Overs 50s Car Insurance Guide
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Over 50s have unique needs for car insurance. You may have a long-established No Claims Discount to protect. You may not be keen on carrying out your own roadside repairs in event of a breakdown. And you may want your car covered for an extended trip to Europe.
Look through the information on this page to give you an idea of what to look for in an over-50s car insurance plan. And get a sense of how the cost of car insurance changes by age and how accident rates change with age—on the bright side, motorists aged 50-59 pay the least for car insurance.
Cost of over 50s car insurance
Motorists in their 50s generally pay the least for car insurance, all else equal. In fact, this age group could pay around half of what a 20-year old would pay. This is because 50-year-olds have lower accident rates. However, by the 60s the cost of car insurance will be on the rise, continuing to increase with age. This is because risks go up for drivers once they reach their 60s. But the real jump comes for the over 70s.
The chart below shows some sample prices for comprehensive cover for a used, 5-year-old car. These are just sample prices for our test case driver who clocks 5,000 miles a year to show how age impacts premiums; your premiums may be higher or lower.
| Average Cost of Cheap Comprehensive Car Insurance, by Driver Age | |
|---|---|
| 20 Years | £808 Get Quotes |
| 25 Years | £669 Get Quotes |
| 35 Years | £575 Get Quotes |
| 45 Years | £518 Get Quotes |
| 55 Years | £421 Get Quotes |
| 65 Years | £442 Get Quotes |
| 75 Years | £692 Get Quotes |
Accident Rates by Age
Perhaps the primary reason that 50 year olds pay less for car insurance compared to other age groups is that the odds of this age group having an accident are lower, when compared to other age groups.
To understand this, let's look at data from the Department for Transport on the rate of killed or seriously injured (KSI) car driver casualties per billion miles driven, by age and sex. By looking at the KSI rate per mile driven (well, billion miles driven), we standardise across the age groups, which takes into account that older drivers probably drive a lot less than younger drivers. This looks at the risk of each mile, essentially.
The data shows that women have the lowest rate of KSI per mile driven in the 46 to 55 year old age bracket; for men, the lowest rate of serious accidents per mile occurs in a slightly higher age bracket, 56 to 60 years old. Rates are somewhat steady and low for both genders around ages 46 to 60 years old—but from around age 70, the odds of a collision with serious repercussions increases quick dramatically, as you can see in the data and chart below. By the 81 to 85 age bracket, the rate for women increases more than 5X and the rate for men increases more than 2X; over age 86, the rate nearly doubles again. This is why car insurance rates increase dramatically after age 70.
| KSIs per billion miles driven, by driver age | Female | Male |
|---|---|---|
| 17-24 | 99 | 147 |
| 25-29 | 46 | 70 |
| 30-35 | 38 | 39 |
| 36-40 | 33 | 35 |
| 41-45 | 30 | 31 |
| 46-50 | 24 | 27 |
| 51-55 | 24 | 26 |
| 56-60 | 26 | 23 |
| 61-65 | 30 | 26 |
| 66-70 | 33 | 27 |
| 71-75 | 58 | 35 |
| 76-80 | 72 | 45 |
| 81-85 | 151 | 84 |
| 86+ | 253 | 152 |
What over 50s should look for in car insurance
Over 50s have unique needs. They may venture off on long road trips in Europe in retirement. They may be less inclined to change a flat tyre roadside. They may prefer to have the luxury of a courtesy car if theirs is in for repairs after an accident. And they might have years of no claims worth protecting. Here is a list of features that any over 50 should consider.
- Upper age limit. If you want to stay with the same company, look for a provider that doesn't impose an upper age limit.
- Courtesy car. Be sure to check if this is only available when your car's in the shop for repairs after a covered accident, or if it's also available in case of theft or a write off.
- Breakdown cover. To assist if you have a breakdown.
- EU breakdown cover. If you will spend time abroad, look for a policy with breakdown cover in the EU as well.
- Alternative transport. After an accident, this provides transport home if your car cannot be driven safely.
- Emergency driver cover. This covers your car if another driver needs to drive it because you've had a medical emergency.
- European cover. If you want to spend your retirement driving around Europe, look for a policy with 180 days of EU cover included for free, or even unlimited EU cover.
- No Claims Discount protection. If you've spent years building up your No Claims Discount, it's nice to protect this because average accident rates start to rise after the 60s.
Note regarding savings figures: *For information on the latest saving figures, pay-less-than figures, and pay-from figures used for promotional purposes, please click here.