can you get insurance for a part time business without having a business license like a LLC or something along those lines?
You can get insurance for *insurance* these days. Insurance is nothing but one side gambling with another as to if or
if not, something will happen. For instance, say you are sponsoring an outdoor concert where rain would ruin the event. You can buy insurance that'll pay you if it freaking rains! It'll be something like if it rains more than ¼" within a specified time you get paid $XXX. Literally, you can get paid $50K for a rainstorm. BUT... if it doesn't rain, or doesn't rain hard enough, fast enough, you get nothing (and still pay the premium). IE; it's a gamble.
I read a post by someone stating they never bothered with insurance. I think they detailed for a couple years and never had an issue. And also that he had an extra account for such cases that would cause for him to pay some damage. No insurance and no accidents. Saved himself a couple Gs
And I ran a towing business for 18 years without ever having a "loss run" claim. Never had any damage to a customers car that was caused by towing or transport. Does that mean I should have never had any insurance? Just one claim would have eat up YEARS worth of premiums, not months, but YEARS! How would saving a few pennies here and there have helped? Considering the bulk of my business was either for insurance companies, or in Hi-Line cars I'd have been NUTS not to protect myself.
I don't understand how bad a damage can be made for it to cost $300k? I mean burning paint with a rotary on a single panel won't cost more then $5000.. But then again, the worst can happen like lights falling down, right?
That was a *car* that cost $300K, not 'damage' that cost $300K.
Let's say YES, you caused damage to the hood on a $300,000 car or for that matter a $30,000 car. Just because the damage is confined to the hood, the REPAIR effects the entire vehicle.
Say the ($300K) car needs the hood painted and by default they most likely will blend to the front fenders. And let's also say that the paint repair can indeed be done for $5000 total. Do you think that is the end of it? And don't expect the owner to let you take it down to your buddies place where he works on the weekend picking up extra cash as a painter.
If is MY car it's going to the most expensive place in town!
By painting the car you have now diminished the value of it. It is NOT as it came from the factory, it is no longer "original". NOW it's a wrecked and repaired car. The value of the car is now less than it was before you touched it. Doesn't matter if it's a rare collectable or a $30,000 daily driver. Heard of CARFAX, repairs do show up there (
albeit not all of them, but depends on who reports them when it's not an insurance claim).
Ask your insurance company about "diminished value" and see what they say. (If you're trying to claim it they may say they have no idea what it is, BUT THEY ARE LYING!) The truth is, in a lot of states, when a car has been repaired you can ask for, AND SHOULD GET a check not only for the price of the repair BUT for diminished value, (especially if it's a fairly new car, a high priced car, a classic car, a collectable car (
no matter what the dollar value) and so on. And none of this even addresses damages that you can be asked to pay for like time lost from work, extra transportation, meals, lodging, and the list goes on.
See where this goes far beyond just "paint damage"? I didn't even mention the other stuff, catastrophic damages and the like. God forbid something that bad happen. So NO, to think that sitting on a few grand in the bank to pay for a respray will help you out when you are faced with a WTF situation is going to be the end of it, well.... I don't think so.
Later,
Cardaddy
