It's almost impossible to watch TV or flip through a magazine now without being bombarded with car insurance ads. "Switch to Brand X and save $400 a year!" "Brand Y car insurance: our customers save $300 a year over Brand X!" You think "wait a minute, those two ads contradict each other! Who do I trust?!", only to flip the page and see "Brand Z car insurance: save an average of $500 over Brand X and Y!" What's going on?!

Car insurance ads can be very misleading. Viewers sometimes forget that there are a host of factors that affect your rates, including your age, marital status, year and make of car, and your driving record. Car ads are often cleverly worded as well. Sometimes you will see "drives who switched saved an average of $350 per year." But think about that for a minute: "Drivers who switched saved money." Well, obviously, or else they wouldn't have switched in the first place! That is very different from saying "All drivers will save $350 if they switch to us." It's entirely possible that many drives may not save any money at all.

If you are considering changing companies, ask yourself why: is it because your company has horrible customer service? Have you called and talked to other companies and gotten firm quotes that you will in fact save money if you change? And if so, are you saving money while staying with the same level of coverage and deductible? Don't be fooled if your rates are going down by $50 or $100 per month but your deductible is going up by $1,000. To quote an old saying, make sure you are comparing "apples to apples."

And if you are getting the same coverage for a better price, then it might be a good idea for you to change.