FCA authorised · FRN 7249520117 325 0027Quote & buy →
Classic and high-value car insurance is private car cover written for vehicles whose worth is not reliably captured by an ordinary trade-guide valuation. It usually differs from standard motor cover in four ways: how the sum insured is fixed, how far the car is driven, how and where it is stored, and how several vehicles are handled under one arrangement. Using the car on a road or other public place still requires insurance in force under section 143 of the Road Traffic Act 1988.
Apex places business across 30+ markets and reports 95% client retention; both of those are firm-wide figures covering Apex’s business as a whole and are not presented as figures for classic and high-value car business specifically.
Apex Insurance Brokers Limited is authorised and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority, FRN 724952. Companies House 07014570. This page explains how the cover generally works and what to ask; it is not a recommendation about your own vehicles or your own circumstances. Cover availability and terms depend on insurer underwriting at the time of quotation.
This page is for private owners of classic, specialist and high-value cars — a car kept for weekends and shows, a long-term restoration, a small collection, or a modern car of high value. It is written from the owner’s side of the transaction. If you buy and sell such cars as a business, the trade equivalent is high-performance motor trade insurance, which deals with stock, road risks and premises rather than with a private policy.
This is the decision that determines what actually gets paid if the car is written off or stolen. The Financial Ombudsman Service publishes its approach to motor valuations and write-offs, and the table below sets out what it says.
| Basis | What it means | How the figure is arrived at | What that means for the buyer |
|---|---|---|---|
| Market value | The price the vehicle would have sold for at a reputable dealership just before it was damaged or stolen. | Assessed after the loss. The Ombudsman says it uses motor valuation guides as an indication of what a fair valuation should be, comparing valuations against AutoTrader, CAP, Cazana and Glass’s. | The figure is not known until after the loss, so it cannot be checked in advance. |
| Agreed value | A previously-agreed amount that the policy requires the insurer to pay. | Settled before the loss, between owner and insurer. The Ombudsman says agreed-value policies are normally only used for valuable or classic vehicles, and that where a vehicle on such a policy is written off it would expect the insurer to pay that amount. | The figure is settled in advance, so it can be checked against your own evidence before you need it. |
| Modified vehicles | No automatic uplift on a market-value basis. | The Ombudsman says that although modifications might increase the car’s appeal to some people, they could put others off, so on balance the overall market value might not be any higher. | Modifications have to be disclosed on either basis, and do not automatically raise a market-value figure. |
| Older or uncommon vehicles | Valuation evidence is gathered rather than read off a guide. | For vehicles older than 20 years or uncommon types, the Ombudsman says it will ask for other information from the business and the consumer, such as engineer’s reports. | Valuation evidence such as an engineer’s report is likely to matter more than a guide price. |
Source: Financial Ombudsman Service, Motor valuations and write-offs. Retrieved 27 August 2026. The Ombudsman’s published approach describes how it decides complaints; it is not a statement of what any individual insurer will offer.
A limited-mileage policy is one written with an annual mileage limit as a term of the contract. The questions that decide whether such an arrangement suits you are practical rather than technical: what the annual mileage actually is rather than what you intend it to be, what happens if the limit is passed mid-year, whether the limit is per vehicle or across the whole arrangement, and whether the use you have in mind — touring abroad, track days, weddings, hire — is inside the permitted use at all. Use for hire or reward is treated differently from private use, and GOV.UK states that it also takes the vehicle outside the historic vehicle tax exemption described below.
A car that is not being driven is not a car without exposure. Fire, theft, flood and damage in storage all remain live, and they are the perils a laid-up arrangement is concerned with. Separately from the insurance question, there is a registered-keeper question. GOV.UK states that you must insure and tax your vehicle if you do not have a SORN, and that a SORN must be made where the vehicle is not taxed, or is not insured even for a short time, for example because there is a delay renewing a policy. A vehicle is off the road, in GOV.UK’s words, if you do not keep or use it on a public road — for example if it is in a garage, on a drive or on private land. Where a vehicle is neither insured nor declared off the road, GOV.UK states that the registered keeper may be fined £100, have the vehicle wheel-clamped, impounded or destroyed, and be taken to court for a maximum fine of £1,000.
Where the car is stored is one of the things a proposal will ask about, so it is worth being able to answer precisely: whether the building is locked and alarmed, whether the storage is shared with others, who else has access, and whether the car is on a third party’s premises. Storage away from home — at a specialist, a restorer, or a commercial storage facility — raises a further question about whose insurance responds, and that is worth settling in writing before the car moves.
Where several vehicles are owned by the same household, a single multi-vehicle arrangement is one alternative to separate policies. The points that decide whether that is worth doing are whether every vehicle can sit on one renewal date, whether a single mileage allowance is shared or allocated per car, how a car joining or leaving mid-year is handled, whether no-claims history is held per vehicle or across the arrangement, and whether each car can carry its own basis of settlement. A collection that includes both a daily driver and a rarely used classic may need different bases for different cars within the same arrangement.
A car under restoration changes value as work progresses, which makes a figure fixed at inception go out of date by design. The questions worth settling at the outset are how the sum insured is reviewed during the work, whether the car is insured while at the restorer’s premises and while being moved there and back, whether parts bought and not yet fitted are covered, and what evidence of expenditure will be needed if a claim is made part-way through. The same problem appears in a milder form on any classic in a rising market: a figure agreed three years ago may no longer be the figure you would want paid today.
| Question | What the rule is | Source |
|---|---|---|
| MOT exemption | The vehicle was built or first registered more than 40 years ago, and no substantial changes have been made to it — for example replacing the chassis, body, axles or engine to change the way the vehicle works. | GOV.UK, Historic (classic) vehicles: eligibility |
| Applying for MOT exemption | You do not have to apply to stop getting an MOT for the vehicle each year, but you must keep it in a roadworthy condition. | GOV.UK, Historic (classic) vehicles: eligibility |
| Vehicle tax exemption | You can apply to stop paying for vehicle tax from 1 April 2026 if the vehicle was built before 1 January 1986. If the build date is unknown but it was first registered before 8 January 1986, you can still apply. | GOV.UK, Historic vehicle tax exemption |
| When the tax exemption does not apply | The vehicle will not be exempt if it is used for hire or reward — for example as a taxi for paying customers — or if it is used commercially for a trade or business. | GOV.UK, Historic vehicle tax exemption |
| Tax still has to be applied for | You must tax the vehicle even if you do not have to pay. | GOV.UK, Historic vehicle tax exemption |
| Keeping a vehicle off the road | A SORN is required where the vehicle is not taxed, or is not insured even for a short time. A vehicle is off the road if you do not keep or use it on a public road, for example if it is in a garage, on a drive or on private land. | GOV.UK, Make a SORN |
| Using the vehicle on the road | A person must not use a motor vehicle on a road or other public place unless there is in force a policy of insurance complying with Part VI of the Act; contravention is an offence. The policy must be issued by an authorised insurer. | Road Traffic Act 1988, s.143 and s.145 |
| Your disclosure duty | It is the duty of the consumer to take reasonable care not to make a misrepresentation to the insurer. A failure to comply with the insurer’s request to confirm or amend particulars previously given is capable of being a misrepresentation. | Consumer Insurance (Disclosure and Representations) Act 2012, s.2 |
Sources: GOV.UK Historic (classic) vehicles: MOT and vehicle tax and Historic vehicle tax exemption; GOV.UK Make a SORN and Vehicle insurance: uninsured vehicles; Road Traffic Act 1988 s.143 and s.145; Consumer Insurance (Disclosure and Representations) Act 2012 s.2. Retrieved 27 August 2026.
Consumer insurance runs on a different disclosure rule from business insurance.
Section 2 of the Consumer Insurance (Disclosure and Representations) Act 2012 places on the consumer a duty to take reasonable care not to make a misrepresentation to the insurer, and provides that a failure to comply with the insurer’s request to confirm or amend particulars previously given is capable of being a misrepresentation.
In practice that puts weight on the annual renewal invitation: the particulars carried forward are the ones you are being asked to confirm, and on a classic or high-value car the details most likely to have moved are value, mileage, storage and modifications.
These are questions to put to whoever is arranging your cover. They are not a view on what your own car or collection needs, which depends on facts this page cannot know.
Apex is a broker and acts on behalf of the client rather than the insurer. A named broker reads the submission before it goes to market and stays with the file through the policy year and into any claim. On a classic or high-value car the useful work is in the evidence: setting out what the vehicle is, what supports the value being sought, how it is stored and how it is used, so that the basis of settlement is agreed while everyone is calm rather than argued about after a loss.
Apex Insurance Brokers Limited is an independent insurance broker based in Bristol, directly authorised and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority under firm reference number 724952, and established 17 years. Every submission is read by a named broker before it goes to market. Apex places business across 30+ markets and reports 95% client retention; both of those are firm-wide figures covering Apex’s business as a whole and are not presented as figures for classic and high-value car business specifically.
The Financial Ombudsman Service describes market value as the price the vehicle would have sold for at a reputable dealership just before it was damaged or stolen, and says it uses motor valuation guides as an indication of what a fair valuation should be. It describes agreed-value policies as policies that require an insurer to pay a previously-agreed amount, and says they are normally only used for valuable or classic vehicles. The practical difference is when the figure is settled: before the loss, or after it.
Not automatically. On market value, the Financial Ombudsman Service says of modifications that although these might increase the car's appeal to some people, they could put others off, so on balance the overall market value might not be any higher. Modifications still need to be disclosed, because they are ordinarily relevant to the risk being insured.
GOV.UK states that a vehicle is exempt from needing an MOT if it was built or first registered more than 40 years ago and no substantial changes have been made to it — for example replacing the chassis, body, axles or engine to change the way the vehicle works. GOV.UK also says you do not have to apply to stop getting an MOT each year, but you must keep the vehicle in a roadworthy condition.
GOV.UK states that you can apply to stop paying for vehicle tax from 1 April 2026 if your vehicle was built before 1 January 1986, and that if you do not know when it was built but it was first registered before 8 January 1986 you can still apply. It adds that the exemption does not apply if the vehicle is used for hire or reward or commercially for a trade or business, and that you must tax the vehicle even if you do not have to pay.
GOV.UK states that you must insure and tax your vehicle if you do not have a SORN, and that a SORN must be made if the vehicle is not taxed or not insured — even for a short time, for example because there is a delay renewing a policy. A vehicle is off the road if it is not kept or used on a public road, for example if it is in a garage, on a drive or on private land. Separately from the registered-keeper position, a stored car can still be damaged or stolen, which is a different question from whether road-use cover is required.
Section 2 of the Consumer Insurance (Disclosure and Representations) Act 2012 provides that it is the duty of the consumer to take reasonable care not to make a misrepresentation to the insurer, and that a failure to comply with the insurer's request to confirm or amend particulars previously given is capable of being a misrepresentation. That duty replaced the older general duty of disclosure for consumer insurance contracts.
Apex Insurance Brokers Limited, FCA FRN 724952, Companies House 07014570. Trading address: QCS, 53 Queen Charlotte Street, Bristol BS1 4HQ.
Apex Insurance Brokers Limited is an FCA-authorised insurance broker based in Bristol. Call 0117 325 0027, email info@apexinsurancebrokers.co.uk, or request a quotation.
Get a quote