Leland West Insurance - avoid in a rising market
 

Last year I switched my collector's policy from Grundy to Leland West (which is affiliated with PCA) and got an "Agreed Value" at the sum that I thought was prudent given the indications that the 928 market appears to be finally going up.
No problems until renewal time comes around and I get a letter stating "based on our review of the market, the value of your car is $XXXX. The amount in their letter was 5% less than the "Agreed Value" in the first year of my policy.

So I pick up the phone and call up Leland West. The young lady on the phone stated that they could not raise the "Agreed Value" amount on the car unless I could provide proof in the form of other 1986 Porsche 928 sales to establish that my car was worth more than the lowered value that they were offering. Further, when she checked her "valuation" resources, she concluded that an 1986 928 in "excellent" condition was not worth more than $20,000.00.

I asked if I get a higher "Agreed Value" if I was willing to pay more in annual premiums. The answer, at least from Leland West, is "No."

So I am searching for new insurer and wonder why I never heard any of this "valuation" crap when I came on board as a new policy holder. Now that I am in renewal land, I have to "prove" that my "Agreed Value" amount is supported by sales reports of identical cars. This is not the kind of protection I want from an "Agreed Value" policy in a rising market.

pm sent. T

Pleasae let us know what you find. I'm covered by Leland-West too.

Hugo

I have Haggerty and have had no such issues, and I have pumped up the value of Blumaxx considerably. I did have to pull some comps, which was fairly easy to do - only a couple and they were good. Go to BaT, grab Brandon's record setting 86 and a couple more of the higher yielding cars between 1985 and 1988, and call Haggerty. My premiums have gone up with the cvalue, but I am willing to pay a bit more for a lot more coverage.

Like Ed, I too have Hagerty. They insure my entire collection, motorcycles, and cars at agreed value. They've never put any mileage limits on anything they insure, and last year they discounted my premium based on my claim history and a larger than average collection.

Every thing insured has a photo package, and I've increased the agreed value on a few of my bikes, and Hagerty informed me that my Brough Superior was worth more than my policy's agreed value. The increase in premium was minimal.

check Hagerty out.

No idea how accurate the yelp reviews are (some gave very specific reasons) , but they are not flattering.

Like all insurance companies, they are your best friend when you are paying and less than friendly when (gawd forbid) you actually expect a claim to be paid in a timely manner in a hassle free way.


Eddie

I had a small claim with Haggerty a number of years back. They took care of it no issues at all.

Leland West are just a broker. The carrier is American Modern Home Insurance Company. Brokers earn commissions on premium paid and premium is dependent on insured value (among other things) so it would be in their best interest to grant a higher agreed value, not lower. I suspect they are just following rules set by the carrier.

Haggerty is a broker too? Don't know the carrier they use.

I've used LW for over 15 years and have never had them lower my agreed value. I've been very happy with them so far and have 2 of my 928s covered by them currently. They didn't have any issue with paying $1500 for a windshield replacement years ago. There is some paperwork from them on the kitchen table that I haven't looked at yet, so maybe I'm in for a surprise.

I left Grundy years ago over a claim. I even had documented email where I outlined a scenario where a car was partially damaged and the repair resulted in mismatched paint. I still have the email where the Underwriter Manager told me the whole car would be painted. About 5 years later I had damage that required part of the car to be painted and since the original paint could not be matched Grundy should have covered it. They did not and I ended up on the phone with Mr Grundy himself and he point blank told me that he knew more about automotive paints and matching than I ever would. he refused to look at pictures and even consider the claim.

My policy is also written by American Modern and I called them first to ask if they would agree to raise the "Agreed Value." They told me that had to call Leland West to do that. I guess there is a lot about the relationship between brokers and carriers that I do not understand since my preconceived notion was that the carrier does the underwriting and not the broker.

American Modern through The Hartford Ins Co. More $ spent on Just Peachy recently and no problem bumping up agreed value. T

I also have American modern insurance through National Corvette Museum and I had my '79 petrol auto agreed value coverage doubled with just new pics. Anymore would require an appraisal which I wouldn't mind since I think it's worth even more, but I was too lazy.

Another bump for Hagerty.

I have my 914, my 928 Spyder, and my RUF 997 all with Hagerty. The Agreed Values on each policy represent the $s I have invested in each car as the primary factor and the market value of each as a secondary consideration. I provided to Hagerty itemized spreadsheets for each car with costs, dates, source of the parts (including web links), mileage parts were installed, etc along with a photo package showing condition. With the RUF car I went further and included RUF registry information for the rarity factor since it's one of 2 or 3 of it's type in the US from what I can gather. On all of the cars, they were fine with the valuation I put on each, without a single issue. Every so often, I send a new photo package to them to create a historical timeline showing that the covered vehicles are remaining in excellent condition. They've never contacted me about lowering a valuation and in fact on the 914 a couple years ago, asked me if I wanted to consider raising it, which I did.

I'm trying to move all my specialty cars over to Hagarty before my first child starts driving in a few years, which I'm hoping will include the custom Cayenne Turbo S currently being built - Hagerty doesn't usually do SUVs but I'm hoping will make a "show car" exception for a long-standing customer. For me, the other advantage to this plan is that my daughter will be on our regular Travelers policy that only has my wife's DD 997, my 2001 pickup, and whatever we get her to drive around and I won't have to insure here on a couple hundred K of Porsches she won't be driving anyway.

With Hagerty, are you allowed to drive the car to work? LW doesn't allow it.