Insurance and rv extended maint. Plans.

JetMech05 · July 7, 2019

I need advice from any and all

What would you all recommended for rv insurance and extended maint. Plans? I have read very bad reviews about good sams club.

richfaa · July 7, 2019

We will not recommend anything however we have been using Progressive for all our insurance needs for a long time and have been satisfied with their rates and service.

We have had the Extended service plan for both our 5th wheels since 2006. We use cornerstone. We have used the plan more than once and are please with the service.

Ray,IN · July 7, 2019

Welcome! There are many insurance companies that specificly cover RV's. The only advice I can offer is to shop around/compare companies coverage and premiums. Also, keep in mind you owe no allegiance to any company, if you find the same coverage for less money, and it makes sense to you change companies. I have found, at least for me, dealing with an independent agent gets me the lowest premium for the same coverage.

Extended service plans vary widely, we bought one through Good Sam when we bought our MH because it had been in storage for 8 years without any attention. The plan more than paid for the premiums + deductibles during the 3 yr contract.

Remember, it is a contract, and as such you should read the fine print and be prepared to follow the requirements exactly to obtain the best results. Also, an exclusionary contract is best because it states what is NOT covered, by omission everything else is covered. An inclusionary contract states what IS covered, leaving what is not covered up to the company.

Many people choose to self-insure, which is fine if you have the reserve finances, we did not to go that route. I feel for the guy on an different rving forum that had a $30,000 diesel engine repair-Cummins only paid $10,000 of that; it happened again the following year only Cummins did not pay anything.

Kirk W · July 8, 2019

For insurance, contact at least two of these:

For Road Service coverage you can get it through Escapees if you choose to join and if not I suggest Coach Net.

For an extended warranty I'd try America's Warranties

Edited July 8, 2019 by Kirk W

FL-JOE · July 8, 2019

Welcome. Like others have said, you just need to shop around for your insurance needs.

The extended service plans are almost like insurance, you have to factor in everything and then decide how much you may want to be covered, if at all.

IMHO (in my humble opinion) if you travel in an RV more than 5 months out of each year then a service plan could be a good idea. Or, if your RV has numerous expensive parts and appliances that could break then you might look at pricing a plan. On the other hand if you only get on the road for 3 months every year and your RV has one air unit, a water heater, a frig and not much else then maybe an extended service plan just isn't worth it.

We have had RVs with them and we have had RVs without them.

sandsys · July 8, 2019

Whatever plans you get be sure to read them. The fine print in our first plan made us cancel it and go with another company. If it's not going to meet your needs why have it?

Linda

RV inspector · July 12, 2019

In my experience, when you mention extended service plans you are going to get strong opinions one way or the other. A lot depends on how much risk you are willing to take on your own and still sleep at night. Some folks also have plenty of cash reserves and they can easily handle any repair expense on their own. For them, self-insuring makes sense IMHO.

But for others who don't have those resources at hand, I think it makes sense to determine what your biggest expense could be and decide if that is something that you can reasonably handle in your RVing budget or not. For instance, if you have a diesel pusher motorhome, there can be lots of big ticket repairs associated with them. That doesn't mean that you will most likely have big those expenses, it just means that it is possible to face large repair bills especially on the diesel motor itself, the tranny, and the generator. Maybe an extended warranty makes sense in this case. And if you never use the warranty, that's great, you also did not have the stress of dealing with repair problems either. Of course, some folks think they MUST get their money back from any form of insurance or the money spent is wasted. I personally don't see it that way.

On the other hand, if you have a 5th wheel or travel trailer, the only motor expense is in the tow vehicle (maybe an extended warranty would make sense on your tow vehicle alone in this case). And most of the components on the towable units are not as high ticket items if repair is needed.

As with everything else in the RV world, the answer to questions about extended warranties usually is "it depends".

richfaa · July 12, 2019

As you know they are not Extended warranties but service contracts with the conditions of use and what is covered clearly stated. We have had them on both our 5th wheels since we started long timing and high end travel since 2006. We did not have them on our 4 previous travel trailers none of which were as pricey as these 5th wheels and we were weekend low end users. We also have the Ford ESP on our Tow vehicle.

We see them as a insurance policy like any other insurance policy. We have them pay the premiums and hope we never use them.

We have used the plans since 2006 on both our 5th wheels and the Ford ESP twice on our tow vehicle, I do not know if we "got our money back" we have not got our money back on any insurance policy '

We see it as paying an affordable premium to protect against a large perhaps unaffordable incident.