Auto detailing insurance.

Specialized protection for mobile and fixed-location detailers caring for customer rides.

Someone else’s keys in your hand. A buffer spinning an inch from clear coat. Chemicals, water, and a customer’s daily driver — in your bay or their driveway. Detailing is a low-overhead business with high-value property in your care every single day, and that’s the exact combination most cheap “business insurance” policies aren’t built for.

Auto detailing insurance combines garage liability, covering injury and property damage from your operations, with garagekeepers, covering damage to customer vehicles in your care, custody, and control. Mobile detailers need both coverages written to apply at the customer’s location, plus commercial auto for the rig that gets them there.

The Coverage a Detailer Actually Needs

Garagekeepers. Here’s the trap: a standard general liability policy excludes property in your care, custody, and control — which is the customer’s car, the entire subject of your business. Garagekeepers fills exactly that hole. Burn-through during paint correction, a dropped tailgate, a car damaged in your bay: garagekeepers.

A common claim we see from detailing is from the pressure washer. Many machines have a high psi and can damage the paint job you are there to protect. Some policies even contain a limitation for the psi that may be used or the policy will exclude coverage. An important item to verify against the equipment you use or the policy will exclude coverage.

Garage liability. Covers injury and property damage from your operations — overspray drifting onto the car parked next door, a slip on your wet bay floor, damage while moving a customer’s vehicle.

Mobile operations and commercial auto. If you’re mobile, your personal auto policy likely doesn’t cover a truck and trailer rigged for business use — and your liability needs to apply at every driveway you work in.

I often see a detailer that is using their own personal vehicle to pull the trailer to their customer to perform work. That personal policy may exclude or deny a claim due to commercial operations. Also, the trailer being towed that is equipped with a water tank and pressure washer needs to be covered and is hard to rate accurately for on a personal policy.

Equipment and chemicals. Extractors, polishers, generators, water tanks — an inland marine floater covers your rig’s equipment wherever it goes.

What Does Detailing Insurance Cost?

Most detailing businesses in our book pay between $750 and $2,500 per year, and the garagekeepers piece is what separates real coverage from a cheap GL-only policy.

What moves your premium:

Call us with your numbers: .

The $40 Policy Problem

Plenty of detailers carry a bare general liability policy bought online in ten minutes — and don’t discover the care, custody, and control exclusion until they’ve damaged the very thing they were hired to work on. If your policy doesn’t say garagekeepers, the customer’s car probably isn’t covered. Even worse, there is no auto liability, so if they get in the vehicle to move it and cause injury to someone or damage property, that general liability won’t respond.

State Requirements

Detailing rarely requires a specific license, but business registration, and in some areas water runoff and wastewater rules, vary by state and city. We’re licensed in 30 states — wherever you operate or expand, one agency covers it.

Why Detailers Choose Us

We’re a garage-niche agency. Licensed in 30 states. We’ll tell you in one phone call whether your current policy actually covers the customer’s car — most agents can’t.

FAQ

Does general liability cover damage to the car I’m detailing?
Usually not — standard GL policies exclude property in your care, custody, and control. You need garagekeepers for the customer’s vehicle itself.

I’m mobile only — do I still need this?
Yes, written for mobile operations. Your coverage needs to apply at the customer’s location, and your rig needs commercial auto.

Am I covered if I burn through paint during correction?
With garagekeepers and properly disclosed paint correction services, yes. With a bare GL policy, almost certainly not.

I detail high-end cars — does that change my policy?
It should. Your garagekeepers limit needs to match the values you actually touch, not an average. Also consider direct primary to cover the high-end cars whether you are at fault or not.

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