Called my insurance agent yesterday to see if I could get the Miata flat-rated at a certain value, he said they only do that with antique/classic cars. He asked why I wanted that, and I said down the road I might modify the Miata by putting a different engine in it. He called his superior, who told him they wouldn’t insure it if I did that.
Now, I still need to go through my policy and verify this 100%, but what do you other heavily modified people for insurance? Specialty providers, or do you just hope you never wreck it?
I just had a policy written on my GTO & Truck. After what happened to my parents 2 months ago (lightning struck their house & burned to the ground), I couldn’t see going without proper insurance. My dad lost 3 classic vehicles in the fire. They were under insured, and he lost out BIG time.
My truck is treated as an “exotic” in Hagerty’s terms & is priced much higher than my GTO. The GTO is worth waaay more than the truck, but it is a classic & is stock. They didn’t even care if the restoration was completed. They just needed pics of the work being done to it. The truck was a little tougher to get coverage. I basically had to email them some pics & plead them to cover it. I would imagine this is what you will need to do with your Miata.
Make sure you have a clean driving record, the car is stored in a garage year round, you have a general use vehicle, and do not use the Miata for business purposes. You are probably better off calling them & discussing your car with a rep.
They require you to pay the premium in full each year, as they do not do payments. I think my truck was about $550/yr for $25K in stated value coverage. The GTO is less than 1/2 that for the same coverage.
Hagerty’s has a great track record & was cheaper than at least 3 other classic insurance companies.
Well, I’d like to insure the Miata for somewhere in the area of 18-20k. I’m currently paying I believe 750-ish a year for full coverage, so it seems like Haggerty’s prices aren’t bad at all.
The problem is that it’s my only car, and at the moment I don’t have the income (read: no legal income) for a second vehicle. However, I don’t put any miles on it anyways. I may have driven over 5k a year once in my four years of driving, so maybe that’ll help.
Thanks for the replies though, guys. Looks like I’ll have some calls to make!
“Regular-use vehicles. Each licensed household driver needs to have a regular-use vehicle for daily driving and must maintain regular-use insurance in his or her own name.”
no it doesnt suck, they dont want just anyone with and old car to drive on their insurance. its keeps the rates low for people to enjoy their sunday drivers.
They already have selective approvals, so either way they aren’t going to insure any old heaps. That doesn’t apply to me. It just so happens that my primary car is also rather “pricey.”
As of now, yes, I plan on driving the Miata through the Winter.
I may not, though. My uncle has a beater Lincoln I might pick up, I haven’t fully decided just yet. It depends. I have an interview at a bank this week. If I get that, I’ll for sure pick up a beater of some sort.
I had State Farm. They would not do the agreed value on my truck, because of the extensive engine mods (of all things, this is their issue???). I would think this is going to be the same with his Miata.
thats not their point. a car thats driven daily is more likely to get into an accident. they dont want to insure a car like that because it would then screw the rest of us who dont drive ours daily… this is what keeps the price down. less chance of an accident and less occurance of accidents because they aren’t primary drivers.
x2, i couldn’t do didly squat with this exact same procedure on my nissan, i plan on turbo swapping it and wanted to cover it like you are, i just went and had it put on my moms policy since all the vehicles are titled in her name and got it down to like 100 every 6 months