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Smart Shopper Replacement Cost by Insurance Company for Totaled Vehicle
196 messages, Last post on Nov 17, 2009 at 7:17 PM
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Hello all, I hope I am doing this forum correctly now. I originally put my question as a reply. Anway, my son got in a car accident this morning, he and passenger are fine, but it looks like the car may be totaled (esp. after I read they could decide to total it if it costs 51% more than the cash value). I'd like to be prepared when the adjuster comes by next week so we fully know and understand our options. The car is a 2005 LS Sports Coupe Chevy Cavalier, it's 4 months old and has only 1,500 miles. I'm so confused as to what I should expect...I've read some articles which say the insurance company is supposed to find you a comparable car, but I cant' believe that's going to happen. Would it be silly for us to expect the insurance company to write us out a check for the full amount we paid? Because it's so new, I doubt I can find any similar cars to compare, other than brand new ones. I will talk to the car dealer Monday morning and pick his brain, but PLEASE, in the meantime, would someone direct me to some sites where I can learn a bit more, or explain in simple layman's terms what to expect. Even tho our insurance covers a rental car, we don't plan on using that option just yet--it's too easy a solution and would make life too easy--I think my 19 year old needs to understand what consequences his bad decision resulted in. I greatly appreciate your time in helping us sort this whole mess out when it comes to totaling a car. Where should I start? Thank you.
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Replying to: joannes (Jul 16, 2005 3:50 pm) To put it another way, given the choice between your car with 1,500 miles on it and a brand new un-driven identical car with 5 miles on it, which one would a person buy if the price were the same for both? Right, the new one. Now then, the goal of this negotiation is to decide HOW MUCH LESS you would have to offer your car for, with its 1,500 miles, in order to get that buyer to NOT buy the new car, but to buy yours. As you can see, to tempt the buyer, you'd have to give them a "break" off the new car price. How much? Well that is arguable. Probably somewhere between what a new car sells for and what a rental car from Hertz sells for after 10,000 miles. Somewhere in there. Keep in mind too that if your car is totalled, the insurance company ALSO has to under law give you back your sales tax and license fees, so that's probably another 8%. So when they make their offer, make sure they haven't already blended in the tax and license, because that makes their offer sound more generous than it is. Hope this helps.
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Replying to: Mr_Shiftright (Jul 17, 2005 8:29 am) |
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2001 MDX Acura was in an accident. My fault. Estimate without a teardown is 14500. Expect the cost to go up a few grand after the tear down at the body shop. Only the front end was damages. The engine, tranny and everything from behind the front wheels is fine. I would prefer the car to be called as totalled and take the money to buy a new (used) MDX. Does anyone know how does Geico decide if the car was totalled? the used 2001 MDX are around 22000. thanks samir
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I have a 2002 dodge ram 1500 truck. I pulled out in front of someone and they hit the front passenger corner, it knocked me to the left and up into an electrical pole. there was major front end damage. the front passenger tire was basically broke off. when the truck was placed on jack stands and the brake line was removed, you could lay the tire on its side while still attached to the truck. and minor damage down both sides, broke windshield etc... the ADP fair market value came back as 15500.00. the repair estimates came to 7700.00 before the truck was tore down. this did not call for totalling the truck out. the cost of repair eventually came to around 8500.00. i now have my truck back and its a peice of crap. it is three years old, and has only 19000 miles on it, and now it rides and sounds like a 3 year old truck with 70000 miles on it. it has creeks and rattles, and just doesnt ride the same. what options do i have? do i have a good chance at winning if i take triple AAA to court? i think they should have totalled the truck. is it possible for me to get them to still do it as totalled? sale the truck, give me the difference to make the 15500.00 (fair market value), i pay the truck off and still walk away with my 4000.00 equity for a down payment on a new one? Any advie would be appreciated.... thanks!
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Replying to: samirs (Jul 25, 2005 10:37 pm) |
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Replying to: conway1 (Jul 29, 2005 7:37 am) About your only option if your insurance company paid for everything is to consult with an attorney and sue the insurance company for acting in bad faith, which would be a violation of their contract. IMO. I'm not an attorney, just throwing out ideas for you.
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Replying to: Mr_Shiftright (Jul 30, 2005 10:01 am)
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Replying to: conway1 (Aug 01, 2005 9:42 am) |
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My husband has a 2004 Porsche Carerra 4S, less than 2 years old, 8500 miles. He was in an accident on 4th of July. Briefly went like this: he was following a driver in a very old Camaro going 10 miles under the speed limit on the fwy, flashed his brights at the guy in front to speed up, the guy in front hit his brakes (probably an obcene gesture at my husband for having a nicer car) & spun out on the fwy. doing donuts in front of my husband who tried to steer around but instead was pushed into the median & came to a dead stop from 55mph. Very fortunately no one was injured & miraculously, the Camaro had no damage. The Camaro driver claims it was my husband's fault and that he he (my husband) hit him (the other driver). That seems impossible since the Camaro had no damage & my husband's car was demolished in the front & passenger side whose airbag deployed. The CHP came to take a report & the officer refused to take a side, possibly siding with the less affluent driver of the old car which the driver admitted needed some maintenance & that he hadn't driven in awhile. He admitted to being a car mechanic. The car was taken to a body shop recommended & partially owned by the Porsche dealer the car was purchased from. The insurance adjuster claimed the damages to be only $14,000 while the body shop gave an estimate of $28,000 which has now climbed to a bill of $44,000 and the car is still pulling to the right. I suggested in the beginning that the car should be a total. It's now "fixed" but the after market paint job is as good as it gets but still doesn't look like the original factory paint job & there's obviously some mechanical issue. I'm also concerned about metal fatigue - all those bolts, joints, etc. that get stressed under that sort of impact. We thought of selling the car but now there's a Carfax report showing the accident so who would possibly buy this car? I feel that the insurance company should be making us "whole" in this situation and buy the car from us for the the depreciated used car retail value of $79,345 + tax. That only seems fair to me. As is, the depreciation from new is over $20,000 without the accident and we haven't even had the car 2 years. Is it right that the insurance company should force us to accept this car? I doubt we could get $50-60,000 for this car now that it's had so much repair work. $44,000 is more than the new value of the average vehicle & that kind of damage on 99% of all cars out there would equate a total. In the case of this car, it's 55% of the value so following normal % calcalations by insurance companies, the spread between the repair cost & value of the car is too high. But shouldn't they really calculate the % based upon what the car would be worth after the repair which would make the repair cost possibly a much higher % of the after-accident value? Please help with my dilemma. I've unfortunately had a couple of totalled cars 25 & 30 years ago (avoiding drunk drivers coming towards me) and always got replacement value+ tax from my insurance-CSAA at that time.. Those cars back then were $4000 cars so it took little damage to qualify a total. I thank you in advance for any advice you can give me in dealing with my insurance co. I'm waiting for a call from a supervisor at Travelers.
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