can i insure my bike under my brother or father?

J

JMH600CBR

Well-known member
I am a 22 year old male, paid about 4000 last year, i have a few friends who have gone through family members and "sold" them the bike and then insured under their name. is that actually a reasonable thing to do? will i get arrested or insurance fraud?
 
yes you can, but they need to inform their insurance co that you will be riding it. the cost will be less, but keep this in mind. Should you screw up and have an accident, etc with the bike. BOTH YOU and the PERSON who holds the policy. WILL pay.

* You get the driving record hit
* They get the insurance co hit.

What bike are you riding?
 
It actually depends... If you're the primary rider but insure your father as the primary rider, you can get screwed for misrepresentation which can result in a policy cancellation and they can choose not to cover you in the event of an accident.

Actually read the contract/policy and it will tell you. It is true that it is cheaper and many get away with it, but if you do get caught, you will be royally screwed.

Its a gamble where the odds are in your favor but people gotta lose sometime. All to save a few bucks

If you are insured as a secondary/occasional driver, and you actually are, as mentioned in the post above, if you were to run into trouble, insurance rates will go up for you and whoevers policy youre riding under
 
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it's a cbr600rr. my second bike. State farm told me that if i am the secondary rider, they will still charge us as if i am primary and my brother will ride for free. he is a 26 year old male with a perfect record.
 
JMH600CBR said:
it's a cbr600rr. my second bike. State farm told me that if i am the secondary rider, they will still charge us as if i am primary and my brother will ride for free. he is a 26 year old male with a perfect record.
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Seems like you are being registered as the primary and whenever your brother rides the bike he would be "borrowing" it.

From my understanding, he should be registered as a secondary rider if he is going to be riding it occasionally... But who cares what I think, if the insurance agent says so, go for it.
 
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It would be fairly difficult to prove insurance fraud, especially if you live with your brother/father.
 
Keep in mind too whatever you do -- if you ever need to make a claim, any insurance company will try to find any hole they can to invalidate you (and get out of paying). Also if they ever hit you with insurance fraud, you likely couldn't get insurance through anyone ever again (and even if you could, I can't even fathom the cost).
 
JMH600CBR said:
he just moved out, i think "billing address" has become very grey for him and i. is that ok?
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These are questions you should be asking your insurance agent. If you don't want the insurance agent you're dealing with to know, just call another state farm agent and ask them your questions.

+1 to what conundrum said.
They don't want to give you money so they'll try to find any reason not to if you were to run into trouble.
 
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What you're describing is insurance misrepresentation fraud. You have to answer insurance questions truthfully. When they ask you who will be operating the vehicle the majority of the time, the answer would be you (and not your brother or father). The premium is based on the person who uses the vehicle the majority of the time, and not the person who owns it.

Penalties if caught? Well, both you and your brother/father would probably be unable to drive for a number of years because insurance would be prohibitively expensive. The insurer could deny coverage in the event of a collision. etc.

Your insurer has ways of catching you in your fraud and actually employ and contract private investigators in their Special Investigations Unit for this sort of thing. As Platinum_Cycle pointed out, this question comes up a lot in the forum and is an SIU textbook case of insurance fraud. You aren't the first under-25yo genius to dream up such a scam :p It's actually fun to sometimes read the SIU files over lunch hour for a few laughs over what some people thought they could get away with.
 
VifferFun said:
What you're describing is insurance misrepresentation fraud. You have to answer insurance questions truthfully. When they ask you who will be operating the vehicle the majority of the time, the answer would be you (and not your brother or father). The premium is based on the person who uses the vehicle the majority of the time, and not the person who owns it.

Penalties if caught? Well, both you and your brother/father would probably be unable to drive for a number of years because insurance would be prohibitively expensive. The insurer could deny coverage in the event of a collision. etc.

Your insurer has ways of catching you in your fraud and actually employ and contract private investigators in their Special Investigations Unit for this sort of thing. As Platinum_Cycle pointed out, this question comes up a lot in the forum and is an SIU textbook case of insurance fraud. You aren't the first under-25yo genius to dream up such a scam :p It's actually fun to sometimes read the SIU files over lunch hour for a few laughs over what some people thought they could get away with.
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Thanks for your answer. I think the reason i really asked is because i know so many riders that do this. I assumed it was a grey line but in reality mostly just parents don't want their kids riding.

Here's another question for you: can i sign up in march and cancel in august? can they deny me coverage the following season if i do this? I canceled last march because i sold my bike but just acquired a new one, will i have trouble be re-insured by state farm?
 
JMH600CBR said:
Thanks for your answer. I think the reason i really asked is because i know so many riders that do this. I assumed it was a grey line but in reality mostly just parents don't want their kids riding.

Here's another question for you: can i sign up in march and cancel in august? can they deny me coverage the following season if i do this? I canceled last march because i sold my bike but just acquired a new one, will i have trouble be re-insured by state farm?
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Most of the questions you are asking are posted/discussed in the stickies of this section.

As for this question, it is also stickied:
Statefarm - http://www.gtamotorcycle.com/vbforu...-Farm-policy-Want-to-know-your-Penalty-Refund

TD - http://www.gtamotorcycle.com/vbforu...immum-policy-Want-to-know-your-Penalty-Refund
 
To your original question, yes you can, but it's a gray area.

We just bought insurance (today) for our Yamaha YZF-6R (599cc). I'm only 17 and my father is 49, he is legitimately the primary driver. I was added on as a secondary driver (I only take it out on some weekends anyway) and our total insurance for both of us is $1672, full coverage with 1 million liability and $1000 deductible. We both have our M2.

It also helps that the bike is classified as "Sports Touring" and we both have clean records.
 
vpetkar said:
To your original question, yes you can, but it's a gray area.

We just bought insurance (today) for our Yamaha YZF-6R (599cc). I'm only 17 and my father is 49, he is legitimately the primary driver. I was added on as a secondary driver (I only take it out on some weekends anyway) and our total insurance for both of us is $1672, full coverage with 1 million liability and $1000 deductible. We both have our M2.

It also helps that the bike is classified as "Sports Touring" and we both have clean records.
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But in your case you really are the secondary driver as your dad will be the one riding it most of the time. OP wants to insure his bike under his brother/father while he is going to be riding most of the time thus making him the primary which is misrepresentation
 
This is true, but it would be incredibly difficult to prove that he was the primary driver. Unless of course he gets in crash going to work or something. Though it is in their terms of service, it's a gray area and its up to your discretion what you will pull off.
 
vpetkar said:
This is true, but it would be incredibly difficult to prove that he was the primary driver. Unless of course he gets in crash going to work or something. Though it is in their terms of service, it's a gray area and its up to your discretion what you will pull off.
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Yeah.. Well its a chance that you have to be willing to take. Although the chances of getting caught may be small, the consequences of getting caught are pretty damn severe.
 
JMH600CBR said:
Thanks for your answer. I think the reason i really asked is because i know so many riders that do this. I assumed it was a grey line but in reality mostly just parents don't want their kids riding.

Here's another question for you: can i sign up in march and cancel in august? can they deny me coverage the following season if i do this? I canceled last march because i sold my bike but just acquired a new one, will i have trouble be re-insured by state farm?
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You can get insurance for only a couple of months. Keep mind you'll only save a small percentage of your premium by doing this based on how they do the calculations (they charge you for way more in the summer than in the other months). They won't deny you anything. Also keep in mind that if you are not continually insured this can raise your rates as they will ask you how long you have had continuous insurance for. Every time you cancel this number starts back at 0. I'm not sure how much that affects the rates, though. Pretty sure the same applies to cars.
 
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