We're insured through Farmer's and bundle home and auto. We've been with them a long time and have a good track record so are afforded several discounts as a result but the premiums still go up.

You can raise your deductables if you feel you'll be able to cover them in case of car accidents or home damage - your agent should be able to discuss options with you and help with cost/vs benefit.

For us, unless it's something catastrophic, DH would handle any repair (he's is in the hope remodeling business) so a low deductible makes no sense for us. But there are usually limits - like if you have $x as your car deductible, you can't have more than $x on home. We've taken the highest deductible we can within our limits. Also, for us it makes sense to keep the home value lower because of our ability to repair/replace. But we value contents much higher and schedule many things separately.

Hi Stinky -

We have Farm Bureau. We have been very well pleased with it. We have auto, boat and home owners with them. My hubby also has a life insurance policy with them. I feel we have had very fair rates. We built our home 11 years ago. Last year, our agent contacted us because our house was ten years old and we qualified for a discount as it fell out of the *new home* category. We also have a discount for having multiple policies, and a security system.

We have dealt with them twice due to serious hail damage (apparently we are in hail alley! LOL). They were very good to deal with. We had no problems with them and had full replacement of hail damaged items. Our rates did not go up after our claim. I cannot remember what our yearly home owners rate this year was, but I do not think we had any kind of increase or I would remember.

Hope this helps!

tina

Stinky, we have State Farm and, also, bundle.

They were one of the only companies to offer a special kind of insurance, that DH wanted, but we couldn't buy that coverage separately.

We just got a mail offer, from another company, who quoted a savings of $300 a month more than we're paying, now.

They haven't raised our rates.

We had Amica for about 7 years, for auto and tenants-then-homeowners, until this last move and their rates went from steep to outrageous because we moved from Yupville to Craptown (and a slightly iffy neighborhood in Craptown to boot). Switched over to MetLife and bundled car, home, and long-term disability for DH. (We get DH's life insurance from SBLI, which had by far the best rates I found with a reputable company.) I did a lot of shopping around - I think I spent two solid days on the phone, and I hate the phone with a passion. Haven't been thrilled with our agent - he's a perfectly nice person but I can never get him on the phone so I do everything like policy adjustments directly through MetLife customer service. Their customer service has been dandy. We had a couple of auto claims (vandalism, DH getting hit with a snowplow) through Amica and dealing with them was kind of a PITA, lots of phone tag. When we cancelled our Amica policy in 2007 you still had to deal with regional offices that were open banker's hours instead of 24/7 (including holidays), hopefully they've gone to a more sensible customer service setup.

Just had our auto policy renewal with MetLife - DH got a speeding ticket (a four-pointer, I could have killed him) and I was in two minor accidents (both times frickin' monster SUVs backed into me in parking lots, claiming they "couldn't see" a station wagon behind them) in the last year but our premiums only went up a tiny bit because DH traded in his hunkajunk for a new vehicle. I was surprised at how little more it cost to insure the VeeDub - like DH works for an auto-home-life insurance company (if you throw tomatoes, throw ripe ones I can cook with, please! LOL) and even with the employee discount the rates were some 20% higher than MetLife's, comparing apples to apples on coverage. Crazy, huh?

Dlm, Tina & Parma, it's nice hearing from you. Sounds like y'all have found companies & policies that you're pleased with! It's helpful to hear about some of the other options out there. Thanks for sharing!

Johnmari, thanks!

Wow, your dh works in the industry & you still found a better deal with Met! Interesting. I throw no tomatoes, just feel the industry is rather intimidating and complex, & yet the coverage provided is so important, & yes, pricey. That't the case with ANY sort of insurance. We all know what a dog-eat-dog world the health care insurance biz is!

Surely you do not do your environment justice when you speak about it in such harsh terms. Insurance costs in my part of VA are higher because we live in hurricane alley. We're closer to the ocean here. Some weather or geographic feature must distinguish your area as "high risk" as well. Anyway, I'm glad that through a number of phone calls you were able to get a much better rate with Met.

Again, thanks for the info!

The "high risk" factor in our case that changed our rates so drastically with Amica was a higher crime rate (but still lower than most urban areas) and lower per-capita income (yes, they do take that into account in risk management) in my "new" town versus the old one - which, BTW, are only about 35 miles apart - rather than meteorological conditions or geography.

I live in NH and mostly it's just snow and ice storms here, with the very rare moderate hailstorm; my car and DH's previous one had a few dozen "dimples" from the last one of any note which I think was 2006, when we got some almond-size nuggets. Maybe once every 10 years we'll get the verrrry tail end of a hurricane as it peters out over the North Atlantic. A bad winter nor'easter (blizzard) can do a good bit of damage, but that's the case anywhere in the northeastern US and Maritime Canada. Storm surges are a problem for those who live right on the shore but we couldn't do that without winning the lottery (and even then I wouldn't - the ocean is pretty to look at but it can also be very destructive, and I can think of better ways to spend the money!).

Thankfully DH is in the computer-geek part of the insurance company and has absolutely nothing to do with sales, claims or policy.

Doesn't hurt to shop around. We've had State Farm for 28 years and get multiple discounts, but our rates continue to rise because we live in a hurricane-prone state. Every year when the homeowner's premium comes due I have them check auto rates, but Allstate continues to be cheaper for auto, so bundling isn't an option for us.

We have had Amica for over 20 years, except for a short stint where we moved to an island and they wouldn't insure us. Auto, home, life and umbrella. We recently added a 16 yo driver, bought an expensive car, bought another new car and hubby got a whopper of a ticket. Our car insurance premium right now is ... yikes. We've had a few claims - water damage, minor accidents and we've been very happy with them. The premiums have been higher than friend's insurance, but the rebates (whatever they call it) help make things more reasonable and we have a pretty high level of coverage.

We are moving back to the island so I will be shopping around again. I'm interested to see if we will get any cheaper quotes. Honestly though, I think we are screwed. Living really near the ocean, teen driver, three cars, hubby's ticket, hubby's mid life crisis car ... sigh.

We previously had insurance with Ameriprise (they took over for AmEx) but they declined to cover our new house in late '07. By the time we were able to drop the coverage on our former home and four cars (incl. college kids), I was more than ready. I ended up with State Farm on a referral from our RE agent, and have been pleased so far. We've never had a HO claim and only a couple of car claims in over three decades with various companies.

My adult children use Progressive. Its quote was the best for dd's house, and their car rates were competitive, too.

We have had State Farm since 1979. We have had everything from 1 car on it to 3 and have had from no teens to 3 on it. We have had lots and lots of claims from small fender benders to total replacement of a car. We have had flooded house due to water from broken pipe in washer to roof damage . We have had a 70's house and now an 1890 house with them. We have run the gamut. They let us bundle everything and we even have 2 grown kids bundled on our policy.They pay me back every quarter for what I pay out of our chck acct. Our rates on cars have dropped consistently for all of us including the kids every year. We now pay $50 month premium on my truck. Our house insurance has creeped up but is not at all bad and remains in the ballpark it has been in since we moved here in 2002. I couldn't be better served. If we make a claim they always either cut a chk that day or mail it in less than a week. Our agent answers if we call him at home and used to literally live next door to us for 23 yrs LOL. So I think they are great. c

Natal, you're in hurricane alley too, huh? We're almost out of the woods now, right? I think the season officially ends Nov. 30?

Deee, so you'll soon be headed back to island living. What a drag! (lol) Thanks for sharing! I enjoyed your story. You make shopping for insurance sound fun. Expensive, but fun.

Rockmanor, thanks for suggesting Progressive. It must be a good clearance house for this purpose. I really should give it a try.

Trailrunner, wow, another State Farm fan! Hmmm, I see a trend here! You certainly give them a glowing recommendation. They should pay you to give this testimonial in a commercial (they could film you standing under your freshly stained pergola!) I think you'd sell a lot of insurance. Thanks for the info!

cute stinky !! Roll cameras ! c

We shopped for insurance a year or so ago, and based on a similar thread like this, I got quotes from Amica, Anpac, AAA (the auto club), and USAA. Since we got married, we had been using Erie for our home and USAA for auto (oddly, it was cheaper that way, even with the discount you get for putting everything with one company), then about 5 years ago, Erie jacked up their homeowner rates statewide, so we moved everything over to AmEx through Costco - going through Costco got us a discount over the regular Amex rates and it was a significant savings (close to four digits) over the Erie/USAA combo. We were happy with the Costco coverage but decided to shop around a year ago because they cheesed me off when they started charging a $3/mo convenience fee to charge my premium to my credit card (it had been free for years and they didn't tell me they were going to start charging the fee - it just showed up one day). I didn't really expect to find anything cheaper since the Costco rates had thoroughly trounced everyone else when I went with them, and they hadn't really gone up that much.

Anyhow, to make a long story short, Amica seemed to have good coverage, but there rates were MUCH higher than the Costco insurance. USAA was a bit higher than the Costco and AAA was right about even. We ended up going with Anpac (American Nattional Property and Casualty). They were a company that was recommended on the thread just like this one from someone who had filed a claim and been happy with the service. They have a local agent, their rates were fantastic (we saved almost $1K/year for the exact same coverage when we switched over from the Costco plan). Plus they have this thing where if you go claim free for 3 years, you start getting a percentage of your premium refunded to you at the end of each year. We're into our 2nd year now, so in another year and a half, we should start getting rebate checks from the insurance company - it's a significant percentage too -- something like 20%. I don't know how they're doing it since their premiums are already lower than all the competitors I checked. But I'm not going to complain, LOL!

I (knock on wood) haven't needed to file a claim so I don't know how that will be, but the agent is very responsive and I have no reason to think the company would give me a hard time. We do have fairly high deductibles since we figure it would take a lot to get us to file a claim that would ruin our claim-free streak and cut off our rebate checks, LOL!

Oh - for reference, we are in southeast PA - not a lot of significant weather stuff here, but we do get snow/ice/hail storms. We're in a fairly crime-free rural area and haven't filed a claim on either auto or home (other than a windshield chip or two) in about 10 years.

Good info here. We've got American Family (had auto then renters then HO) and it really bites. We have never had a claim for HO, do not live in any high risk area for natural disasters (no flood plain either), yet they are increasing our insurance annually.

We did cancel our auto and went with another co, and were to bundle with them but we're having miscommunication. So as to not be without coverage, we've stayed with AmFam for the time being. We get the 'long term patron' and 'claim free' discounts, but they're raising us over $150 for the year. Crazy.

We have State Farm and bundle as well. When my husband's car got broken into, State Farm was very quick to cut us a check for way more than the amount of what was stolen cost. They went above and beyond to make sure we were taken care of.

When we first looked at insurance, I wanted AAA, it sounded great at the time but we had a dog on their dangerous breed list (Akita). Farmer's had no dangerous breed list, they went off a history of claims, so we used them. Dh was in an accident (not his fault) and they handled everything very well. We liked our local agent. But they raised their rates which gave me the incentive to shop around and USAA was much cheaper for us.

Dh had a bad experience with Allstate many moons ago and will not even consider them.

Thanks everyone! There is a lot of good information here that I'm finding quite helpful. I'm sure this thread will be useful to many readers.

Ikplatow, I had no idea that AAA had home insurance. Went to the website & it looks interesting. I definitely want a quote from them. ANPAC is another one I want to check out. Thanks!

Sounds like you're shopping around too. Good luck!

Roobear, another State Farm user. Sounds very good...thanks!

Tish, wow, I never knew the breed of one's dog factored in! Of course, if these companies knew what my cat was like, sheesh, I'd never get insurance! Let's just keep that our little secret. (lol) Glad you are one of those lucky USAA people now.

WOW! Look at this article on pets and insurance for your home...

Here is a link that might be useful: Homeowners Insurance and pets...

Interesting link, Trailrunner! Thanks! I never, ever would have guessed that a homeowner's dog could be a deal breaker for insurance!

Btw, my cat, Jasmine, is up in arms about the little joke I made at her expense. To set the record straight, she is truly the sweetest, most good-natured cat in the world. She lets me clean her ears with q-tips & drop cold liquid medicine in them, all the while remaining a very good sport. She's so good! Jasmine, your sterling reputation is officially restored!

I did see another link about why one needs to make sure and have coverage that includes "cat scratching the postman" ...thought you would love it...glad Jasmine is a good girl :)