Hey all, I'm new here, however I've owned my baby since November 2004. After a much-needed vacation away last week, my first day back to work (Valentine's Day, no less), I was rear-ended by a monster Chevy truck coming back from lunch. Two co-workers were with me, but thankfully everyone was ok. My baby went to my insurance-picked body shop; came back with an estimate of $7565 for all the repairs. I still haven't gotten firm confirmation that this isn't considered a total loss or not, but for kicks, let's say they actually pony up the money for repairs. So what do I do next? I'm already miffed that this happened, and I've already asked my insurance company about diminished value (haven't heard back yet). The laundry list of repair items include some Toyota certified parts, but a lot of after-market, used, and "refurbished" parts. Clearly I will not be able to sell it or trade it in at the value of what it was before the accident. (In some ways, I'm hoping the insurance company writes it off so I can get a new one. The car was great workhorse and had about 65k miles on it.) If they do the repairs, what could I realistically expect to get on a trade-in at the Toyota dealership? I'm not particularly interested in trying to sell it on my own. Any advice/info would be most appreciated! Thanks!
Get a lawyer. No, really, get a lawyer. That's pretty much the only way to get the attention of the insurance companies.
Usually if the cost to repair is at about 70% of the value of the car they will total it out. depends on the insurance co for the exact % number. you do have the option to fight them either way (to fix or to total) When the Wife crashed her 08 Matrix in December last year, the body shop implied it would be fixed. even after they looked at it they were making it sound like they would fix it (at over $8000 in damages) I called my agent and they said to wait for the word (total or not) and if i wasn't happy my agent would fight for me. The final numbers of the damages came back at over $12,000 And Here's the Copart auction for car after the total loss. Copart We replaced the Matrix with a Prius, and just 8 Short weeks after we got that- we ended up with this thread here- http://priuschat.com/forums/gen-ii-prius-main-forum/89494-prius-crash.html
