It's not fuel prices that's going to kill the boat market

a) doesn't have a trailer

and/or

b) is more than 5 model years old (2001 and older are uninsurable if they're over 30 feet and valued at more than $100,000)

I just applied for quotes from NBOA, Boater's Choice, Progressive, and 2 or three others. All said the same thing: no dice.

Progressive was willing to write my boat for $100,000 coverage (it's valued at $113k though) to the tune of $4500/year.

I'm with Boat/US, and insured for $113,000 for just under $3000/year. I was looking to save some money, and it's apparent that that isn't going to happen.

Read this thread on thehulltruth.com to understand how bad it is in Florida now:

http://www.thehulltruth.com/forums/thread-view.asp?tid=114956&start=1

Guys cannot get financing on boats because they can't insure them.

"Insurance companies are private businesses that must make a profit to survive and fulfill their ability to pay claims filed by insureds. It is a highly regulated, carefully controlled profit, however. Rates for nearly all lines of insurance must be approved by the Office of Insurance Regulation. The maximum allowable rate of return is generally 5 percent, with 2 to 3 percent returns more typical on an actual basis. Excess profit laws exist in several lines of insurance requiring automatic rate rollbacks when the maximum approved profit level is exceeded. They have been rarely activated."

From:

http://www.flains.org/public/ht_irate.html-ssi

This is probably more of a significant issue with commercial use rather than recreational boaters, although it *certainly* is a problem.

I guess the "out" isn't available on boats like on real estate.... where they declare that everything is "flood damage" and refuse to pay unless the insurance holder has flood insurance (which may be unavailable in some areas).

as of yesterday, 87 octane at Sam's and Costco was $2.61

http://edition.cnn.com/2006/BUSINESS/08/23/bp.pipeline.ap/

***** Hope your day is great! *****

John

There's nothing wrong with the basis concept, but there are plenty of problems with the Bill's proposed implementation.

1. The Act exempts association health plans from state laws and regulations, and therefore eliminates consumer protection and coverage requirements.

2. The insurers would have no incentive to cover preventive care or many expensive procedures if the law did not require them to do so.

3. AHPs open the door for cherry picking.

And $3.79 on the water.

***** Hope your day is great! *****

John

The Senate version is S.1955. It has 56 votes in favor of it, but Democrats used a procedural loophole to block the vote on it.

http://www.govtrack.us/congress/bill.xpd?bill=s109-1955

All one has to do is look at the list of the folks who oppose AHP's, and it becomes evident just why they oppose them. And it's not for any of the smoke and mirror reasons that you stated above.

Eisboch

As I said in my first post, this doesn't affect people like me who are already insured. It affects new buyers...which will kill the boating market. Reread the title. This isn't a personal bitch session. It affects tens of thousands of people, and could end up affecting an entire industry and the folks whose jobs rely upon that industry.

It doesn't make any sense for boat insurance companies to "average" the risk of loss against all policies in the country. It makes more sense for an individual's boat insurance premiums to reflect, as accurately as possible, his or her personal risk of loss.

We had a similar situation here in Washington with health insurance. A few years ago, the state legislature passed a law that said any company writing health insurance in Washington could not refuse coverage to any individual. The insurance companies could set the rates to reflect the risk, of course, but they couldn't actually refuse anybody because they presented too great a risk. Net result: A lot of insurance companies just stopped writing health insurance in Washington, period. After all, what sort of premiums can be charged to cover the cost of caring for some of the AIDS patients who require many thousands of dollars in prescriptions each month just to delay their certain death?

It's the same reason that you have trouble buying full coverage mechanical insurance on a boat these days. Time was that if you blew up your 5000 hour diesel engines the insurance company would scratch out a check for $40,000 to offset your "loss". Not typical anymore. The premiums charged cannot even begin to offset the almost certain "loss" that every boat will eventually experience. The only reason you can buy boat insurance from any carrier at any price in FLA is that some boats will survive a hurricane, and most boats don't have to ride out a hurricane in a specific location every year.

Here is a very interesting link for you Doc:

http://www.collierem.org/never.htm

In 1960, when hurricane 'Donna' struck, there were approximately 15,500 people living full time in Collier County. Today there is nearly 300,000 residents, most of whom have never been through a severe land-falling hurricane, even though they lived through the 2004 hurricane season. We have come to southwest Florida from all over the country and around the world, and we would all like to believe that we are safe from the ravages of hurricanes. After all, how often is Collier County struck by tropical weather? Records kept by the National Weather Service date back to 1851, or 153 years as this is written. In that time 73 tropical storms and hurricanes have passed within 75 nautical miles of Naples, or one nearly every 2.1 years! Of those, 40 have been tropical storms with winds of less than 74 miles per hour. That also means at 33 have been hurricanes, or one about every 4.7 years!

Ah, but they're all small hurricanes aren't they? Let's take a look:

a.. Sixteen major hurricanes in 153 years averages out to 1 every 7.7 years! b.. 14 have been category three, one has been category four and one was a category five. Now THAT Was a Close Call! (Center Less Than 20 Miles From Naples)

Tropical Storms: 1861, 1878, 1891, 1899, 1907, 1932, 1936, 1945, 1953, 1969 (Jenny), 1985 (Bob), 1994 (Gordon), 1998 (Mitch), 1999 (Harvey)

Hurricanes: 1870,1894, 1910, 1926, 1929, 1941, 1947, 1960 (Donna) ('Andrew' passed 35 miles south of Naples in 1992)

---

Hang on To Your Hat! Winds Greater Than 96 mph (Category 2+) within 75 nautical miles of Naples

1865 (100 mph), 1873 (115 mph), 1876 (104 mph), 1888 (113 mph), 1894 (104 mph), 1910 (126 mph), 1924 (104mph), 1926 (130 mph.), 1929 (115 mph), 1935 (146 mph.), 1941 (121mph), 1944 (127 mph), 1945 (127 mph), 1946 (113 mph), 1947 (147 mph), 1948 (115 mph), 1950 (115 mph), 1950 (107 mph) 1960 (Donna, 129 mph), 1964 (Isbell, 115 mph), 1965 (Betsy, 124 mph), 1966 (Alma, 120 mph), 1992 (144 mph, Andrew's winds were less than 95 mph at Naples, but higher on Marco Island and in Everglades City), 2004 (Charley, 145mph), & 2004 (Jeanne, 120 mph)

==

And you were saying? ;-)

Those rates sound astronomical to insure a $100k boat, but it makes some sense to evaluate local risk rather than just "average" it out against everybody in the country- whether they live in a hurricane zone or not. Kind of like the 450-pound diabetic trying to buy medical insurance- it wouldn't be fair to the 190-pound jogger to just average the two of them together and charge them both the same rate as one is many times more likely to suffer an expensive incident than the other.

And I would think all those high dollar houses near and on the water are going to take a beating on their market value because of these things related to insurance and insurability.

I have a custom made trailer for my Contender which is used to haul the boat twice a season for a wash and wax. It also doubles as a winter storage trailer - just put it on, park it and shrink wrap.

The only problem is if I wanted to take it from the yard, I would need a special permit because it's over-width for the highway. So I couldn't just pick it up and move it away from the coast if a storm approached or whatever.

If that boat was a, say 2000, would it be covered?

House insurance, at least in the area we were in, has become prohibitively expensive, if you can even get it. We were very lucky to sell when we did.

Eisboch

Eisboch

Eisboch

You can bet that the most popular booth at this year's Miami International Boat Show will be the insurance agents.

But the entry-level and mid-level market could get hammered. Sales this year in June are about 1/3 of last years sales. The median price for the year fell 6%, but the median price in June and July actually increased.

Naples is not a normal market. Some houses went up 80-100% in the past 5 years. A 10-15% correction isn't going to hurt anybody who bought more than a year ago.

I have no place to store a trailer unless I'm willing to pay $150/month storage fee. Even if I pulled the boat, where would I put it? And I'd need something that could tow upwards of 12,000 lbs that is 10'6" wide.

Incredible.

All the comparisons about terrorist threats being greater in NY, Seattle, Chicago or what not don't have anything to do with why your boat insurance is so high and whether or not it should be so high based on the risk you choose to run by living where hurricanes are commonplace. Your boat insurance premuims aren't underwriting losses suffered by terrorist attack in large cities, and if there is some sort of insurance premium one can pay to be insured against loss by terrorism- none of that money if going into a fund to buy new boats for Floridians who get smashed up by a hurricane.

The insurance companies should not be forced to sell you cheap insurance, or even accept ridiculous levels of risk if they don't want to. Falls under the category of free enterprise, don't you know.

I'd like to buy insurance against getting one year older next birthday- but there isn't anybody willing to write it at any price because it is a certainty that if I live to my next birthday I will indeed be a year older. Rather than call for government regulation forcing people to sell policies that don't make any sense, I think I'll just adapt to getting older.

Seriously, it's a darn shame that you guys are having trouble buying boat insurance down there- but no company should be forced to make suicidal business decisions just to make boating more convenient in the hurricane zone.

Statistically, we have as high or higher probability of getting a hurricane up here in MA this year as Jupiter does.

Eisboch