Travel Insurance - Do You Need Coverage?

 Depending on your health, cost of your trip and your travel destination, you may want to consider travel insurance.  Make sure you shop around to understand all your options before you make any decisions.  Do this before buying or committing to any plane tickets, car rentals, hotels or other travel purchases.

My wife and I went to Italy last year so I did a bunch of checking around to see what the least expensive options were for the various aspects of the trip.

Credit Cards

First check with your credit cards, you may be pleasantly surprised that you already have some form of travel insurance if the purchase for travel is done with that credit card so call your credit card company.  I learned that my credit card offered travel insurance free of charge.  There were restrictions on what they covered so read the fine print.  Also see if your credit card company covers auto insurance for any rentals.

Home Owners Insurance

As you know, I'm into photography and so I travel with $1000's in camera gear and lenses.  I talked to my home insurance provider and learned that my homeowner's covered my camera's while traveling.

Buying Directly from the Service Provider

This is probably the most expensive approach, but they may offer a specific unconditional cancellation policy that you may be interested in.

Trip Cancellation

If you have to cancel a trip, insurance typically covers any nonrefundable costs.  Usually there are restrictions on when you can collect, for example medical, illness, loss of job, etc.

Trip Interruption

If for some reason you start a trip but can't finish it because of illness, death or other covered events, you will be reimbursed for trip costs.

Emergency Medical

If you become injured or sick, you may need medical care.  Medical insurance can get you to a location or maybe even fly you home depending on your coverage or the issue.  Emergency medical treatments are also typically covered.

Is Travel Insurance for You?

Your circumstances will dictate if you should add travel insurance.  Are you traveling with your grand children?  Do you wan coverage for lost or stolen bags?  Is it possible you'll miss a connecting flight?  How expensive was you trip?  Are you planning and international trip or cruise with significant up front costs?  All of these could move you into wanting travel insurance.

Return to Travel Page

Are Your Finances in Shape - 8 Tips to Double Check Your Status

Check out these 8 tips to help you save money and get your finances in shape.

1) Life Insurance

You should be reviewing your life insurance every year.  As your family situation changes you'll want to adjust your life insurance accordingly.  As you approach retirement and get older the cost of your insurance increases significantly because the actuaries data shows the older you get the more likely you are to pass away.  You probably will also have less need for a huge life insurance policy so make sure you balance your needs.  I most recently retired and reduced my life insurance and will be considering just cancelling my plan as I move forward.  If I were to pass my wife's income would come form my pension, social security and disbursement from our investments. 

2) Savings Accounts

Beef up your savings to cover emergencies.  The experts say you should have 6 months to a years worth of savings to potentially protect you from a loss of a job or unexpected expenses.  Make sure you consider all expenses when thinking about how much you need to save.  Don't forget medical costs and unexpected house repairs.  Cut unnecessary spending to put more in your savings account.

3) Pay Down Your Credit Card Debt

Review how much you spend on your credit cards.  How much did you spend last year?  How much have you spend this year?  Are you carrying a balance on your credit cards that's costing you huge interest charges every month?  Make it a goal to stop all unnecessary purchases on your cards.   Maybe move to a cash envelope budget where you budget a specific amount by category.

Review your credit cards if you have more than one.  Figure out which one charges the most interest and pay off that card first, then focus on the next highest interest card. 

4) Home Insurance

Make sure your homeowners insurance is up to date with the right level of coverage for your dwelling and all it's possessions.  You should have a log for everything in your house including electronics, jewelry, furniture and clothing.  I like to take a photography of all my rooms with closet and cabinet drawers open as a reminder on what I have.  Make sure to update you possession list with any new purchases or gifts you may have received in the last year.

Most of all shop around for a better insurance.  Make sure the coverage is the same from all insurance companies that are quoting.  Call and get four or five quotes, you'll be surprised at how much you can possibly save. 

5) Auto Insurance

Same thing for your Auto Insurance Policy.  Make sure you have the right coverage for the vehicles you are driving.  Consider your liability risks, do you need more or less coverage.  Now that you're retired, are you driving less miles?  This can lower your insurance.  Maybe you moved to a city or town with less crime, this can also lower insurance.  Hopefully your kids have moved out and aren't on your plan any longer, this can lower your auto insurance.

Same as for Home Owners, shop around.  Make sure to get quotes a combined policy which would include all your cars, boat, house, liability.  This can save money on your insurance.

6) Is your Income Stuck in Retirement

Maybe it's time to start a part time job to get your income back on track.  There are many jobs out there that are just looking for a reliable worker to help them out.  What are you willing to do do get your finances in order?  I have a neighbor in Florida who found a job working a help line from home so he could pay cash for a new firth wheel.  Be creative, you might be surprised at what you can find.

7) How Are Your Expenses

Simply stated, lower your expenses and safe up to pay cash for those big expenditures.  Can you change to a smaller or used car to save on auto expenses.  Cut vacation and travel costs, save up for the next vacation and don't pay for it on credit.  If you need a vacation, stay local and figure out how to lower your costs.  Put off any non critical home remodeling or renovations, consider painting instead of other more costly updates.  Do it yourself!  Avoid shopping sprees, stick with the essentials.  

8) Check Your Credit

Check your credit report on a regular basis.  Focus on transactions that will raise your credit score.  Make payments on time, only keep necessary credit cards.  Check to make sure you don't have any identity theft issues or transactions.  Make sure to freeze you credit reports on the three major credit bureaus.

Return to Money Page

Ride Share or Own a 2nd Car in Retirement?

I've been asking myself this question, in retirement should I keep our second car or just rely on my eBike and ride sharing services for our second vehicle.  The intent here would be to save the cost of the car which in my opinion is pretty significant.  You could potentially save the payments, maintenance, repairs, tires, gas and insurance.  

In the end I think it's about how many miles you are driving the second card and of course the convenience for those rare times when you need two cars.  Ride sharing like Lyft and Uber certainly charge more per mile and so a per ride charge could be $10-$30 depending on how far you need to go.

I recently read and article from AAA where they said the average yearly cost to own a new car is a little over $7300 per year which works out to be about to be about $0.68 per mile based on about 10,000 miles of yearly driving.  If you were to Uber or Lyft 10,000 miles, it might cost you around $20,000, clearly in that example owning your own car makes more sense.

But what if you only drove your second car 3300 miles a year, that could be breakeven for using a ride sharing service.

Of course if you buy a lower cost car or a used vehicle, it probably will always make more sense to own your vehicle.

--> Shopping Cart and Shopping List - Add and Hold to Save Money

<-- Save money at dollar stores

<-- Money Page