measuringworth.com/ukcompare/), yet you’re lucky to get insurance for anything less than £2K. (I know I’ve tried to get insurance for my 19yr old son on something similar).
Insurance companies will claim “statistics” prove they’re right but personally I think they are abusing the maths.
(Some of the worst examples of bone headed driving I have seen were from senior drivers, who according to insurance companies are safer and attract lower premiums.)
IMO if insurance companies insist on charging these prices then they should refund you at least half your premium, if you remain claim free for that 1st year, since you were not the risk they thought you were.

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The worst part of this is that insurance companies are so harsh with certain cars. For instance, the Ford Fiesta is really popular as first car and they’re are plenty on the market, meaning the prices are fairly low. But. because it’s popular and ‘more people have accidents in them’, they charge way more for insurance, even if it’s a Group 3 or Group 4 car.

Worse still is how they sometimes even charge you for different trim levels. The cheapest car I ever managed to find insurance for was a base model Toyota Aygo from 2006, with the quote at about £900. But, if I wanted that very same basic trim level with Air Con, it suddenly rose to £1012. Because why the hell not.

Best advice I can give to you @CadillacDave is a black box, like you say. I’m with Direct Line and they were pretty much the cheapest company I could find for my car, plus they have great customer service.

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I have seen quite a lot of bad senior drivers, my grandad tells me that half of them have probably never done a driving test and that half of them just drove a tank in the army and got their license that way. I really think they should refund half the premium if you are a good driver also but they want to milk is of all our money

I think I have the base level trim except it’s probably tha alloy wheels doing it, it is rediculous how the moment sport is in the name (even if it is a 660cc car for example) or has alloy wheels the insurance sky rockets

I think black box is the only way to go as I am a smooth and calm driver and don’t decide to drive like Colon McRae on the back roads of Hampshire :joy: I can’t go anywhere fast in that car anyway as the 0-60 is about 14 seconds

Now that’s just crazy. Surely, insurance companies know that of course a car that more people drive will be more likely to be in more accidents, right? Isn’t a Toyota Corolla more likely to crash or be crashed into than a Dodge Neon? Right? Tell me people aren’t full of this much bullshit. How did it get that bad in the first place?

The excuses you get out of them here for knocking the price up are outstanding. My friends Nissan 350Z had a tracker, which you would assume would make it more likely to recover from theft and so cheaper, yes? Nope, costs more to replace in a crash, premium went up £200 if he declared it. And that “there’s more of them” mentality also explains how as a 23 year old, it’s cheaper for me to insure my GT86 than it was to insure my Prius. Mental.

This whole car insurance thing is just a big scam, my car is classed as a family car but because they are so popular a lot of people crash and steal them and newer cars also get cheaper insurance because they think we will be more ‘careful’. If your Prius was new then the insurance on that should have been cheaper as it is an enviromentally aware car

This is why I will only ever use my car insurance under one of 2 conditions: Theft, or Total loss. Luckily, neither of those have happened yet. My insurance is really cheap despite me being an 18 year old male, only because of the fact that I have the most basic plan allowed, and a rather high deductible (I only drive beaters. I’m not putting comprehensive coverage on something I maintain with junkyard parts). If the Galant dies, I can make most of my $2500 back by just parting it out and scrapping the rest. Hell, I might even be able to turn a profit!

There is a policy you can get here that is 3rd party fire and theft which is generally cheaper and only covers you if your car gets nicked or burnt to a crisp or if you plough into the arse of someones £30K Jag but will not pay out for damages done to my car, this policy is cheaper and I am considering it. At the end of the day if I crash my car I generally wouldn’t care as much as I could get an almost identical car for cheaper or just opt for financing a new car that does free insurance

How does free insurance there work?

Basically you finance a car with a garanteur, the manufacture of the car offers an insurance deal where for the first year or two are covered by them and the deals are usually good but you do need to put a deposit down of about £1,500, I know Peugeot do a good deal

over 10k zlotives for car that has engine capacity under 2 litres? Woah, I thought 2 thousand zlotives is a lot for insurance, I was wrong ;_;

Did a bit of spring cleaning on the interior, it amazing what a Hoover, magic sponge and cheap dash polish can do.

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that’s a tidy looking motor for it’s age, seen a lot worse from a younger car.
Nice Job you’ve done there. :thumbsup:

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Thank you :thumbsup:
All I have to do now is make the outside shine