Liability approach for kid driver

[DanP]

Likely a common topic not sure how to best search for it so asking:

My now 21 yr son, with a full DL, is still on our auto insurance and sharing our cars. All good zero incidents.

BUT:

Seems best to detach him completely from a liability standpoint, no?

As in get a car in his his name, and his own policy.

Concern is that even then he would be living in our home, does that pierce some liability to us somehow?

Or keep with our healthy insurance + umbrella, but then again also our potential monkey.

Not looking for legal advice and realize there are no absolutes but is the general thinking among our like-minded ER crowd that its best to spin them off for liability?

All thoughts appreciated!

 

[SecondCor521]

I would think that a 21 year old would be independent from a liability standpoint regardless of who owned the auto or the auto policy. The only exception to this that I can imagine is contributory negligence if, for example, you owned the car he drove and you failed to, say, maintain the brakes and that resulted in an accident.

I'd be curious what your umbrella policy agent says about if your son would be covered under it. I would guess not.

But IANAL, YMMV, etc.

 

[USA]

When our son had his car loan paid off (DH was co-signer on the loan) it was titled in his name and he got his own insurance. He was still in college so we picked up the cost of insurance. It would have been cheaper to do it all in our name, but that wasn’t the point. If you discuss it with your adult son I would expect he would step up to the plate. Liability is a big deal. So is a young adults self esteem and transition to total financial independence.

 

[Lakewood90712]

Concern is that even then he would be living in our home, does that pierce some liability to us somehow? Likely yes at 21 , as crazy as that sounds.

Does he formally "Rent" a room ? .

"Or keep with our healthy insurance + umbrella, but then again also our potential monkey." My 2 cents , yes, and get him started off under his own roof as soon as practical.

 

[GoodWishes]

DS1 lives away from us, has his own car and insurance so we are free from him.

DS2 lives with us and drives our car a couple times a week. We talked to our insurance agent and our understanding is that he is covered under our car insurance and umbrella insurance. He is listed as a driver on our car insurance and umbrella insurance. We think that even if he has his own car and insurance, as long as he lives with us, we need to list him. We need him to move out and get his own car.

 

[donheff]

DD owns her own car but carries insurance under our policy because its cheaper. She has maintained our address as her legal reference but will switch it later this year. At that time I assume she will have to go on a separate auto policy. She keeps a cell phone under our plan for the same reason.

I don't think liability is an issue for us. It is not tremendously different than back in my days. My parents didn't keep us on policies but I did use their address as my official residence during my frequent move days. It was easier than going down to the DMV every few months to change my driver's license. At the time zone parking wasn't an issue so it didn't matter much where in the city my cars were registered.

 

[EastWest Gal]

We are keeping DS and his car on our policy until we move out. We have lots of discounts now-no accident, etc. and it’s much cheaper. We all three met with our insurance guy last year to review our changing needs.

He’ll get his own policy when he moves out permanently.

DS is a cautious driver anyway.

 

[SecondCor521]

We are keeping DS and his car on our policy until we move out.

A new option presents itself to parents like me with children who fail to launch...

 

[bizlady]

I would talk to my insurance agent if I were you. Separate seems best, but I would also consider making sure I had an umbrella policy. You can always work out some payment arrangement with DS if desired.

 

[greydog17]

Title the car in his name, and insure it separately in his name will put liability for that car in his responsibility. His policy will be primary coverage for anyone driving his car, even you. And, vice versa his policy will be secondary to your policy should he occasionally borrow your car. Your policy will not respond to his negligence while he operates his owned car.