Umbrella Insurance without Car Insurance?

I read that as having land that is not built. Many homes do not have even 1 acre of land they are built on so would not make sense to only allow integers for that question. Or I guess you could round up to 1 acre if below 1. It’ll be clear you don’t own tons of land either way.

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I highly doubt it refers to the footprint of the house. 1 acre would be much larger than most mansions.

Unless I’m reading your post the wrong way.

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Related question. New teen driver is on permit stage so i’m not sure he needs his own umbrella policy yet .Will my 1MM USAA umbrella cover us/family if we’re in the car with him teaching him or only if he is listed as a driver w/ a license?

or is it better to get a separate driver policy?

Does your USAA umbrella policy cover family members?

Either way get your son added to your car insurance policy. In most (all?) cases, adding a teen as a permit holder does not cost anything to add them to the policy (at least from my experience, and those I’ve talked to). Once they get a license though, watch out. Your policy is going to skyrocket.

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In my experience, the umbrella requires underlying insurance for everything you want covered (auto, HO-3, HO-6, and anything else you own, boats, motorcycles, etc). So if your teen is not on your underlying auto insurance, I don’t see why they’d cover anything.

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Correct USAA had me raise the coverages of all underlying auto etc. But I thought it was family asset lawsuit protection, when people sue beyond auto coverage etc. Esp w/ teen driver on their way

tried doing it myself online no go, it might have to do w/ age/ permit thing. Will call tomorrow.

Will come back here for premium strategies once he gets his license later. eg he just did Curriculum - (3 hr. Sessions) | B.R.A.K.E.S. Teen Driver's Training For Safe Driving and Accident Prevention

they talked about umbrella coverage there too…

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Yes, but I think if your teen is driving your car to learn (as opposed to driving you to a hospital because you’re incapacitated), he’s probably not covered by your auto coverage at all, so he also would not be covered by the umbrella.

IIRC from reading (hint hint!) my auto policy details, the only time I could allow someone else not on the policy to drive my car is in case of emergency when I couldn’t drive it myself, such as if I asked someone to drive me to a hospital because I couldn’t, the driver would be covered by my insurance (instead of theirs). You could also let someone else drive your car if they have their own insurance and it covers them. IIRC my insurance is primary for me if I drive someone else’s car, though I’m not sure of the details.

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My understanding is completely different. Auto insurance insures the car, not drivers. The car is covered when driven by anyone, except a licensed driver living in the same household but not listed on any of the auto policies with the same company. I just went through this with my State Farm agent and my teen. While she had a permit, she didn’t need to be added anywhere, and if she caused an accident (with me or my wife there – that’s the only way she would be driving, other than with a driving instructor) that would be covered. Once she got a license, she needed to be added, but only to one car, and she’s covered driving any of our cars.

This kind of agrees with my understanding:

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You may be right in that it may need not to be an emergency, I should re-read my policy.

That’s not exactly correct – it insures both. Primarily it insures the listed driver driving the listed car. But, per the article, it may also insure anyone driving that car if the insured gave them permission, and someone stealing the car won’t be covered (your insurance is liable to you only, not to the thief or for any damage the thief may cause).

Even though insurance generally “follows” the car with a permissive driver as primary, it may also follow the insured when they rent a car, or as secondary if the insured borrows someone else’s car and causes damage in excess of that car’s policy primary coverage.

So I guess a teen with a permit should be covered while learning to drive, but I’d seriously consider reading the policy or possibly even asking the insurance provider directly (with a paper trail for the answer, of course).

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Not quite. Your liability (as the car’s owner) from someone else driving your car is covered. But your insurance will not cover the driver’s liability unless named on the policy. You drive my car and hurt someone, you will be sued as the driver and I’ll be sued as the car’s owner - I’ll be covered by my insurance, you will need to have your own coverage or defend yourself on your own. Our mutual interests may cause you to benefit from my coverage since it’s often impossible to separate the liability of the car from the liability of the driver (so a defense is going to apply to both), but the insurance is not directly covering you - defending you is their best defense for me.

There is a tremendous amount of variability from state to state, too. In my state, you are required to have liability insurance just to get your license, even if you do not own a vehicle. In some states, insurance may follow the car rather than the driver. (I probably should’ve led with that!)

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Obviously that was an oversimplification, but I think that’s the way to think about it - with certain exclusions and other inclusions. It may not even cover the listed driver on the insured car, if e.g. you start driving for Uber and the policy excludes that (most probably do by now).

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+1 to this. In my state only the car is required to have liability insurance. When my daughter got her DL she didn’t need to show anything insurance related. (Long time ago, when I was getting my DL, I had to show insurance info for the car I was driving for the driving test at the DMV, and it was a friend’s car and obviously I wasn’t listed on the insurance, and that was totally OK and expected.)

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I think @glitch99’s and @olegos’s explanations are the most accurate. @scripta I’ve never heard of insurance only covering your car with another driver only in an emergency. I suppose that could be a thing in some states, but it definitely isn’t in my state.

Yeah I goofed up on the emergency case. Can’t remember how or why that got into my head. I just re-read my policy and it seems to mention that only permission is needed, nothing about emergencies.

I also noticed there is a permissive driver limitation for anyone who is not a household relative – the insurance only provides the minimum coverage required by the state, which in CA is 15K/30K/5K (bodily injury per person / all persons / property damage).

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Called USAA \ and added my son. Gave his SSN+DOB etc. Didn’t have his permit # but she said they didn’t need it and can get info from DMV. No premium impact, but she did make an interesting comment for the next step when get his license.

Some people stay on permit for YEARS with no rush to get license with no premium impact. Can I do that as a premium savings idea for a while till they get info from DMV ? My concern would be impact to umbrella and auto, when he’s driving by himself. I’d like to delay the premium hike as long as possible. now that I’ve done my part adding him to the policy.

CSR also suggested to assign him to cheaper car as one method, good student , also driving school, etc which we did.

This is for AZ and we do require Applicant must have the following in the vehicle during the test = Valid Identification Documents – Current Insurance –but it doesn’t say individual or car

https://azdot.gov/motor-vehicles/driver-services/tests-manuals-and-driving-schools/road-tests

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I dont know how long you can get away with a licensed driver being insured as a permit holder, or if there’d be consequences if he were to face a claim. There’s a lot of pretty gray area, where it isnt clear how much is the risk of adverse coverage consequence and how much is baseless insurance company threats. Insurance always wants you to add everyone possible, and make it very hard to determine if you actually need to or not.

But yes, assigning primary drivers based on the relative value of each vehicle is pretty commonplace.

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Your first sentence made sense, but then you took a turn. I think the point is to keep a valid permit without getting a license, not to get a license and hope the insurance provider doesn’t find out. And, IIRC, a permit holder can’t drive by himself, needs another licensed driver in the car.

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I guess my question is the onus on the provider to query the DMV, now that I gave them the permit info (CSR seemed to imply they do that routinely for permits->DL).

Permit expires in a year and he’ll probably take the test in about 6 months. I am in no rush to inform them now that he is on my policy.

Great will do that since that’s the one he’s drivigng anways.

USAA seems to be very lenient with my claims so far (been with them 20+yrs), but I don’t want to tempt fate unless permit vs DL is indeed a gray area. Person is on (didn’t want to push that)