Wealth Today

My wife and I were previously traveling on our way home on LBJ Freeway’s HOV lane in Dallas. We enjoy ride sharing because the HOV lane cuts the trip’s duration almost in half. Since there’s no traffic, we get to move at 50-70mph when everyone else is stopped on the four lane parking lot. The lane is protected with double solid white lines and those lines occasionally change to an unprotected single dashed line where everyone slows down to allow people to change in and out of the HOV lane.

About a year ago we were in an accident when another person traveling at about 0mph, breaking the law, crossed those lines. We  were hurt and our car was pretty mangled.

It happened again. This time though, I did not hit the other person. Fortunately, no one was hurt. However, my tires were flat-spotted from the hard-braking action. I buy good tires, Yamaha YK420, and have always appreciated their road worthiness. I buy the free replacement filters as way of protecting those tires. Since the tires are destroyed, I have to replace them. The certificate doesn’t help because it’s not considered a road hazard. How frustrating! Last time the insurance took care of the tires. This time, there’s no insurance involved. That one person’s foolishness cost $190USD this time. Thankfully, I had some cash saved in my freedom savings account that helped with that.

Here’s some advice. If you do it to me again, get out of your car with a wad of cash. It would be better to at very minimum, have the courtesy of looking in the lane and not pulling in front of someone. Rather though, please wait for the single dashed line where other courteous driver’s have slowed down and given you freedom to safely enter or exit the HOV lane. This is where you’re not breaking the law and endangering your life or someone else’s.

After 8 years with Progressive, I switched. I called my local State Farm agent and did a quote over the phone. My automobile insurance now is a LOT better, and I saved almost 33%.

I put my wife on the policy, so she is now covered for the first time in our marriage. I increased my coverage significantly from what I had previously. I went from 20/40/15 to 100/300/100.

Now, let me tell you about the savings. I saved so much (about $500/yr) that I thought I should put the savings to good use, so I also bought renter’s insurance. State Farm has a nice perk called a “multiline discount“, so by buying a policy in a another line of business, I lowered my automobile insurance even more. With the additional policy cost, I still spent $200 less than what I had saved, so I still saved a bunch of money.

The lesson I learned here is: if you’ve been with the same company providing any service or product longer than a couple of years, chances are competition has been working to your advantage, and you may be missing out on a competitor’s great deal . It’s worth the time and energy to do a little investigation. All together, switching my insurance company may take about 4 hours of my time (the calls today, completing property value worksheet, faxing it back, the trip there & back, signing paperwork, notifying the lienholder, etc), but it’s going to save me thousands over the next few years. This should be a “no-brainer” for anyone. MAKE THE CALL. Your wallet will thank you.