The cost of supercar insurance in the UAE

Car insurance clearly doesn’t come cheap in the UAE, especially after the recent change in the rules, but it’s interesting to look at the figures for annually insuring a supercar.

According to insurance-comparison site yallacompare, fully comprehensive cover for the Ferrari 458, for example, costs an average of Dhs 10,433, although it should be noted that this is an old model, with prices less than half of its original Dhs 1 million tag.

They also say that fully comprehensive insurance for the Mercedes-Benz G63 AMG comes in at an average of Dhs 10,225 with agency repair, although it is unclear which model-year is being referred to. With agency repair, fully comprehensive insurance for the Maserati GranCabrio comes in at an average of Dhs 19,095, while for the Ferrari California, it costs an average of Dhs 20,010.

While these numbers are large in absolute terms, they argue that supercar insurance in the UAE is reasonably priced, given how much these vehicles are worth.

“With older vehicles – particularly SUVs – premiums for fully comprehensive policies can cost much more relative to the value of the car. You could be paying up to 10% of the car’s value to comprehensively insure your 2008 Mitsubishi Pajero. However, insurance for supercars is sold at anywhere between 0.5% to 3% of the car’s worth. So, in one sense, supercar insurance is actually quite good value,” explained Jonathan Rawling, CFO of yallacompare.

When the UAE Insurance Authority introduced new tariffs at the beginning of 2017, one of the rules stated that insurers could not charge more than 5% of the car’s value for a fully comprehensive policy. However, in practice, it appears that that rule can be superseded by the rule that states fully comprehensive policies must not be sold for less than Dhs 1,300 when insuring a saloon car, or Dhs 2,000 when insuring an SUV (which is how an old Pajero can have an insurance rate of 10%).

To cover a Dhs 1.3 million Bentley Bentayga in the UAE, fully comprehensive quotes are available from the site apparently start at Dhs 8,474, which amounts to just 0.65% of the car’s value. Fully comprehensive cover for the Dhs 1.1 million Bentley Continental GT comes in at 0.87% of the car’s value, or Dhs 9,520. The Lamborghini Aventador, meanwhile, can be comprehensively insured for Dhs 14,404, or just 0.96% of the car’s Dhs 1.5 million selling price. These numbers seem oddly generous, considering we know someone who paid Dhs 35,000 to insure his (new at the time) Ferrari F430, but he was under 30. Age is a factor, as per our own experience as well.

However, third-party insurance for supercars is generally no more expensive than third-party insurance for normal cars, which costs anywhere between Dhs 1,303 and Dhs 1,915 for the above-mentioned cars.