How motoinsure Sources Its Numbers

motoinsure is an information site about motorcycle insurance in the United States. It does not sell policies, route quotes through affiliate links, rank carriers, or recommend a "best" insurer. This page documents where the figures and rules on every other page come from, how each source is hedged, and what motoinsure refuses to claim. A rider — or a regulator — should be able to read this page and check the work.

Cost data

Every premium figure on motoinsure is either a published average or a range from motoinsure’s own cost model, and never a quote. The baseline is the pair of all-50-state tables of average annual motorcycle premiums, one for state-minimum liability coverage and one for full coverage, compiled by the consumer-research site MoneyGeek ^{[MoneyGeek, Average Cost of Motorcycle Insurance, 2026]} (national averages $141 for minimum coverage and $364 for full coverage). Each state's published average is carried in the site's source data (data/state-cost-index.json) and drives that state's figures directly; the per-state multipliers are simply each state's average divided by the national average, so the numbers trace to MoneyGeek rather than to any hand-set constant. A range communicates the published average while signalling that an individual quote can land anywhere inside or outside it.

The source grain matters and the site states it openly: MoneyGeek publishes state-level averages for two coverage lines, state-minimum liability and full coverage, and each state page's headline band uses both figures as published. Any breakdown narrower than that — premiums for a specific rider profile or bike class — is modeled, carries wider uncertainty than the headline state range, and the page presenting it says so.

The longer-term plan, locked but not yet built, is to migrate the cost cluster off MoneyGeek’s published averages and onto a derivation from state Department of Insurance NAIC rate filings — the carriers’ own actuarial filings on file with the regulator ^{[National Association of Insurance Commissioners, 2024]}. NAIC rate-filing derivation is the same source class an underwriter would build a premium estimate from, and it allows a per-state, per-coverage-type matrix rather than a single state average. Until that build lands, MoneyGeek's 2026 published averages remain the baseline for any page that cites a state premium, and the source is named on the page where it appears.

How the cost model works

The premium ranges on state pages, bike-type pages, cost-pillar pages, and the cost estimator are not hand-typed per page. They come from one published model, applied the same way everywhere, so a figure on a California page and the same figure in the estimator move together and can be checked against each other.

The model is a base figure scaled by a short, fixed set of multipliers:

• a base annual premium, anchored to the published-average range described above;
• a state multiplier (each state’s MoneyGeek published average divided by the national average — so it reflects the real cost spread, not a guess);
• a bike-class multiplier (a liter-class sport bike rates well above a mid-size cruiser);
• an age multiplier and a riding-experience multiplier (a young or newly-licensed rider is the single largest factor);
• a coverage-level multiplier (on a state page, minimum coverage is set by that state’s published MoneyGeek minimum; full plus custom-parts runs above full coverage).

The model multiplies the base by those factors, then widens the result into a low–high band rather than reporting a single point, because a single number implies a precision no model has for an individual rider. Every table built this way is labeled "illustrative, not a quote," and the rider profiles a table is built from (age, years riding, bike class) are stated next to it so the inputs are visible, not hidden.

These are modeled estimates, not figures pulled from any single rider’s policy and not fabricated cell by cell. The multipliers are documented in the site’s source so the same inputs always produce the same range. A real quote depends on a rider’s full record, ZIP, and the carrier’s own filing, and can land outside the band; the band is a starting point for shopping, not a price.

Regulatory data

State requirements — minimum motorcycle liability limits, helmet law, lane-splitting law, registration rules, reinstatement procedures — are sourced from state statutes, insurance regulators and motor-vehicle agencies ^{[National Association of Insurance Commissioners, State Insurance Department Directory, 2025]}, with an official state rider manual or the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety’s helmet-law table used where the statute could not be reached ^{[Insurance Institute for Highway Safety, Motorcycle helmet use laws, 2026]}. Where a state statute or DOI bulletin is the authority, motoinsure cites it and notes the as-of date on the page. Where a state has no motorcycle-specific liability mandate (Florida is the canonical example), the page says so directly rather than reporting a number that does not exist.

State regulatory pages are date-stamped at the file level via the page’s lastReviewedDate frontmatter, surfaced as a visible "last reviewed" line on the page itself. Each minimum-liability figure also shows the year it was sourced, so a reader can see how current it is.

If a rule changes, the change reaches the page when a review or a reader catches it. The site does not claim real-time regulatory tracking.

Claim-cost data

The /claim-costs/ cluster — figures on what a motorcycle claim costs a rider out of pocket — draws on four source classes, each named on the page where it appears:

• NAIC industry aggregates, for loss-ratio and average-paid-claim figures across the motorcycle line ^{[National Association of Insurance Commissioners, Auto Insurance Database Report, 2024]}.
• NHTSA crash-cost data, for the per-incident cost benchmarks underlying medical and economic-loss figures ^{[National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, Motorcycles, 2024]}.
• Kelley Blue Book salvage and trade-in ranges, for total-loss valuation benchmarks at the motorcycle-class level ^{[Kelley Blue Book, Motorcycle Values, 2024]}.
• State reinstatement-fee schedules, sourced from the same state DOI / DMV pages as the regulatory data above, for the cost of a lapse or a suspension.

None of these sources publishes a single "what your claim will cost" figure, and motoinsure does not invent one. Claim-cost pages present ranges and benchmarks with the source named, and they state plainly which number is an industry aggregate, which is a per-incident benchmark, and which is a state-specific fee.

Who writes this and how it is reviewed

motoinsure publishes under the organization, not a personal byline. That is deliberate: the authority a reader should weigh is the source behind each fact — a state statute or regulator, AM Best, NAIC, MoneyGeek, the named cost model — not the name of a writer.

Drafting and review are kept separate: one pass writes a page against its sources, and a second pass checks its figures and rules against the cited sources before a change ships. motoinsure does not employ licensed agents or hold any insurance license, and it does not present its pages as the work of one.

Update cadence

State regulatory pages show their last-reviewed date and the year each minimum-liability figure was sourced. Cost figures are re-derived from the source average when that published data is refreshed. Trust pages — this one, the funding disclosure, and the about page — are reviewed whenever the posture they describe changes, with the review date stamped at the top.

What we do not do

The three lines that define the posture, plainly:

motoinsure is not a licensed insurance broker, agent, or carrier. Everything here is general information about motorcycle insurance, not insurance, legal, or financial advice for a specific rider. Nothing on the site is a quote, a binder, or an offer of coverage — a rider who needs an actual policy should contact a licensed agent or the carrier directly, and a rider whose situation is unusual should confirm any rule with their state’s department of insurance before acting on it. How the site is funded, and the fact that it carries no affiliate links or ads, is on the funding disclosure page.

Limits and corrections

If a rule, range, or figure on motoinsure is wrong or out of date, it is corrected against the primary source for that fact; a correction that comes with a primary-source citation is the quickest to verify.

Last reviewed

2026-06-04.