Gap Insurance in Connecticut (2025)
Gap insurance helps protect drivers from losing money when an insurer pays less than their outstanding loan balance after a covered loss.
Excellent
Why you can trust Insurify: Comparing accurate insurance quotes should never put you at risk of spam. We earn an agent commission only if you buy a policy based on our quotes. Our editorial team follows a rigorous set of editorial standards and operates independently from our insurance partners. Learn more.
Gap insurance protects drivers with car loans and leases. If someone steals your vehicle or something damages it beyond repair, your insurer declares it a total loss and pays the actual cash value. This could be less than the cost to repay the vehicle loan balance or lease payoff amount.1
Connecticut drivers who don’t want to pay out of pocket in this situation should buy gap coverage, although it’s generally optional. Drivers with leases and loans longer than 60 months and people who finance brand-new cars or roll negative equity from past cars into their current loan can probably benefit from gap coverage.
Quick Facts
A full-coverage car insurance policy in Connecticut costs an average of $272 per month. Adding gap insurance to your full-coverage policy typically costs only $2 more each month.
Gap insurance covers the gap between the amount you owe the lender or lease provider and the amount the insurer pays for the vehicle.
Many companies offer affordable gap insurance in Connecticut, including Travelers, Nationwide, and Amica.
How gap insurance works
Gap insurance is short for “guaranteed asset protection” insurance. Insurers offer it as an add-on to collision and comprehensive insurance policies. These pay when you damage your car in a covered incident, such as a collision or theft.2
Comprehensive and collision insurance pay to repair your vehicle. But if something severely damages your car or someone steals it and the authorities can’t recover it, the insurer only pays the car’s actual cash value. Since it’s common to owe more than your vehicle is worth, this could mean you receive less than the full amount of your outstanding auto loan balance.
Without gap insurance, you’d have to pay the remaining balance out of your pocket for a car you no longer own.
What gap insurance covers in Connecticut
Gap insurance only covers the difference between the amount an insurer pays and the amount you owe an auto lender or lease provider when a car is totaled or stolen and not recovered.
Here’s an example of how a gap insurance policy could protect against loss.
Let’s say you have an outstanding loan balance of $30,000, but your vehicle has depreciated and it’s now worth $25,000. If you total your car and have a $1,000 car insurance deductible, the insurance company would pay you $24,000, leaving you with $6,000 in out-of-pocket costs. If you have gap insurance, it will pay the $5,000 difference (minus your deductible).
Important Information
It’s important to note that gap insurance doesn’t cover an auto insurance deductible. Even with gap insurance, you have to pay your deductible amount when you make a covered claim.
Best gap insurance companies in Connecticut
Many Connecticut auto insurance companies offer affordable gap insurance. Here are some of the best insurers known for offering affordable rates and good customer service.
Travelers
Nationwide
Amica
Data scientists at Insurify analyzed more than 40 million real-time auto insurance rates from our partner providers across the United States to compile the car insurance quotes, statistics, and data visualizations displayed on this page.
The car insurance data includes coverage analysis and details on drivers’ vehicles, driving records, and demographic information. Quotes for Allstate, Farmers, GEICO, State Farm, and USAA are estimates based on Quadrant Information Services’ database of auto insurance rates.
With these insights, Insurify is able to offer drivers insight into how companies price their car insurance premiums. The data included on this page represent averages across ages, genders, credit scores, and driver profiles for Connecticut drivers.
Gap insurance vs. full coverage
Connecticut requires drivers to purchase liability insurance. This pays for losses a policyholder causes to others. The Connecticut Insurance Department also identifies other kinds of protection that are part of a full-coverage auto insurance policy, including:
Gap coverage isn’t automatically included in a full-coverage policy because drivers who don’t have a car loan or lease don’t need this protection. But anyone who could potentially owe more than their car’s value will benefit from having it so they don’t face thousands of dollars in out-of-pocket costs when an insurer won’t cover their full loan amount.
Who needs gap insurance in Connecticut?
Connecticut only requires liability insurance. While it doesn’t require gap insurance, buying this coverage has definite benefits if there’s a chance you may owe more than your car is worth at any point.
It may be especially important to buy gap insurance in the following circumstances:
You make a down payment of less than 20% when financing a new vehicle.
You take out an auto loan with a loan term of more than 60 months.
The car you buy depreciates faster than a typical vehicle.
You rolled some of your old car loan balance into your new auto loan.
You’re leasing your car and need lease gap coverage.
A car insurance agent or auto loan lender in Connecticut can help you determine whether you need gap insurance and can help you understand all the insurance products available to you.
How to buy gap insurance in Connecticut
You can buy gap insurance from one of several different sources:
An auto insurer that provides other coverage: Gap insurance is a common add-on to a full-coverage policy.
An auto loan lender: Lenders also refer to this as loan forgiveness coverage.
A stand-alone policy: Some companies provide a separate gap insurance policy that’s not part of other auto coverage, although this isn’t as common.
Gap insurance in Connecticut FAQs
If you want to know more about gap insurance in the Nutmeg State, this additional information may help as you research your coverage options.
Does Connecticut require gap insurance?
No. Connecticut doesn’t require gap insurance. But if you have a car loan or lease, you may wish to purchase this coverage.
Who should get gap insurance in Connecticut?
If you might owe more on your loan or lease than your vehicle is worth, you should get gap insurance in Connecticut. Without this coverage, the insurer pays only the vehicle’s actual cash value when it’s damaged beyond repair or stolen. If that’s not enough to repay the full car loan balance, you’d be left to pay out of pocket for any remaining money due.
What are the pros and cons of gap insurance?
The biggest benefit of gap insurance is that you won’t have to pay the remaining loan balance beyond what your insurer pays for a vehicle after a covered loss. The biggest con is that you’ll have to pay additional premiums for gap insurance, which makes auto insurance costlier. But it typically only costs an additional $20 per year.
Is gap insurance worth it?
Gap insurance is worth it if you may owe more on your financed or leased vehicle than it’s worth. This protection could save you from having to pay thousands of dollars out of pocket to fully repay a loan for a vehicle worth less than the outstanding loan balance.
What does gap insurance cover in Connecticut?
Gap insurance pays the difference between your car loan balance and the actual cash value of the vehicle if you total it or someone steals it. Without this coverage, you’d be on the hook for paying any outstanding loan balance for a car you can no longer drive.
)
)
)
)
)
){kind=logo}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}