I made my insurance agent do some work this morning and got the Pajero insured. I had gotten a quote from Hagerty before I bought it just to make sure I could insure the truck in the worst case. They said sure, for $67/month and the usual classic/specialty car insurance policy restrictions.
Folks online indicated they had been successful getting State Farm to insure imported cars, which is handy since I’m a lifelong State Farm insurance customer. Apparently not all insurance companies can/will deal with insuring imported vehicles with non-standard VIN numbers that don’t exist in North American databases and for which book values also don’t exist.
Once we got past the initial “a what?” question when they asked make and model, the rest was pretty easy on my part. He took the information, made a copy of the purchase paperwork and the import documents and took some pictures and told me he’d get on the phone with underwriting and get back to me with a quote.
Apparently he spent a couple of hours with underwriting, but by lunchtime I had a standard full coverage policy at an agreed value of $14000 for $37/month and no restrictions on use.
Even though the truck was technically covered under my existing F-150 policy under the clause that any purchase is automatically covered for 30 days under that policy, I cringed at the thought of having to make a claim under that with something like the Pajero. Now that it is fully insured and everyone agrees on what it is and what it is worth, I feel like I can really start getting go know it and what it can do.
Next step, title and registration. Currently it is on a Virginia temporary tag.