Washington DC Injury Lawyer Blog
Last updated September 29, 2026 · Reviewed by Jack D. Lebowitz
The D.C. Council has rewritten the District’s auto insurance requirements, raising the liability limits every driver must carry, changing how underinsured motorist coverage is sold, and barring binding arbitration clauses in underinsured motorist disputes. D.C. Law 26-155, the Motor Vehicle Insurance Modernization Amendment Act of 2026, became effective on August 14, 2026. Its own text then says the act applies as of October 1, 2027.
Until that date, the D.C. minimum car insurance a driver has to carry stays where it is. D.C. Code § 31-2406 sets it at $25,000 for one person injured in a crash and $50,000 for everyone injured, with $10,000 for property damage. Anyone hurt by a minimum-limits driver between now and then is looking at the same $25,000 that has been there for years.
The distance between a serious injury and a $25,000 policy is a recurring problem in the District car accident claims Lebowitz & Mzhen Personal Injury Lawyers handles, and the new law addresses it from two directions at once.
What Changes in October 2027
The act’s main changes to private passenger auto insurance in the District are these:
- Higher minimum limits: $50,000 per person injured, $100,000 for all persons injured in one accident, and $20,000 for property damage.
- Enhanced underinsured coverage by default: every policy includes it unless the first named insured waives it in writing.
- No binding arbitration of underinsured claims: a policy issued on or after the applicability date may not require an insured to arbitrate a dispute with the insurer over underinsured motorist coverage.
- Rental vehicles: the renter’s or authorized driver’s own coverage is primary for claims arising out of the rental.
- Scheduled increases: starting January 1, 2037, and every 10 years after, the limits rise by $5,000 per person, $10,000 per accident, and $2,000 for property damage.
A crash that happens before October 1, 2027, is measured against today’s requirements. The act does not reach back to raise the limits a driver was obligated to carry on the day of an earlier collision.
How Underinsured Coverage Works in the District Now
Enhanced underinsured motorist coverage is coverage that pays its full limit without any reduction for what the at-fault driver’s liability insurer has already paid. That is the version the new law makes standard.
The current rule is looser in a way many drivers never notice. Under § 31-2406(c-1), an insurer has to offer underinsured motor vehicle coverage, but the coverage is optional, the insurer does not have to obtain or keep a written rejection, and once a policyholder has declined it the insurer never has to offer it again. A driver who said no to it during a phone call years ago may have no memory of the conversation and no paperwork showing it happened. Uninsured motorist protection is a separate and mandatory coverage in the District, and the two work alongside each other in uninsured and underinsured motorist claims.
Beginning in October 2027, the default flips. An insurer has to include enhanced underinsured coverage unless the first named insured signs an affirmative written waiver on a form the Insurance Commissioner prescribes, in at least 12-point boldface type, after being told in writing what the coverage is, what it costs, and what waiving it gives up. An insured cannot hold enhanced and standard underinsured coverage at the same time, and the enhanced amount cannot exceed the uninsured motorist coverage on the policy.
What to Check on Your Own Policy Before Then
Your declarations page shows whether you carry underinsured motorist coverage today and at what limit. That single line often determines what a claim can recover when the driver who caused the crash carries $25,000 and the hospital bill passed that in the first week. Drivers who live in the District and work in Maryland, or the reverse, are covered by whichever policy they actually bought, so the answer does not change at the line.
A District injury claim carries its own deadline as well. D.C. Code § 12-301(8) gives an injured person three years to file suit in most personal injury cases, and waiting to sort out coverage questions does not extend it.
We represent people hurt in crashes on District streets and on the routes that carry them into Prince George’s and Montgomery Counties, and minimum-limits policies come up constantly in that work. Our attorneys identify every policy that can respond to a claim, including the injured person’s own underinsured and uninsured motorist coverage, and we explain plainly what the new law will and will not change for a crash that has already happened. We take these cases on contingency. One of our attorneys is licensed to practice law in the District of Columbia.
Reviewing the Coverage After a Crash in the District
What a D.C. injury claim can recover often depends on insurance decisions made years before the crash, by the at-fault driver and by the injured person both. Lebowitz & Mzhen Personal Injury Lawyers represents people injured in Washington, D.C. and throughout Maryland. We offer a free consultation on any injury claim. Call (800) 654-1949 or send us a message and we will get back to you.