The Grand Forks Herald is reporting that the state of North Dakota has the country’s lowest auto insurance rates, as talled in a December report from the National Association of Insurance Commissioners. In the most recent year for which data has been compiled, 2007, for example, North Dakota motorists payed roughly $512/year in car insurance premiums, as opposed to the national average of about $795, and less than half of the average annual premium paid by drivers in New Jersy, who cough up about $1,100/year to keep their cars legal.

NoDak neighbors Iowa and South Dakota had the second- and third-lowest average insurance costs, at about $518 and $534, respectively. Other states near North Dakota had insurance premium averages that fell near the middle of the list – with the average around $666 in Montana (#19) and $721 in Minnesota (#24).

Who has the highest average insurance premiums? That honor goes to Washington, D.C., where drivers pay about $1,140/year for automobile insurance coverage.

The figures used in the list are based on the assumption that all insured vehicles carry liability coverage, but are not necessarily covered by collision or comprehensive policies, but even when using the “state combined average premium,” which takes all three coverage types into account, North Dakota still comes out at the bottom end of the payment scale, at the third-lowest average premium, with drivers paying about $658, with Wisconsin and Iowa coming in ahead of – or is that behind? – it, paying $643 and $658 respectively.

And at the top? Yep, once again it’s Washington, D.C. with average annual payments of roughly $1,289.