4 tips to reduce the crazy costs of auto insurance for teen drivers

Learning to drive may be a major rite of passage for American teenagers, but it’s also the leading cause of stress eating for their parents–and for good reason. Compared to drivers who are 20 years old or older, teenagers’ crash rates per mile driven are nearly four times as high.

If you’ve ever met a teenager, this can hardly come as a surprise. Kids that age lack experience, are convinced of their own immortality, and tend to make impulsive and risky decisions. Unsurprisingly, those are the exact same reasons why teens pay the most for auto insurance premiums of any age cohort.

The good news is that you can reduce auto insurance costs for teen drivers using strategies that also help keep them safe. Here’s what you need to know about affording your teen’s car insurance–and keeping your worry to a minimum.

Let driving and grades be the carrot-and-stick

Teen drivers who maintain good grades are statistically less likely to get into car crashes than those with low GPAs. While this statistical phenomenon is a correlation rather than a causation–the school Valedictorian is just as capable of driving like a boneheaded speed demon as the 6th-year senior–it can benefit parents in two ways.

The first benefit is that students with high GPAs can generally expect to receive a good student discount on their auto insurance premiums. Insurance companies certainly understand the good grade statistics (even if they’re just correlations) and they want to encourage the punctilious, Type-A teens to get experience and confidence behind the wheel. Many insurers offer discounts anywhere from 15% up to 25% to teen drivers with B averages or above.

This also gives parents a way to encourage unmotivated students. Considering the level of savings on offer (depending on your insurer), it seems reasonable to make adding your teen to your auto insurance conditional on them bringing up their GPA to the discount qualification level. Many a slacker will improve their grades in exchange for the freedom of the open road in Mom’s 2018 Kia Carnival.

Let safety be your guide

Though you can’t encase a teen in bubble wrap, making sure they drive a safe vehicle may be the next best thing. Not only will that give you peace of mind, but it may also save you money. Insurance companies commonly offer discounts to customers who drive cars with certain safety features, including the kinds of features most helpful to newbie drivers, such as:

• Backup and side cameras
• Lane departure detection
• Blind spot detection
• Anti-lock braking
• Automatic emergency braking systems

Before you assume only brand new or expensive cars will have these kinds of discount-worthy safety features, check out this list of safe cars for teens created by the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety and Consumer Reports. Many of the vehicles on the IIHS list, which includes both new and used cars at prices ranging from $5,000 to $20,000, have the kind of safety features that insurers offer discounts for.

Let someone else teach them defensive driving

Many insurance companies offer discounts to customers who have successfully completed a defensive driving course, including new teenage drivers. But even if there’s no price break on offer from your insurer, it’s still a good idea to enroll your kid in one of these kinds of classes, preferably one that includes classroom and driving instruction.

There are several reasons why this can be helpful. First, these classes help train drivers to recognize and anticipate situations that could lead to collisions. With a focus on the driver’s own behavior and judgment, your teen will learn how to make better decisions on the road and recognize the signs of potential problems and how to avoid them.

Though it may not lower your insurance premium immediately, it will get your kid in the habit of safe driving now, which will lead to lower insurance costs over time.

Secondly, it’s a lot easier for your child to learn these skills from someone other than you. Not only do you vividly remember when your kid got a Cheeto lodged in her nose, but you’re also quite aware of the fact that she’s operating a two-ton death trap on roads populated entirely by maniacs.

Allowing a professional instructor (who has probably seen it all) guide your teen through the process of learning situational awareness on the road is much less likely to end in a shouting match, tears, or anyone threatening to live with Aunt Sophie.

Let the insurer be Big Brother

It’s admittedly a bit creepy, but most insurance companies these days provide telematics monitoring programs that can potentially reduce your premium.

When you sign up for one of these auto insurance Panopticons, your insurer provides you with an app or a plug-in device for your car that will automatically measure specific risky driving behavior, such as phone use while driving, sudden braking, speeding, or your teen trying to corner your 2012 Odyssey like it’s on rails.

These programs are designed to lower premiums for safe drivers, but they can also provide parents important information about how their teens are behaving behind the wheel. Signing up for a telematics insurance program can encourage your young driver to make good choices–or else lose their privileges.

Practice your deep breathing

Reducing the cost of car insurance for your teen driver is a solvable problem–and happily, it’s one that coincides with helping to keep your kid safer on the road. Encouraging your kid to hit the books, making sure they’re driving a safe car, enrolling your child in a defensive driving course, and signing up for a telematics monitoring program will all potentially help lower your premiums–and your blood pressure.