What Is Minimum Liability Car Insurance?
Liability coverage pays for damage that you cause. This includes damage to another person’s car, the other party’s medical bills resulting from the crash, damage to property like a fence or lamppost, and legal fees. If you didn’t have insurance or if you didn’t have enough insurance, you might be financially liable (another word for responsible) for these expenses.
Most car insurance policies split liability coverage into bodily injury and property damage, even though nearly all states require drivers to buy at least some of both. The least amount of insurance you can buy is called “minimum liability insurance.” It may be cheaper up front, but if you cause a crash, it could pay for as little as $25,000 in damage. Considering that medical bills can be in the hundreds of thousands of dollars and new cars often cost more than $50,000, minimum coverage may not be enough, and you may end up on the hook for the other party’s bills. We recommend purchasing more than the minimum liability coverage.
“Auto repair costs and medical expenses have been steadily increasing over the last several years, so it’s possible that the costs from a crash will exceed the limits of minimum coverage,” Bell says.
