You can check the complaints about an insurance company on your states website. At least you can in Missouri. If you are in one of the areas Shelter writes business in I would check with them. They had some of the best rates when I was shopping around.

Big scummy industry. Here in Mass., insurance companies are canceling people's homeowner plans. Want to know why? Because they filed claims due to the harsh winter last year.

So basically, these companies are saying, Yes, you pay us a monthly premium, but you don't expect us to actually cover you, do you? We'll cancel if you do!

Gee, what a novel Idea: pay me but don't expect me to actually do what I"m being paid to do!

Allstate was cheaper in cost of the premiums so I switched to them. Was happy until they sent an inspector out and they said I needed to put a new roof on or they would cancel my insurance. My roof is fine. I cancelled them out and went back to State Farm. No worries now. And I am replacing the roof on my timeline rather than some company's timeline.

Plus the female answering the phone in the local office had no customer service skills.

Allstate has had the best price for us for the last few years (there was a time when they were always higher).

Cheaper then GEICKO and Progressive. Our Independent agent also was able to bundle it with our homeowners so have a saving there too. I have not had a claim so really can't comment on the service.

I have Allstate and recently had a very good experience with them in regards to hail damage and a new roof. I think much comes down to the local office and I love the staff at the branch I am with.

For decades I've had Liberty Mutual and have been very happy - have both homeowners and auto, and customer service has always been excellent - at least so far. Don't know if they are everywhere, however.

This is very timely. I got my semiannual auto insurance bill and it is so expensive. I have my homeowners and auto insurance with State Farm. I am thinking of shopping around. I've made almost no claims over the years, just a couple fender benders many years ago. Someone hit my car in a parking lot and State Farm paid for the damage (not huge) and for a rental car, no problem. Nevertheless, I'd love to pay less if I could feel comfortable that another company is going to be reliable. I can't say anything bad about State Farm except the expense.

We had Travelers for years. One claim when lightning hit traveled down a tree, across the yard and hit the house. Then another claim about 3 years later when the electrical line from the road to the house broke -- huge surge and we lost a lot of electronics and expensive repairs.

The adjuster was a PITA. They tried to wiggle out of paying the claim for the electrical line first and the driveway repair. Naturally the break in the line was under the brand new million dollar driveway.

Then they nickel and dimed us. When DH threatened to call the state attorney general they cut it out. They paid and didn't cancel us.

Then we had Irene and Sandy. No damage, thank the Lord. And I took out flood insurance years ago which is expensive. DH was teasing me about it until recently. But I feel there's real cause for concern about getting flooded or something catastrophic like a huge tree falling on the house in a crazy storm -- which happened to friends.

I think a lot depends on stage of life. Traveler's wasn't horribly expensive and it was OK. If something bad happened, they would pay but it would still cost us money. And we could only get paid if we rebuilt, f.ex.

So I went for premium insurance -- something catastrophic happens we can take the money and walk away. We are not obliged to rebuild. Same for car. They drive crazy around here and I have the Kathy Bates attitude -- I'm older and I have more insurance.

Before I changed, I did a lot of research. Traveler's and the Hartford were rated very well. If anyone is a vet there is insurance there is good insurance from a company that deals with vets and their families -- can't recall the name right now but they advertise.

Home and car together should generate a discount. I took a defensive driving class -- good for 3 years -- 6 hours at a community college. That gets me 10% discount off the car premium each year. They don't install anything. Things like alarm systems with water sensors and a host of other things can get discounts. I found a great agent and worked with her. A good agent who knows her/his stuff can make the decision smarter and easier.

I had Allstate for home, 2 autos for 25 years. Shortly after our long time agent retired, I was hit by an uninsured driver. What I got from the replacement agent was basically a phone number (Claims), and 'good luck'. All the detail, leg work, was left to me.

I settled the claim, had my car repaired, and cancelled. I've had Grange for the last 10 years and have been pleased. We had a tree fall on our house causing just under $10,000 with their coverage and they were both prompt and fair, no raise in premium. My policy now is for home, one car....DH has his truck insured with a business policy with a very high liability which Grange doesn't handle. When he retires in a few months and is no longer driving his truck to conduct business, I'll have them insure it too (which should slightly drop premiums on my car and our home).

I have State Farm for house and AAA for auto. Every year they each try to get me to drop the other and go with just them. But I think I have good rates with the two and like the idea of not having all my eggs in one basket. My rates have remained quite stable over the past 10 years. No claims. Knock on wood.

My car is insured by USAA, a really great company, actually. Great customer service.

We have Electric Insurance for cars and Amica for home and are happy with both.

USAA is the company that covers veterans and their families. They are fairly liberal in who they include--ds served thirteen years so he did not retire, but they still cover us. When we check they are always the cheapest for us. They've been okay for paying out on auto claims, haven't had to make a renters or home owners claim with them.

Geico for auto and Cincinnati for home. Both are okay but expensive. We are still insuring DS2 (boy, still in college) and that is challenging.

Adding that ten acres of our property is managed under a conservation plan we filed with the county and there is a barn on it, which had to be insured separately.

Rates themselves vary so greatly by location it's hard to give advice. We switched companies a few years ago to Erie, and our auto rate was almost 50% less than with the old company, and for homeowners our rate stayed the same, but coverage was much better. I was so happy I recommended them to a coworker who lives in a town in the same county, around 15 minutes away. Their quote was much more expensive, based upon the insurance company's assessment of their town. So if rates can vary so much within one county, it's hard to generalize across an entire country.

One thing we learned, though, about homeowners, is to pay careful attention to deductibles and catastrophe exclusions. After Sandy, our old insurer (State Farm) raised our hurricane deductible to 5% of the value of our home. They didn't tell us this; they just slipped it into our renewal hoping we wouldn't notice. We didn't have a Sandy claim or anything, SF just said they wanted to "share the risk" in the event of future occurrences. Amica and other companies we contacted had similar provisions. It took a while to find a company with reasonable premiums and deductibles.

We're with Liberty Mutual for our auto and Amica for the house. We've never had an issue with either but it's been a while since I rate shopped.

I would never in my life consider State Farm and suggest to those who use them to do some research about their history because when it comes time to pay out, they are really bad news. My first experience with them was years ago when one of their insureds ran into me from behind. It was in California and they were responsible for the repair. I was forewarned by my mechanic about them right off the bat. He strongly advised me to stick around during the inspection so I could fight for what was right because they would insist on refurbished parts if I didn't. Historically, they've fought to avoid paying claims after natural disasters putting their insureds through a living hell. And in Michigan, our auto insurance is required to pay the medical costs for anyone injured in a vehicle for life. State Farm is involved in more law suits to fight their insureds' claims than any other insurance company. I see it when they subpoena records for law suits their involved in. 2 out of 3 times the insurance company being sued or trying to disprove a claim is State Farm.

I am a former ANPAC insured, too. A good friend was an agent and wrote my 1929 house when Allstate (my employer at the time) refused. I stuck with ANPAC for many years, until my friend died, his book of business went to two guys I didn't know, and they tweaked something that really jacked up my premium. I then went with another friend who was an Allstate agent. I never had a problem, but I also never had a claim. When we moved we shopped and found the best deal was with USAA. Again, we haven't had a claim, so I can't jusge the claim experience. But the rates are decent.

We had Allstate for maybe 10 years, and had auto claims maybe 2 or 3 times, and no problem at all. We deal with a local Allstate agent and the staff was awesome.The only reason we switched to Nationwide was because of the cost. My 2 boys started driving within months of each other, and the cost just went up significantly (which is expected, but I don't want to pay that much.) I got a quote from USAA and it's higher than Allstate.

We have had AMICA for both for years and have been quite pleased with them. DH spent mucho years in the insurance industry and has always felt that they were one of the best.

I could have written maddielee's post. Exact same situation with Allstate here.

We have Alfa, which is local to Alabama (an outgrowth of Alabama Farmer's Federation) for both homeowners, our rental properties and cars. Very, very good and no complaints at all.

We've had Allstate for auto insurance for a gazillion years and have been very pleased with their response to our claims. We had State Farm for our homeowner's insurance, but they kept raising both the rate and the deductible. We switched to Allstate and got better coverage, with MUCH lower deductible and for much lower cost. Can't tell you about homeowner claims, under Allstate, because we haven't had any. But when we had a claim for hail damage with State Farm, they were not all that great, claiming that the damage to our roof wasn't from baseball sized hail (the roof was brand new).

We had Allstate HO/Auto for over 30 years, then they kept going up each year - never a claim. Changed two years ago to Cincinnati Ins for all, and it's better coverage for less. Also changed my parents HO/Auto over to them (same thing w/Allstate). DD2 however kept her Allstate since she has the declining deductible (at max now) and her HO rate was good - but has gone up $50-$60 each of the two past years. Farmers was way less for one, but not the other. She is going to check into changing hers again.

My sister has had Traveler's for HO for decades. No claims. I handle her things and need to comparison shop just because I haven't in awhile.

The only claim we've ever had was on a rental house and Allstate was great, but that was in the early 80s.

We have Farm Bureau for home and auto. Also have a life insurance policy with them (hubby) and have had both boats and rvs insured through them. We have had FB for probably 25-30 years. In this house we have had 3 roofs in 18 years. This one has been on a while (knock on wood!). For several years we had some bad spring storms with some serious hail. Both times FB was wonderful to work with. We didn't have to submit multiple estimates and the claim was paid quickly. Last year on a day I was working, I was coming back from lunch and a student and I collided. Police could not assign blame (I honestly think we were changing lanes at the same time) so each of us handled our own vehicle. They are great to work with on an auto claim. We had to use them once before for an auto claim and the one body shop in the area we would choose to use is set up with FB. All you do is take your car in. They handle everything, even a rental car if needed. My only complaint is we had a wonderful agent for years, and are not so fond of the younger agent who took on his clients (original agent retired). But it's a personality thing, I can't say he doesn't do his job. In both the roof claims and the recent car claim, our rates didn't go up. The home owners did eventually, with an explanation of so many claims, etc. due to storms in the area. It was not a major increase though. We do get discounts for having multiple policies, for having an alarm system, for having fire coverage, etc.

I manage my grandmother's affairs and she has had Travelers for years. She also had a claim a few years back due to hail and they were good to deal with. However, they did the depreciating method, which I do understand. Her rates seem high compared to ours.