It occurred to me that I don’t write about insurance very much. The main reason is that I think it is very boring. It’s hard to get people excited about insurance.

On the other hand, insurance is very important. Perhaps the fastest way to bankruptcy is to not be adequately insured when something catastrophic happens.

However, insurance isn’t all about saving yourself from these events. Since you have to pay premiums every month, you want to keep these expenses down. With that in mind I decided to come up with 5 insurance tips for 5 insurance types:

1. Car Insurance – There are two secrets to car insurance. You want to protect yourself, your wallet, and earnings in the event of a big accident. Secondly you want to match the level of car replacement insurance with your car. If you have a clunker, you might not want car replacement at all, because it won’t be worth the deductible. No matter if you buy a cheap car insurance or an expensive one, just make sure you have insurance coverage for your vehicle. (Yes, I slipped in an extra tip. Don’t tell anyone.)
2. Renter’s Insurance – I’ll keep this short: Get it. I’m amazed at how many of tenants didn’t have it. It is extremely cheap and covers a lot. Now when I get a new tenant, I have a talk with them about getting it if they don’t have it. I tell them that I want their property to be protected and this is the best way to do it.
3. Life Insurance – Understand the difference between Term Life and Whole Life. Know what your objective with life insurance is. My wife and I’s plan with life insurance is to help the other financially raise the children. Because of that we got a 20-year term life plan that was relatively cheap. It protects again catastrophe and doesn’t drain our wallet.
4. Home Owner’s Insurance – With regard to houses, separate the value of the house from the land. Buy appropriate insurance for replacing the cost of the house. This can be significantly less than what you paid for the whole property.
5. Motorcycle Insurance – I thought I’d have a little fun and include a less popular insurance. I don’t have a motorcycle, so I for this one, I reached out to Gerry Bucke, general manager at Bikesure. He said “Completing a motorcycle rider safety course can save you as much as 15% on your premiums.”

There are many more tips on insurance and this is really just the tip of the iceberg. Maybe it’s enough of a tease to make insurance a little less drab.