Cost to insure autos is going up

Rates in Golden State have skyrocketed as a result of inflation and soaring repair bills.

- BY LAURENCE DARMIENTO

BRIAN VAN DER BRUG Los Angeles Times A DRIVER stays dry as a tow truck operator hooks up the wrecked car to a flatbed truck in Sylmar in 2019.

Jeff Phillips, a retired computer consultant who lives in Oceanside, did a double take when he saw his auto insurance bill from Garrison Property & Casualty. It was nearly $300 more than last year.

Phillips, 60, who primarily drives a 2010 Mercedes sport utility vehicle and owns other vehicles, is now paying $3,244 a year for coverage from the USAA subsidiary, despite a multicar and good-driver discount.

"I didn’t have any incidents that would have caused it to go up," he said. "So I was kind of shocked that it was going up as high as it was."

If, like Phillips, you've recently received your renewal for auto insurance in the mail and can’t quite believe how much it has gone up, you aren’t imagining things.

The top 10 insurers in California got the nod last year to raise premiums an average of 6% on top of a 15.4% hike in 2024 and a 13% jump in 2023, according to S&P Capital IQ.

Add it all up and rates by insurers who write about 85% of all California auto insurance have climbed on average more than one-third from 2023 to 2025.

That means a California driver who paid the state's average premium of $1,087 in 2022 could be paying hundreds more today.

And that’s only for drivers who have avoided accidents and tickets that can drive premiums even higher.

Rates have surged not only in California but also nationwide, despite new safety features in cars that help reduce collisions.

Several forces are driving the higher rates. They include sharply rising prices for new cars and parts driven by inflation and exacerbated by President Trump's tariffs; more powerful, complex and heavier vehicles; increasing speeds on the highway and a greater severity of collisions, experts say.