How To Read The Premium Index

Want to know how your insurance premiums stack up against your state's average? The CarInsurance.com Premium Index makes comparing premiums easy, allowing you to compare auto insurance premiums right on your computer screen.

Comparing average automobile insurance premiums can give you a good idea of whether you are getting a fair deal on car insurance. The CarInsurance.com Premium Index (CPI) lets you see, with the click of a mouse, what car insurance rates are doing in your state.

Car insurance premiums are the amount of money drivers pay - sometimes on an annual basis, but often through a monthly payment plan - for the insurance coverage they receive from their insurance carrier.

The CarInsurance.com Premium Index (CPI) offers insurance premium comparisons. It tracks trends in average car insurance premiums to help people shopping for car insurance. When you look at the CPI before requesting rate quotes through the Web site, you will know:

The CarInsurance.com Premium Index (CPI) provides a lot of information about average car insurance premium rates in your state. But what if you don't like what you see when you compare your state's auto insurance premiums to other states?

Whatever you're shopping for, it helps to have a side-by-side comparison of the features, prices and benefits of products in a specific class, in addition to an insurance rate comparison. Automobile insurance premiums are no different than, say, laptops or flat screen TVs in this regard.

Car insurance premiums vary widely state-by-state. This is based on a number of factors, including:

The cost of living in that state. In states where most items cost more and salaries are higher, car insurance premiums follow suit.

Studying the CPI (Carinsurance.com Premium Index), we can see that car insurance average premiums change monthly in nearly every state. Why don't car insurance premiums stay the same each month? What factors cause a rise or fall in car insurance premiums? And, most importantly, why do average insurance premiums seem to rise each year?