Title: Stop Buying the Cheapest Auto Insurance | It Could Ruin Your Life
Downloaded: 2026-04-10 14:52:30

[Music] Welcome everyone to another episode of the Auto Accident Attorneys podcast brought to you by the Auto Accident Attorneys Group where our motto is simple. We take care of you. By now, if you've listened before, you've seen that we've had episodes ranging from pet adoption to barberhops. Today, we're going to get back to some of the basics, how it all started when I procotized to you all about uninsured motorist protection. Today I am so lucky to have a fellow community member and a business uh owner with me, East Cobb Local, Corey Reichman of the Reichman Agencies.

And we are going to talk all things auto insurance and All State and I'm going to be very nice to All State. Even though typically this building isn't very nice to All State, today we will be. Corey, thank you so much for joining me. >> It's my pleasure. Before we hop into auto insurance and and giving people advice about what to choose and how to make those decisions, why don't you please tell me a little bit about yourself and how the Reichman Agencies came to be? >> Well, so I'm an agent, an insurance agent.

My wife is also an insurance agent. We're business partners. We have multiple offices with 33 employees now, I want to say. Uh we manage a really big agency um across multiple states uh like close to 30,000 households are our customers here around Atlanta. >> Impressive. >> Yep. So I'm in the weeds every single day uh with with customer escalations and writing new business and making sure it's compliant. So hopefully I can add some value to your to your listeners from a like purchasing insurance standpoint and what they'll need.

>> Absolutely. I really appreciate you coming in. I I I feel lucky that I'm able to have this conversation. Um I don't know how easily I could have gotten somebody to to come in to a plaintiff's firm to be like, "Yeah, this is what insurance is about, but I did want to share this. I'm holding it incorrectly." There we go. We're going to put your ad. We don't have commercials, so I'll just put the ad on on screen. So that's you and your wife, fivestar reviews, 30,000 households. So, you probably are even more acutely aware of claims than than I am.

Uh, let's start with uh before we get into the practical logistics of it all, share some stories with me, not nightmare scenarios, but maybe some issues that you have uh where one of your clients may call you where it didn't have adequate protection or something went sideways or does that even exist in your world? It does exist all the time because customers are constantly shopping on price. It is the number one thing any customer that calls into our agency or or fills out a web form or whatever, it's all about price.

And it that's not what the conversation should be about. Like yes, you want a good deal, but that doesn't mean the cheapest thing out there because you are getting way less coverage. I promise you, if you want the best price, we can give you the best price. but you're going to miss a ton of coverage. So, god forbid something happens, you might not have the coverage that you you really needed because you were shopping to save 10 bucks. So, >> right, >> realistically, it it's like like in anything you buy, you just want a good deal.

You get a good bang for your buck, feel good about the purchase, and that's not always the cheapest thing out there, >> right? I think that's one of the issues. I I can validate what you're saying right now because I see it after things go wrong and they come to me because they need to litigate an issue. When they're basing it on price, they are under the misconception that the coverages are all the same or every the protection is the same regardless of which bucket they pick. And so they're picking the the least expensive bucket, but there's so many little variables that go into what is and is not covered.

Right. >> Yeah. And part of the issue is you're also you're buying insurance sometimes from people that just won't have that conversation with you. Um like the insurance agent you're talking to or the online form you're filling out and trying to buy a policy online. You have almost no clue sometimes on exactly what you're buying. So buying from a just a 1-800 person that's that's not going to take the time to explain coverages. And one thing I want to do mention is the bulk of the customers we work with is the more educated if you will like the customers that care more about their finances.

So it is >> less common for us to kind of fight on price with certain people because they they do understand value. They own nice houses like they do around here in East Cobb, nicer cars. So, they do have a better conversation with our agency than if you were buying a 1-800 policy, >> right? That makes sense. Uh, one of the things I always tell people in our office, especially our intake department, is when you get that intake call where it's a catastrophic accident, 90% of the time that's going to be an accident involving either minimum limits or no insurance.

Because the people that cause the head-on collision, driving the wrong way down the highway that causes fatalities are rarely the type of personality that has protected their assets, that had the foresight to get protection and be like, "Oh, this is the type of policy I need. These are the assets I have to protect." That's like the easiest thing I I often say when I'm talking to a customer is you've earned or you've worked your butt off to have this nice house, to have these nice cards, you've built yourself some savings, maybe some rental properties, you know, a stock portfolio, etc.

Like, the cheapest way to protect all of that is to have more insurance. Yes, it's another 300 bucks a year or whatever for more coverage, 600 bucks a year, but like it's a lot easier for insurance to cut a million dollar check than it is for you to have to liquidate your assets to pay for this claim. >> Right. So, I'd like to get focus in on because we're the auto accident attorneys group, I'd like to focus in on auto insurance specifically. Uh, one of the conversations I have all the time are people that come to me and and say that they're not worried about what the case value is going to be because they have full coverage.

Well, what I have to tell them is full coverage doesn't really tell you anything about what is is actually covered. Typically, what I found is that people when they're talking about full coverage, they're just talking about the property damage. They have liability and collision, but they may not have uninsured motorist coverage for bodily injury. And even if they do, then there's different levels of it. They could have it at this the Georgia state minimum, which is 25 or anything above that. Mhm. >> So when somebody is out there shopping, a listener here, can you take us through a sample onboarding or or the types of questions you would ask or what they need to analyze to know what kind of insurance to get for auto policies specifically?

>> Yeah, I definitely. So probably the most prominent one you talk about is just regular bodily injury. You know, that's protect. Like, god forbid you're at fault in an accident, you hurt somebody else in another wreck and they get out and they're like, "Oh, my neck." They're going to want to sue you or hire an attorney to to get you or your insurance company to pay for their injuries. So, how much coverage do you need? I like to say if if they want to sue you for everything you got, how much is that?

That's how much really liability coverage you need right then and there. And maybe it's half a million bucks. Maybe you're worth 100,000, but at the very least, whatever your liquid net worth is, like that's how much insurance you need from liabil from a liability standpoint. Then obviously it's your car property damage. So if you're at fault, like can you leave the accident with a total car and just write it off and get nothing from it? Most people like, "No, I want my $30,000 for my Camry or whatever." So, you need enough property damage now for for your own stuff.

And then uninsured motors is probably the hardest conversation you have with customers because they just don't comprehend it that well. >> And it and it's hard to say it in like really lame terms because you've got the added on and the minus, >> right? >> And you really lose people there. So, the way I like to to have the conversation is now, God forbid somebody hurt you in an accident. They had state minimum insurance or no insurance at all. They left the scene and you're hurt. Like, do you want your insurance company now to pay for your medical bills or for your injuries?

And a lot of times they're they're like, "Well, I have great health insurance, so if I'm in a hospital," and a lot of that is true. You know, your health insurance definitely kicks in and pays for injuries sustained from a from an accident. Um, but what if you can't work? What if it's more than just those bills from the hospital? So, that's where you have to have the uninsured motors conversation with people, but that's also probably the most expensive line item on an insurance policy. >> Oh, I didn't know that.

>> Yeah, >> the M coverage is the most expensive one. >> M has become the most expensive one. It used to not be. um liability like just the general liability part of it is is very it depends on how much coverage you buy but yeah I'd say has become the most expensive and if if not it's within a dollar or two of each other >> you had mentioned the reduced buy versus the add-on type of um coverage so there well actually let me let you describe it >> I'm going to lose a lot of your listeners here because it is it is confusing but you have two kinds of uninsured motorist you have the regular which is called the reduced like minus So, whatever the other person's company's pays, let's say their limit is 25,000, it gets minused from whatever your policy says.

And if there's anything left, that's what you get. >> Mhm. >> Whereas the added on is just like it sounds. It's added on. Whatever the other carrier pays, it could be 25, it could be $100,000. Your coverage now can be added on top of it. It's never minused. It's just whatever they pay. Now you have whatever your limit is can be added on never minused. >> Between those two types of uninsured mo I know that the uninsured motorist polic line item has become really expensive. What is the price difference between the reduced buy versus the add-on?

>> It's twice the price to go add it on. >> Is it really? >> Yeah. So, if you if you're buying $100,000 uninsured motorist uh policy, it'll probably be in the neighborhood of 350 bucks every six months. >> And to go to add it on, you double it. It'll be 600 bucks. >> Really? Well, I didn't know that, but it makes sense because, well, from my perspective, I'm the the guy that you go see that needs to get into those policies. When it's reduced by the statistical likelihood of it ever being used is pretty radically reduced.

It only really kicks in if you're hit by an uninsured motorist and have zero. >> And maybe you can you can speak on that and educate me a little bit. When does addedon, non-addon really come into play? And maybe share a case scenario. >> Sure. Awesome question. I'm glad. It's almost like you were setting me up for it. So, uh, obviously, you know, but for our listeners, you don't get into uninsured motorist coverage until you exhaust the liability policy. If the fault driver doesn't have a liability policy in place, they're completely uninsured, then you can immediately tap into your uninsured motors protection.

Doesn't matter if it's reduced by or add-on on those cases where the >> treated equal at that point, >> right? Because there's there's zero to begin with, >> right? They were uninsured, so there was zero to minus from the policy. >> Thank you for bringing that up. Hopefully, it makes sense to the listeners and we're not losing them. In the cases where the atpha driver has, let's just say the Georgia state minimum of 25,000. Then once that's exhausted, that's when you as the insured are able to tap into your M policy, the underinsured motorist part of it.

When it makes a difference on whether it's reduced by or add-on depends on how much in medical bills that you've incurred. If you've got $30,000 of medical bills and they have a $25,000 policy and you have reduced by, you're going to be upside down that $5,000 because you have to minus their 25 from your 25. >> So, what if someone has excellent health insurance and they they have to stay in the hospital for a week, you broken leg or whatever. um and they get out and they're fine and everything, but where does health insurance not kick in or kick in versus auto insurance in a in a case like this?

>> We're going to start from the night of the auto accident. When an auto accident occurs and the injured person that was not at fault is taken to the hospital, the industry has turned in such a way where in the hospital intake department, it looks like a nurse, but they're actually part of the management office. They come in with that little thing on the wheels with a computer. If you are taken in by ambulance, they already know you're part of an auto accident. If not, they'll ask if it was an auto accident.

If it's an auto accident, they may not take your health insurance. Not because it's not accepted, but because they don't want to because the health insurance contractual rate is going to reimburse them at such a lower rate than if they bill you directly. And what they're doing, they present it to the patient as if you're in an accident that wasn't at your fault. you don't need to use your health insurance, the other person will pay for it. What's really going on is that they're billing against the settlement that that patient is going to receive at the end of the case and they're billing dollar for dollar and they'll file a lean.

There are law firms that that's their whole job. They work for the hospital and they will file a lean against the settlement proceeds of an auto accident case. So one of the things that we because we specialize in auto accident cases, we actually have a lean coordinator whose sole responsibility is to deal with issues like this on behalf of a client has no legal work just in terms of accounting. So when we do intake and we know that somebody has gone to the hospital, we immediately will get their health insurance information, contact the hospital, put the hospital on notice that this person has health insurance and they are obligated to take it.

That's another issue. If the hospital has contracted with United Healthcare and the patient presents United Healthcare, the hospital is supposed to bill United Healthcare. Now, the reason that it becomes a little bit of a problem is because the hospital doesn't want to actually bill United Healthcare because they don't want to receive contractual reimbursement. United Healthcare doesn't want to actually pay because they don't want to pay out any premiums. So, even though the rules are in place, you've got two entities that don't really want to play ball with you.

>> Mhm. the health insurance doesn't really want to pay and the hospital wants to file a lean. So, there's a little bit of a uh problems or issues that come along with that, but we we push it through. Getting back to the question of when does health insurance kick in? Technically, it should kick in when when you're there. Why why would you still want the uninsured motors protection is because you still have the pain and suffering and general damages to get reimbured for. If you don't have insurance, you're not going to get consideration for the possibility of future medical bills, right?

Like if if you've got an injury that shows that you have a physician that says that you're going to need six ortho treatments in the next two years and 20 physical therapy treatments, we average that out. Let's just say that each visit is $1,000. You can actually use your M policy if it's already in excess and receive some consideration for that future medical treatment. But you're not going to get that through your health insurance. When you go and make those visits in the future, you can use your health insurance.

Sure. But it's sort of like a different It's the present value of the dollar. >> You could get that right there at the settlement or use your health insurance instead. >> Yeah. And you mentioned pain and suffering. Like it's one thing to just get your hospital bill covered. You walk out of there though. But like what just happened to your quality of life if you've got a broken foot, broken, you know, whatever. Like that sucks. >> Yeah. >> And even the the deductible and the co-ay or the ambulance. I don't most health insurancees won't pay for the ambulance ride.

And the ambulances are all private entities and they bill and they don't reduce their bills for anything. Unlike hospitals that sometimes will do a charitable writeoff, the ambulance won't do it. So, by having insurance in place, even if you've got great health insurance, if you've got the appropriate pieces of your auto insurance in place, you're covered against the co-pays, deductibles, the EMS service, which leads me to medical payments coverage. What is the cost of med pay on policies right now?

So Med pay is way cheaper than M. And it's kind of become common practice to steer people to max out meday and do less. >> Mhm. And I I could be wrong for saying this, but like Mother Insurance when they teach a salespeople how to sell their policies, they do often say that um M is like the the reason it went up in cost and yada yada is because so much of that goes to attorneys whereas med pay maybe doesn't go so much to attorneys and goes towards those those medical bills. So they, >> you know, we where it's a contingency fee based practice and you're not permitted to take fees on medical payments coverage, which actually if you're a listener and you've ever been represented by an attorney and they took Med pay fees, you might want to give them a call or contact the bar, but that that makes sense.

So it goes directly to reimburse incurred medical bills. >> Now on on the downside, med pay limits are way smaller. Way way smaller. So like it's it you might get up to $100,000 if I'm not mistaken is the limit on Ned pay, but for M it could be half a million bucks or more depending on the carrier. >> Right. Yeah. Typically the the most common number I see in our cases when we're doing intake because we've got graphs on every case on a quarterly basis. I'm reviewing you know how many cases did we have that had uninsured motorist, how many cases had med pay and I'm looking at them.

The most common number I see for MedPay is 5,000. >> Yeah, >> that's by far and away this is >> like five bucks for that. >> It annually or per pay period? >> Per six months? >> Per. Okay, guys. For $5 a month, I mean, sorry, for $5 per pay period, you can get medical payments coverage that will pay for any incurred medical cost that you have up to $5,000 regardless of fault. That's that's >> Yeah, that pretty much covers your deductible. Yeah, >> your health insurance deductible at that point if health insurance did kick in and pay for all this.

>> We're still walking out of there with a bill. Med pay will pay will cover that. I've used I've been in an accident myself. Uh you were talking about your accident earlier before we started recording. I was also in a a single vehicle accident uh a rollover in a Jeep. >> Oh wow. >> And I used my I have health insurance but I I used the med pay to pay for my deductible. Luckily for me, I had gotten into that accident early in the year. So, the rest of that year, I had just free use of my health insurance with with no deductible, which is another thing to take into consideration.

Um, when you decide to use health insurance or have your doctors treat you on a lean, if you have an accident case, if it's the beginning of the year, we recommend that you use your health insurance because you're going to get that deductible reimbured, but you can use your health insurance without the deductible for the rest of the year. and maybe line up some procedures that year after an auto accident. That's just sort of like a practical advice. >> Yeah. >> Type of thing. Um, okay. So, getting back to the logistics of of for liability, it makes a lot of sense.

Look at what you have, whatever it is that you need to protect and then purchase enough insurance to shield that. Do you have a formula or anything similar for when you're talking to people about uninsured motors protection? I I can't say that I have like such an easy simple question I should be asking them and maybe you can help me formulate one. Um for forum it it does become like a cost discussion >> because they understand to protect their assets and then so many people struggle like hypothetically if I get hurt you know and the other person doesn't have a bunch of insurance you can buy as much insurance as you want but you might never use it.

So people struggle with buying a ton of insurance on on a scenario like that. >> Yeah. >> Whereas they know they've got a house to protect and and stocks to protect, >> but like I may never get hurt. >> Yeah. >> So they struggle on buying a bunch of um cuz it is expensive. >> Yeah. from my perspective because of what I see day in and day out. Uh I've I've had friends reach out to me because they've seen my social media content and they reach out to me when they're purchasing insurance. So I'm I can if you ever need somebody to help do a sales pitch, feel free to hit me up.

my personal friends and family members. I look at the uh liability limits as yes, you're you're protecting your assets from from being seized when you do something wrong or negligent. But if you flip that a little bit, what you're doing is you're paying to protect somebody else in a sense because if you cause injury, you're you're paying to make sure that that person's injuries are handled here. At the same time, contemporaneous to that, you are protecting your assets, but you're making sure that they're handled.

the uninsured motors protection. I I tell friends and family if if I'm paying to protect others, I want to get the same amount of limits that I have in liability for protecting myself and people in my vehicle. In any given time right now, I've got four people in my vehicle. So knowing the rate of uninsured motorists in the country, I want to make sure that I've got as much protection as possible. It I want to make sure that I'm protecting my own occupants of my own vehicle as much as I'm protecting people.

>> That is that did remind me that is definitely one way we have that uninsured motors discussion is because what is it like one in five drivers has no insurance somewhere around there. And then let's talk about how many people have state minimums, which is $25,000. So, god forbid they do hurt you in a wreck and run or just have no insurance. It's 25 grand and you're injured. Like, don't you want your own insurance company that to help with your pain and suffering with your injuries? And that's where M really comes in.

I don't know if you've ever, you probably haven't seen any of my social media, but most of my social media, if it's not pictures of my kids and food, it's about uninsured motors protection specifically because I've seen too many times people be involved. And and again, earlier in the episode, I said the most catastrophic accidents are caused by people that are wolffully underinsured, if insured at all. So that that's the one thing where I I believe that you owe it to yourself. You owe it to to your family to purchase that product to protect knowing that there's this many uninsured drivers on the road.

I think a good rule of thumb is if you have acquired any decent amount of wealth or net worth, like I'm not talking about millions and millions of dollars, like you've you finally afforded a house, you know, you're not struggling every single day paycheck to paycheck. Like at that point, you max out your insurance. I mean, I I I did that early on in my career and never looked back. Mhm. >> So, I I think a good rule of thumb is just just because I said I said it earlier that the cheapest way to protect all this stuff is through auto insurance and property insurance and whatever stuff you have to protect.

Just it's a couple hundred dollars a year and you could potentially have millions of dollars worth of coverage. Like that's the best use of a few hundred bucks in my opinion. >> I 100% agree. I had a guest on last week and we were talking about life insurance and we were talking about term. She said that everyone should have term no matter what. And I made the metaphor that I I think of that as like the revolver underneath your mattress in in in the safe. You don't want it. You're not a gun guy. You don't want to go out and shooting with it, but it's there as a worst case scenario.

I insurance is like that revolver where the way I look at it, I I hope I never have to use it. If I pay an additional $600 a year, good. But the peace of mind that that brings knowing that if it happens, and I think I'm in a unique position because I've seen it affect people. You know, the the number one cause of bankruptcy in America is unexpected medical bills. Y >> right. >> The number one reason for unexpected medical bills, I believe I looked into this last year, was uh disease. But right behind disease is auto accident or some sort of accident injury.

So, knowing that statistical probability is that high and that causes bankruptcy, here we are in this episode telling you there are products that go there's no safety net. That's another thing I I feel like a lot of people think, well, you know, I wasn't at fault and all of these bad things have happened to me. Surely there's protection for me from somewhere. The government, the state will will step in. I always tell him I'm like, "First off, don't call me Shirley." >> And then it won't >> it won't there's nothing for it.

>> No. >> Part of that is is maturity. You know, the older you get kind of the more conservative you become. Um and what do you think insurance is? It's kind of like a you're being conservative and you're buying insurance to protect yourself so other grabby, you know, won't won't come after your own assets, >> right? >> And the younger folks, they don't have that same mindset. They maybe haven't earned enough money to feel that way yet. >> Um, so they just give you the cheapest thing, but then they end up getting hurt and it affects their life a lot longer than it would somebody that's older.

So, an argument can be made that like you should still have adequate insurance even when you're young because yeah, >> you got a long runway there. >> I have so many questions on the homeowner side and I have questions about like insurance leaving, but I feel like we we should probably save that for another episode. Usually at the end of the episode though, what I do is I provide the guests an opportunity if there's something that you feel like we should have covered that we didn't cover or if there's something in your heart that you feel like listeners could really benefit from hearing.

uh just sort of like a an open forum for you to give information or advice to people. >> If you are a potential customer of the Reichman agencies, like you owe it to yourself to have a serious conversation with a good insurance agent about all of your assets and how to properly protect them. Uh insurance is one of those things where people will just shop based on price and not coverage. And if you if you have any net worth, it's time to have a coverage discussion and not a price discussion. >> And so our agency was in 2023 All State's number one agency in the country.

Out of 8,000 agents, Cory got number one. And we're not far behind in the next two years. So we're continually an awesome agency. And we insure more homes in the state of Georgia than any other state agent. I personally invest in real estate. So, like I really understand homes and investment property and protecting those things and obviously auto insurance. I'm a huge gear head. So, we're going to we can protect your cars too. So, all I'm saying is when you're done thinking about cheapest price and you want to have a serious conversation about protecting your life, that's when you call us.

Call the Reichman agencies, look up Corey Reichman, and just give us a call. >> That's awesome. Um, we'll make sure to get all the links below the video so that you guys can reach out to Corey. Um, like every other guest that we've ever had, you already know if they're willing to come on to the podcast, they're looking to take care of you. So, reach out to them. As always, please like, comment, and share. It'll really help me out. And, Mom, I know that you watch every episode every week, and I appreciate it.

You're getting my YouTube views up. I love you so much. I'll see you next week. Take care.