What Is the Liability Risk of Lending Someone Your Car?

There might be thousands of reasons when you want to lend your car to someone else. Perhaps, your roommate has to visit the super-shop quickly, and his car is in the garage, or your cousin has come to see you who wants to drive your vehicle, and so on.

There can be many other situations like those, but that doesn’t mean you have to lend your car. Maybe lending the car is harmless but do remember it could have profound financial implications.

The car owner is liable for an accident, whether the owner was driving or not. This article is all about lending your car to someone else, especially the liability risk of lending someone your car.

What Is the Liability Risk of Lending Someone Your Car?

At first, have to know about vicarious liability and the consequences of letting a reckless person drive your car. Here is another harm.

Vicarious Liability

Vicarious liability means the car owner’s responsibility at the occurrence of an accident, whether the owner was driving or not.

The car owner will be held responsible for the driver’s negligence action as long as the owner permitted the driver. The relationship between the car owner and driver can be parent and child, friends or acquaintances, employer, and employee, etc.

Liabilities of Letting a Reckless Person Drive your Car

Suppose the car owner permits an unfit, incompetent, reckless person to drive the car, and in the meantime, any accidents occur. In that case, the owner will be liable for all injuries, damages caused by that accident.

In such circumstances, the owner of the car will be held responsible under two criteria of law- 

• Vicarious Liability
• Negligent Entrustments

However, not all the time owner will be held responsible. Based on the following circumstances liability of the vehicle owner will be decided-

• Negligence of the driver
• The acuteness of the accident
• Relationship of the driver and the owner
• Whether the owner had an idea about the driver’s incompetence, recklessness, etc

Why You Shouldn’t Lend Your Car to Someone Else

Let’s now elaborate on why you shouldn’t lend your car to someone else.

Insurance

You must have car insurance. So, you are lending the car, along with the vehicle, you are also giving the insurance. If, in such a situation, the vehicle meets with an accident, the financial risk can be excessive. 

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The insurance company won’t respond in that case. And also, it will impact the insurance premium, and in most cases, it increases the premium. Eventually, you will be the only person responsible for all damages and financial liabilities to take.

Your Liability

So, what happens when you lend your car to your friend, and he runs over the car to someone?

You will be held liable for all the damages as you have given the driver your permission. Unless your car is robbed, you will be responsible for all accidents that occur in your vehicle.

Driving Reputation

Lending someone your car means lending them your good driving reputation as well. Any occurrences such as collisions, parking problems, racing, etc., can lead to degrading your reputation.

Legal Consequences

If your car has been found in a crime spot, you must go through all the legal consequences, even if you weren’t driving the vehicle. You may end up being in jail or any other legal hassles you can face.

Probability of Losing Car

Your automobile is precious to you, but it might not be to others. If you lend your car to someone else, they might not be as careful as you are, which can lead to an accident. You can even lose your vehicle. 

Final Words

As now you know, what is the liability risk of lending someone your car? Therefore, you will be more careful than before. Our discussion wasn’t meant to suggest you never lend your car to someone else, but it was meant to inform you of some vital liability risk, which will make you more conscious.

We believe it’s always better to know about the future consequences of your action, and this is the main reason behind our motivation to write this one. 

From this writing, you have got an idea of the liability risk of lending cars to other people and what problems you can face if you do lend. We believe this all information will be proved helpful in your practical life.