Aucklanders pay top dollar for car cover

There are many ‘‘prices’’ to be paid for living in Auckland: high rates, high property prices, high rents and high beer prices.

Online financial product comparison website Moneyhub has added one more to that list: high car insurance premiums.

MoneyHub researcher Christopher Walsh said: ‘‘Vehicle owners in the regions generally pay a lot less than those in cities, with Invercargill and New Plymouth being two examples of cities where car insurance can be 35 [per cent] to 50 per cent cheaper than what it would cost an Auckland driver of the same age to insure the same vehicle.’’

Some rural dwellers did pay more, however, if they were in areas with treacherous roading.

‘‘Insurers tended to penalise those living in areas with tricky and bendy roads such as Piha by charging more for a policy,’’ Walsh said.

And, even within cities there was a large variation in the premiums charged by different insurers for the same car, depending on the suburb the owner lived in.

Moneyhub gathered quotes from rival insurers State, AMI, Trade Me, AA Insurance and Tower, and found vehicle owners all over New Zealand could be overpaying to the tune of hundreds of dollars a year by not shopping around.

It priced out comprehensive insurance for a 2011 Toyota Corolla, with no alarm, which was parked off-street, but not in a garage. It assumed a 35 year-old male primary driver, who did about 6000 kilometres a year, with an insured value of $12,000.

For someone in Takapuna, the quotes ranged from $480.47 at Trade Me Insurance ($500 excess compared to the more common excess of $400) to $840.04 at AA Insurance, Walsh said.

The range of premiums for that insurance if the car owner lived in Invercargill was $370.19 to $635.90.

For New Plymouth it was

$355.47 to $589.88.

For Riccarton, Christchurch, it was $392.22 to $683.43.

And for Lower Hutt, it was

$377.53 to $632.56.

But even at the same insurer, prices varied within cities.

If that same car was owned by someone living in the lowerincome, higher-crime suburb of Mangere in South Auckland, Trade Me Insurance would charge $524.58 instead of the $480.47 charged to the person living in upmarket Takapuna.

Walsh said: ‘‘Policy costs for a typical vehicle vary widely. We found Trade Me Insurance [which is underwritten by Tower] to be the best overall value at around 30 per cent below the market average for the vehicles we priced.’’

Many car owners may be overinsuring their cars, he said.