You know, Hollywood always makes it seem like getting your car stolen is something glamorous that only happens to movie stars, celebrities, criminals on the lamb and yes, people with really cool cars. What they don't tell you is that there are hundreds of thousands of cars stolen every year across the U.S., and not all of them are a sky blue Porsche with a sunroof. As a matter of fact, Honda sedans regularly come in on the top five! Because auto theft isn't as uncommon as people think it is it's up to you and your auto insurance company to keep your car safe when you're out on the city streets.
If you live in an area prone to auto theft, or you drive a car listed by the Insurance Information Institute Highway Data Safety Department as one of the most "at risk" on the market, making sure your car was covered under a comprehensive auto insurance policy would be one of the smartest things you could do for yourself and your car. Ideally you'd have comprehensive insurance anyway (you never know when those kamikaze deer are going to decide to play chicken with oncoming traffic), but it's even more important that you have comprehensive coverage on your car when you've been victimized by thieves taking exception to the fact that you were understandably reluctant to let them hawk your car's parts on the black market.
As long as you have comprehensive insurance any of the 50+ nationwide auto insurance companies doing business in the U.S. will replace your car for you at its full, current Kelley Blue Book value. That means that while you might be left with the inconvenience of having to find an alternate way to get to and from work for a couple of weeks you're not going to be left scraping the bottom of your savings account trying to find the money to buy an old, second hand clunker because you're still paying the car payment on your Jag.
Somehow, most professional lenders just aren't as understanding about your car getting ripped off as they ought to be. They expect you to pay the money back they loaned you whether you've still got a car to drive or not.
Just because your auto insurance provider is going to replace your car doesn't mean you want to stick your car out on the street with "Free to Good Home" painted on the windshield. If you want to keep your car safe (and bring down your auto insurance rates at the same time) it's important to invest in some added security measures for your car. For example:
1) Always lock your car when you're not going to be in it, even if you're just ducking into the store for a minute. It takes an experienced thief less than a minute to hot wire your car and be back on the road. The last thing you want to do is stand there and stare because your car is cruising off without you while you were paying for your gas.
2) Never leave your keys sitting on your front seat-or even worse, in your ignition.
3) Invest in car alarms, fuel switches and GPS locator systems for your car. Not only does this make your car considerably less criminal friendly, it also has the potential to knock 10% or more off your annual auto insurance rates.
Auto theft is an unavoidable part of life, but with conscientious care, an eagle eye and a good auto insurance company backing us up we can give our car a best odds chance to be allowed to stay comfortably exactly where we left it.
