Novice driver - insurance

iguana

I only started driving 18 months ago and passed my test in June. I'd love to get a camper but I'm not sure if it would be possible to get any reasonable insurance quote for it. I have a number of family members with campers and they all get their insurance through camping club membership and you need a 5 year NCB for that. So I'm not sure if I have to wait another 3.5 years to get one, which is a pain as my son is 5 now and getting a camper to take holidays in would be just ideal.

If you're over 25 get someone else to insure it. +€50 Open drive.

iguana

I'm 39 and wouldn't feel comfortable with potentially wrecking someone else's NCB if I was involved in an accident.

Don't have an accident. :pac:

Try Dolmen I think you only need to have a full licence.
Try Stuarts if you have a daily.

mrs.doubt.fire

Dolmen Insurance use to be age 23 with a full license but this year (2017) they changed the age limit to 25 yrs with a full license. I know because my son is 23 and I had promised him he could take my camper when he was 23 but we only found out this year the age limit went up to 25....and yes he's livid as now he has to wait 2 years to drive it lol

bonky2018

One of my mates decided to solve the problem for him

He went to Hungary where he had Hungarian friend with Hungarian address and bought a Hungarian registered LHD camper van

The compulsory third party insurance there was something like 100 euros per year for anybody over 18 with EU license to drive it .
He registered the ownership of the camper van with his Hungarian mate
Then he drove Camper van around the region and stores it in long term storage for 1 euro a day so 365 euros per year .

Then he fly out on Ryan air and does several holidays a year drives around the region

He also pays another separate insurance for the camper van to cover theft fire and other comprehensive issues .
He cant impact the Hungarian friends insurance as the insurance is to the specific car or truck or camper van .

However officially his Hungarian friend owns the camper so he has risks if his Hungarian friend decided to want to take the van but in ten years this has not been a issue and unlikly to be as his Hungarian friend doesn't have any interest in driving anything not even a push bike .

The eastern Europe insurance tends to cheaper in that it is not unlimited like Irish insurance
The max payout for third party is something like 1/2 million with Hungarian insurance and with Estonia is something like 100,000 euros

This tend to mean if there is larger claim than the maxim pay out then the car driver at fault could have his assets like house taken and sold to pay the extra and have leans on his income enforced for life . How these extra claims could reach across from Hungary or Estonia to Ireland isn't so clear .However as 99% of car wreck claims in the entire EU region rarely exceed more than 20,000 euros often just rear end shunts this risk to exceed maxim pay outs remains tiny

Many parts of EU the third party insurance for the car or truck or Camper Van is attached to the vehicle and not the driver .Therefore there is not a real no claims system in place for third party claims .
As the majority camper van car and truck owners chose to do desperate comprehensive policies these work on the individual and there exist no claims for this element of the insurance for vehicles

The UK and Ireland chose to have unlimited claim liability attached to the driver and this makes the cost for third party insurance rise exponentially faster than inflation to cover these few 1million plus claims .

This method to bypass Irish camper van insurance could probably also work if Irish applied for Spanish resident status which only requires living in Spain for some weeks a year .
Insurance on Spanish vehicles is also attached to vehicle but has to be Spanish registered vehicle and typically cost 400 euros a year for a medium sized car of which often there is mandatory break down recovery of 50 euros which will gives break down assist in all of the EU

Not sure for Portugal but they often pay less than 150 euros a year for their cars third party insurance but purchace costs of camper vans tend to be double that of Spain due to high import tax similar to Ireland

Buy a Spanish van park it in long term parking or suitable cheap rate camping site in their car park and book on cheap RYAN AIR flight s and tour spain several times a year is a possibility .

Very popular is to buy German vans import them into Spain and insure them in Spain as German camper vans are often the cheapest and Spanish insurance is cheaper and more easy to get than German insurance. German insurance policies require registered official German address and that is complex to get saying you live with your mate wont cut any ice in Germany systems .

As long as you never bring these forgien reg camper vans to ireland you can tour all the EU fora entire year legaly and be legally insured for third party .
There would not be any requirement under EU rules to have green cards and declare where you go for the entire year for the third party element of the policy to remain legal .

The comprehensive elements of any insurance policy could increase in costs if you do many countries and tour all year long in the EU to reflect the extra risks , Also there is a possibly to require notification of the location and schedules of the tours that would take place and the habitual parking region of the camper van and some regions of the EU could increase the costs a lot such as high crime regions like Paris or regions near to Ukraine or Russia frontiers where car theft hijacking is more common .

If a tour leaves the EU such as to go to Turkey , Morocco Russai , Ukraine then normal green card requirements kick in which often only issue green cards for maxims of 6 weeks to 3 months depending the third party insurance set up .
Moroccan tours are very popular with EU camper vans so much so that Morocco often puts quota limit on camper cars as they clog up the falling apart third worlds region road networks so limiting the foreign camper vans numbers helps reduce the traffic congestion problem. How you book into going to Morocco is whole different story. Very few will ever risk to go to Ukriane they say its mad max with car boot sales with every type of known gun mortar grenade and heavy machine gun and ammo boxxes on open sale and high crime rates on rich foreigners often from Ukraine police and army


Places like Spain have special long term car parks full of hundreds of foreign reg German french Swedish UK etc camper vans that owners return to do another leg of their journey like going to Morocco or Portugal or Andorra or France etc

Camper van rental solutions exist all across the EU but costs are extortionate so its cheaper to stay in five star hotel or keep a camper van parked in the EU mainland than pay those rental fees. Also many charge extra fees for under 25 drivers

There is an easier way this policy covers you globally except in the vehicle's country of registration.