My parked vehicle was involved in a hit-and-run accident. Four other parked cars were also hit. The offending vehicle was recovered but the driver had abandoned the car. This all occurred in Chicago. The police crash report has the name of the vehicle owner but, according to my insurance company, the owner of the vehicle doesn’t have insurance. I filed a claim and my car was shipped to a collision shop and I was informed today that my car is a “total loss” and that a claims representative will be contacting be later regarding a settlement.
What should I expect? Has anyone else been through this? Mind sharing your experiences? I don’t want a settlement, I want a car, is it possible an insurance company would pay for a used vehicle of the same make, model, and mileage? Is it possible the insurance company and I could take the uninsured owner of the vehicle that hit me to court to recover the money to for getting a used vehicle?
Thanks.
P.S. This may belong in GQ now that I think about it.
I was rear ended several years ago and came within $1000 of my car being totaled. If it had happened six or twelve months later, it would have been a total. Can’t imagine what I would have done. My sympathies.
We took the money the insurance company offered: “value” of car (hah!) minus scrap value minus deductible, fixed it up for that, and it’s been fine since.
Forget buying the same car as the totaled one. The amount the insurance company will give you + deductible won’t be at all close. They will claim “comparables” to set the value that are pure fiction. So the insurance company really won’t reimburse you the right amount, let alone help you find a car.
I was in an accident where I was rear ended while sitting at a red light. My car was totaled (even though it was drivable).
I was given a check for the blue book value of the car I lost, no negotiation and no thought from the insurance company on getting a replacement car. The car I lost was 10 years old with over 100,000 miles, so the check I got (I think it was around $5,000) was no where near enough to get a replacement.
I assume my insurance company went after the at fault driver’s insurance company to get the money back, but I was not involved in that at all.
I had a car declared totaled. They gave me a value of something like $6,000 for it. I went online and found multiple vehicles in its same general class and mileage all for more like $10,000. They, of course, had reasons why none of those counted. Got into an argument with the company’s representative who at one point said “I don’t know what you want from me” and I came back with “I want you to help me get back to where I was. Isn’t that the whole point of this? Nothing for $6k comes close to putting me back to where I was before the accident.”
She put me on hold for a little bit, came back and offered $8k which I accepted. So it was a fight but came out better than their offer. I wound up putting in about $1,500 out of pocket with that for a ‘new’ car that was comparable enough for my needs.
I’ve had a couple of cars “totaled” in the last 4 years. My insurance company (Progressive) in both instances sent an adjuster to look at the vehicle. The adjuster then prepared a report that was essentially an average of the sale price of several vehicles of the same make and model and condition. They then called up me up to review it. At that process I signed the title over to them and received a check on the spot, less my deductible ($500).
In the first accident the ass that ran into me form behind (also talking on his cell phone of course) didn’t have insurance. AFAIK, he won’t be able to renew his driver license or register his vehicle until he pays off the insurance company and my deductible. I’ve since received a notice that they’ve been unable to recover my deductible and that I can sue the guy for it in small claims.
On the second one, (T-boned by a woman exiting a gas station) between the insurance call to me to meet with the adjuster and that meeting the other driver and her insurance admitted fault/liability and my deductible was included in the insurance payout.
Both times they tried to assist me in buying a new vehicle, including making the Vehicle History Reports available me at dealerships with cars of a similar class to my totaled car. In both cases the checks exceeded what I’d paid for the car. It seems I’m in the exception across the board.
I had this exact scenario happen to me - my car was totaled while parked in my own driveway. What happened was, at the time, the house I was in had a side-by-side driveway with the house beside it. A school bus driver was in the habit of using this double-wide driveway to turn around. He wasn’t careful, and bashed in the side of my car, parked on a parking pad beside the driveway.
The car was an old one, and so the insurance company had their mechanic look it over, and the mechanic stated that the cost of repair was more than the value of the car - so it was a ‘total loss’.
What we did was this: apparently, the way my insurance worked, you could if you like take the money the insurer was offering for a “total loss” and then buy the car back “as is” from the insurer at scrap value (I think at the time that was around $200).
Then, we took the car to our mechanic, who was considerably cheaper than the guy hired by the insurance company. We paid him to fix the car out of the money we got from the insurer. We still had a thousand or so left over.
Same thing happened to me, but I never even called my insurance company, I called the at-fault driver’s insurance company and they were understandably quite eager to settle things with me as quickly as possible. They gave me a little over $8000, which was at least a grand more than it was worth, so I was satisfied with that. Still didn’t make me “whole” again of course, but that’s not one of their obligations.
What hurt the most? I had one payment left on it. :mad:
We avoided having it officially declared totaled. Among other things, this would have required getting it inspected by the state after the repairs and having a salvage title.
My Passat was sandwiched last month, and declared a total loss. The Insurance company gave me the Blue Book Purchase value plus 10%, minus our deductible. In all, we’d gotten a bit more than we would have gotten for a trade in.
On the bright side, I have a new car. On the down side, it turns out I didn’t really want a new car.
I’ve had cars totalled by insurance on me a couple of times and they always lowballed the first offer. Do some research on what your car would sell for in your region. Craigslist, autotrader, kelley, & nada.
ETA:
My last one had 4 new tires with less than a thousand miles on them. Took the car to a used tire place and had them pull off the new ones and mount up 3 bald tires at 10 bucks apiece and the donut.
My Father’s pickup had a barn fall on it. The insurance company declared it totaled, but it still drove, so he decided to buy it back for the scrap cost. I’m afraid I don’t know how much they paid him or how much he paid to buy it back.
May be too late for the OP, but keep your car clean; vacuum the floors & wash the interior windows. I pulled all personal belongings out at tow yard when I was picked up. Insurance adjuster stated he gave me some extra $ because, with the exception of some dog hair it was very clean & indicated I took care of it.
I told him I had brand new (week old) tires & he raised the offer, giving me a substantial cost of them back.
To answer the OP’ question, I got a check & it was up to me to get something to replace it (or not). I could have bought a junker & pocketed the difference, used the $ for a similar replacement, or used it all on a down payment for brand new.
