Who Has Cheap Insurance for a Ford Escape in Iowa?

Our staff writers always rib each other than when writing about car insurance, the word “cheap” really should not be used as a descriptor for auto insurance rates. Excuse the oxymoron, but cheap car insurance for a Ford Escape may be a thing of the past. Don’t let that ruin your day, because there may be ways you can quote auto insurance that you can afford.

The chances of finding the cheapest car insurance for a Ford Escape in Iowa hinges on a large number of rating criteria such as if you are married or single, your profession, and any past driving violations you may have had. Drivers pay an average of $690 every 12 months to buy Ford Escape insurance, but that amount is an approximation calculated using a 30-year-old married female that includes comprehensive and collision coverage and $100 physical damage deductibles.

Chances are good that you aren’t exactly 30 years old or even a female, possibly single instead of married, and maybe your Escape just needs liability-only coverage. Having just a slight change in input factors can result in big changes in rate quotes.

Car insurance rates are unique for each driver, so your best shot at finding affordable rates for your Ford is to compare as many rates as you can. To start saving now, get free quotes and you will get price quotes from the best auto insurance companies that offer coverage in Iowa.

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The trim level of your Escape will influence the yearly cost, so the rate you will pay to insure a Escape XLS 2WD will cost $94 less than the cost to insure the fancier Escape Limited 4WD model, as shown below.

Data based on married female driver age 30, no speeding tickets, no at-fault accidents, $100 deductibles, and Iowa minimum liability limits. Discounts applied include multi-vehicle, claim-free, multi-policy, homeowner, and safe-driver. Premium costs do not factor in zip code location which can change premium rates noticeably.

Deciding which company offers the cheapest car insurance rates for a Ford Escape involves a little more work in order to find a policy that fits your budget.

Every auto insurer uses their own formula to set policy rates, so we will examine the most affordable car insurance companies in Iowa. It’s important to know that Iowa car insurance rates are influenced by many factors which can substantially decrease or increase the price of coverage. Simply getting older, buying another vehicle, or getting a ticket for careless driving can trigger changes in premium that can now make some companies cheaper in comparison to the competition.

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USAA normally has some of the lowest car insurance rates in Iowa at around $662 per year. Partners Mutual, Western National, Allied, and Hastings Mutual also make the cut as some of the cheaper Iowa auto insurance companies.

As shown above, if you are insured with Western National and switched to USAA, you may see an annual premium reduction of in the neighborhood of $139. Policyholders with Allied may save as much as $141 a year, and Hastings Mutual customers might reduce rates by $218 a year.

Bear in mind that those premium estimates are averaged across all drivers and vehicles in Iowa and and are not calculated with a specific rating modification for a Ford Escape. So the car insurance company that has the lowest price for you may not even be in the list above. That helps illustrate why you need to compare prices as often as possible using your own specific driver and vehicle information.

Accidents and violations increase rates

The ideal way to enjoy cheap insurance for a Ford Escape in Iowa is to drive attentively and not get tickets or have accidents. The diagram below highlights how traffic violations and at-fault collisions drive up car insurance costs for different age groups of insureds. The premium estimates are based on a single female driver, comp and collision included, $250 deductibles, and no policy discounts are applied.

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In the prior example, the average cost of an auto insurance policy in Iowa per year with a clean driving record and no accidents is $1,252. Add in one speeding ticket and the average cost surges to $1,418, an increase of $166 each year. Then throw in two accidents along with the one speeding ticket and the 12-month cost of car insurance for a Ford Escape jumps again to an average of $2,848. That’s an increase of $1,596, or $133 per month, just for not being more responsible behind the wheel!

Full coverage rates vs. liability-only

Finding cheap insurance for a Ford Escape in Iowa is important to most vehicle owners, and one of the fastest ways to reduce the cost of insurance is to not pay for full coverage. The information below illustrates the comparison of auto insurance costs with and without physical damage coverage, medical payments, and uninsured/under-insured motorist coverage. The data is based on no claims or violations, $100 deductibles, single marital status, and no additional discounts are factored in.

google.charts.setOnLoadCallback(drawFclqcibChart);function drawFclqcibChart() {var data = google.visualization.arrayToDataTable([[‘Age of Insured’, ‘Full Coverage with $100 Deductibles’, ‘Liability Only’],[‘Age 20’, 2455,763],[‘Age 30’, 1281,423],[‘Age 40’, 1269,393],[‘Age 50’, 1153,369],[‘Age 60’, 1115,363],[‘Age 70’, 1347,481]]);var options = {title: ‘Full Coverage Compared to Liability Only’,titleTextStyle: {color: ‘#333’,fontSize: 17,bold: true},width: ‘100%’,height: 500,’chartArea’: {left:100,top:50,’width’: ‘100%’, ‘height’: ‘70%’},legend: {position: ‘bottom’},colors: [‘#6791b9′,’#98bee2’],hAxis: {title: ‘Annual Insurance Cost for a Ford Escape in Iowa’,minValue: 0,format: ‘$###,###’},vAxis: {title: ‘Age of Insured’}};var formatter = new google.visualization.NumberFormat({fractionDigits: 0,prefix: ‘$’});formatter.format(data,1);formatter.format(data,2);var chart = new google.visualization.BarChart(document.getElementById(‘qcibfcl’));chart.draw(data, options);}

If averaged out across all ages, physical damage coverage costs an extra $1,437 per year more than buying just liability insurance. That amount may make you wonder if it’s worth it to buy full coverage. There is no clear-cut rule for phasing out comprehensive and collision coverage on your policy, but there is a broad guideline. If the annual cost of coverage is 10% or more of the replacement cost minus the deductible, then it could be time to drop full coverage.

For example, let’s say your vehicle’s settlement value is $5,500 and you have $1,000 policy deductibles. If your vehicle is severely damaged, the most you would get paid by your company is $4,500 after the deductible is paid. If you are paying in excess of $450 annually for your policy with full coverage, then you might want to consider buying only liability coverage.

There are some scenarios where dropping physical damage coverage is not financially feasible. If you haven’t satisfied your loan, you are required to maintain full coverage to protect the lienholder’s interest in the vehicle. Also, if your emergency fund is not enough to purchase a different vehicle if your current one is totaled, you should keep full coverage.

State Farm, Progressive, Geico, or Allstate: Who is cheapest?

When buying insurance for an Escape in Iowa, four of the best places to start are State Farm, Progressive, Geico, and Allstate. If you add them together, they insure about 50% of all policies written. Each one has unique features and discounts that you can choose from. The following table breaks down some of the different features shoppers can expect to find with each one.

Best cheap Ford Escape insurance quotes

There are many different ways to quote car insurance rates in Iowa, but the most prevalent ways are through an independent or non-exclusive agent, a captive (or exclusive) agent like Auto-Owners or State Farm, or buying direct from a company like Geico or Progressive. They all have the same basic principle, but they are slightly different in how they price policies.

Independent agencies work for many companies and can compare rates with every one. These types of agents are able to provide you with more rate quotes, which can help you get improved odds of finding cheaper coverage. If premiums increase, they can switch companies in-house and the insured can keep the same agent.

An exclusive agent is only able to quote rates from just one company such as a State Farm or Liberty Mutual agent. These agents normally cannot shop your coverage around, so unless you get quotes from other companies, you cannot determine which is cheapest.

The third popular method of shopping for car insurance is direct, which means you bypass an exlusive or independent agent and buy direct either online or via phone. This option may be a decent choice consumers who do not have a lot of assets and know more than average about how their policy works.

So which way is best to buy cheap insurance for a Ford Escape in Iowa? We would first guess that buying from a direct company results in the cheapest rates since no commissions are paid to an agent, but that is not always the case. It would also be easy to say using an independent agent saves the most money since they have access to many companies, but that idea is not necessarily true either. In many cases, exclusive agencies have extremely competitive rates that are the cheapest in Iowa.

Due to that fact that car insurance uses so many rating variables, the only true way to ensure the lowest rates is to get as many comparison quotes as possible. To find the best rates, be sure to get rate quotes from independent agents, exclusive agents, and direct companies to give yourself the best selection. For a list of car insurance companies with low rates, click here to view.