ORLANDO, Fla. — It’s no shock that insurance rates increase when a teen driver is added to a policy.
“There are higher risks we see with younger drivers,” said Florida Highway Patrol trooper Migdalisis Garcia. “If this younger driver gets a citation, it’s not them paying it.”
“Depending on the county that you’re in, it could be a $164 citation, so it’s another additional cost these parents have to face,” she said.
On top of costly tickets, families also face staggering insurance premiums. A new WalletHub survey found that Florida has one of the highest rate increases in the country.
“With Florida, your policy is going to go up an average of 84%,” said WalletHub analyst Chip Lupo.
Page Quintana, a father of three, knows that reality firsthand.
“For two cars, just my wife and myself, we were paying, just a little, about $300 and change,” he said.
But he said after adding his kids, they’re at $1,090 per month for himself and his three children.
Consumer advisor Clark Howard says the cost is affecting families across the U.S. He said, “One of the main reasons for what I’m about to tell you is because of insurance costs. Seventy-five percent of 16-year-olds do not have a driver’s license. Only one in four teens at 16 got a license. And then the shocker, because the auto insurance premium rates are so high that even at age 18, 40% of 18-year-olds don’t have a driver’s license.”
Howard advises parents to find ways to limit coverage and risk.
“If you are going to insure a teen, you want to have an older car, one that hopefully has basic safety features on it, but one that you don’t need to insure the car itself, only the liability risk of your teenage driver,” he said. “And it’s cheaper to pay for a teen to go in an Uber or Lyft, regularly when they need to, rather than insuring a car for a teen.”
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