Are Red Cars More Expensive To Insure?
At Hood Insurance we want to debunk the myth about whether red cars are more expensive to insure or not. This urban legend has been floating around for decades, and appears to have its roots in the theory that red cars are more eye-catching than vehicles of other colors. Under this theory, red cars are more likely to get tickets than vehicles of other colors. The theory of if red cars are more expensive to insure also seems to suggest that red vehicles are more likely to be owned by aggressive drivers, and thus be more likely to be involved in collisions.
It has also been suggested that red cars cost more to insure because red is a more expensive color and therefore costs more to replace in the event of a total loss.
Answering the Question: Are Red Cars More Expensive to Insure?
A deeper dive into the subject reveals that in fact, red cars are no more likely to get traffic citations than any other color of vehicle. There are also no studies that indicate red cars are involved in more collisions than cars of other colors.
When determining the replacement cost of your vehicle, insurance companies use a standard called “like kind and quality”. In other words, the replacement must be similar but does not have to be exactly the same as the original. Insurance carriers use an appraisal to determine the cost to replace a vehicle that has been declared a total loss. This appraisal takes into account the details of your vehicle and looks for comparable vehicles for sale in your local area. The starting point is year/make/model/trim and goes on to engine, transmission, condition, type of seats, interior materials and so on. The full list of features usually fills one column on an 8×12” page, sometimes more – but color is never one of the features considered when determining whether another vehicle is comparable or not
Similarly, insurance companies take into consideration a great number of your vehicle’s characteristics when determining the premium to be charged. Horsepower, safety features, the vehicle weight, the carrier’s experience with similar vehicles and more are all part of the calculation that ultimately determines your rate. However, you may recall that when you initially insured your vehicle, the color was not something included in the application questions. This is because the color of a vehicle is not considered a risk factor, and it does not affect value because in the second hand market a vehicle’s color doesn’t affect the price to any significant degree.
The truth behind Are Red Cars More Expensive to Insure?
As color does not make a vehicle more or less likely to be involved in an accident, and does not impact the cost of replacing a vehicle in the event of a total loss, insurance carriers simply have no reason to charge higher premiums based on the color of a vehicle, red or otherwise.
In short, the answer to are red cars more expensive to insure, is a solid “No”. So the next time you’re out car shopping, buy the car you want regardless of color. There’s no downside to a beautiful, blazing red or any other permutation of the color and plenty of upside in the pleasure of looking at it.
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