Unethical financial question

[ttex]

I got liability for my 39 year old boat from Progressive five minutes after I bought it using their website on my phone. $120.

[valhalla360]

Is this possibly a wood boat?

Really, for a $10k boat, the risk to the insurance company isn't much different between full coverage and liability only...t-bone a $500k boat and send her to the bottom...$510k vs $500k is a rounding error. Add in that old cheap boats are often more prone to problems that could result in claims, you can see why they might encourage you not to buy from them.

[Breaking Waves]

Originally Posted by ttex

I got liability for my 39 year old boat from Progressive five minutes after I bought it using their website on my phone. $120.

out of curiosity - is the boat in a hurricane area? and does the policy cover wreck removal?

[mlydon]

Talk to an actual marine insurance broker. Ask about what is known as 'harbor risk' coverage, whixh is a full policy, for when the boat is laid up in harbor or ashore.

Matt

[anotherT34C]

Geico did the same to me. Required full coverage, told me I wouldn’t qualify for liability only. Cost is somewhat more than 1% of insured value.

I’m ok with the cost for now, but will probably shop around soonish.

[a64pilot]

Liabilities expense compared to full coverage for a boat worth say $2,000 ought to not to be much different in price.
Reason is exposure, the Insurence Co has a Million dollars of exposure or whatever the limit is if you go on the rocks in an Estuary or other sensitive area, but only have a $2,000 exposure on the boat.
So what your saying is illogical.

I raised my Insurence last year by about 50% based on an evaluation survey on the work I had done to the boat. I expected a 50% increase in Insurence premiums of course, but the increase was almost insignificant, I couldn’t understand that and it was explained to me that what I pay for more than anything and what the Insurence company worries about is that 1 Mil environmental clean up fee, not paying me for the value of the boat.

[Island Time O25]

The last boat show I attended, Feb 2020, of about a dozen or so insurance reps there, only one was even remotely interested in liability only for a 40 year old 36' boat. And his ball park quote was well over $500, the limit I expected based on all the claims here of having such policy "for a few hundred dollars a year".

So much for "who is scamming who" argument.

[anotherT34C]

AFAIK, for my ~100k USD boat from the mid 80s, the only insurance I could get was a full coverage policy costing north of a grand/year. It looked like it was that or nothing. Didn’t shop extensively, just with the well knowns.

[a64pilot]

To add to my earlier statement of Insurence not going up much when I increased it, I also when I got the new dinghy a few years ago insured it for $10,000. I called and asked if they would and how much would it cost. The answer really surprised me, the bill went down, the reason why was I now get a multi boat discount.
You can’t use what seems logical with Insurence, you have to call and ask.

[LastMango]

a64pilot, which insurance company do you have?

[smac999]

If the boat is financed. The bank may require full insurance.

[Boatguy30]

I've never seen too many boatyards that concerned about anything but liability......YET
The last yard I hauled I'm friendly with the office person and she asked "you have insurance right" and I thought I still had my Boat US liability but I guess I'd cancelled it the year before. Oops.

Anyway, maybe best just to move on and leave the boat (aI should say I misread and thought you were given the boat) Get more educated about boat ownership and decide if it's for you. In many states it's getting much harder and more expensive.

And I have to say if a boatyard gets wiped out by a hurricane and boats fall all over, it isn't going to matter if his boat had insurance or not. Wreck removal will be a few more minutes with a bull dozer or the yard will pick it back up to get to other boats that have insurance. No big deal. Unless the Karma gets you. So basically you need to get liability or give the boat back

[Sailor279]

Definitely shop around and consider if you might incur damage from a storm before you forego proper ins. If you can’t afford hull insurance, can you afford to replace the boat in the event of a storm/hurricane? Boat I’ve raced on for years got blown off it’s cradle (properly strapped by reputable yard) by a 96 mph gust during Sandy and keel nearly ripped off. Insurance paid max value.

[marshmat]

Boat insurance isn't like car insurance. It's not a standard product where everyone's policies are based on the same set of government-issued documents (give or take a few options). Every carrier does something different, and some just won't touch certain markets.

For an older boat, i.e. anything built more than 15 or at most 20 years ago, the only thing to do is keep shopping around, keep calling independent insurance brokers, until you find one that's willing to deal. Some are willing to insure older boats, but only with a perfectly clean survey - this is part of why there's a market for shoddy, cursory "insurance surveys" that spit out a valuation and no recommendations. Others will extend liability & comprehensive coverage on-the-hard only until any repairs stemming from the survey are complete. I'm not sure where the OP is located, but we're happy enough with April Marine (central Canada) so far for our 45-year-old boat, and Desjardins also made a decent bid with a clever blanket-liability policy that put $1m third-party coverage on the boat itself plus another $1m that would apply to the boat, cars, homeowner's liability, etc. wherever it was needed.

A liability-only policy, for $2m third-party on a $20k boat, would only cost about 1% to 5% more than one which also provides comprehensive coverage of the boat itself on a fair-market-value basis. Hence why almost nobody offers liability-only.


As for taking out a policy for a couple of months and then cancelling, no, they won't let you do that. For policies under about $1k/year in total premiums, there's often (usually?) a 1-year minimum term and the first year's payment is 100% up front.


It's pretty hard to go without it in a developed country. A boat without any insurance stands a good chance of being barred from most marinas and is frowned upon by bureaucrats, who look at the boat and then look at the potential cost of cleaning things up if it were to drag anchor and break up in a seal breeding sanctuary.