Everyone's favorite game, totaled or fixable.

[740GLE]

Last Friday afternoon around 4pm when i was in Minnesota about to board a flight back East, got that call every husband hates to get, "i just got hit". A kid in his grandparents CRV completely blew through a stop sign on surface streets in Manchester and tagged the right rear. Luckily this was about 1000 feet from our daycare so the kid wasn't in the car. The wife was prob doing 20-25mph, the guy was prob doing the same or a little less.

The rear camber of the tire is def skewed 1-2", wheel is prob pend, door can't open, top of the window frame is lifted about 3/8 from the car. It's drivable and luckily she only has a 7 mile commute as i'd wager that tires inner tread is short for this world

Looking at residual value I'd wager insurance puts the value of the car at 10-13K. She's got 110K on the clock, bought new April 2017, With subframe and rear quarter damage, I'm 99% sure shes totaled. I'd think repair bill prob needs to be under 8K for them to attempt a repair.

Such a royal s**ty situation for us as we just dropped $1050 on a timing belt job 2 months ago, just had Phase 2B emissions done hardly a tank ago. It's been paid off since 2020, registration has minimized to $170/year. She was all set to go for another 50K trouble free/2-3 years and then jump into something newer when the wife wanted to, not now.

Up note, the wife didn't really mind spending the rest of the weekend looking at off lease 2022-2023 Volvo S60's.

 

[oilhammer]

Well that's totally fixable, and professional collision person would have no issue with it. Question is how much vs. what the insurance company would pay.

If it smacked the wheel, and it is "off", it probably just bent an arm or two, which shouldn't be a big deal. Fortunately the NMS' rear end is all adjustable.

And my (non-body guy) opinion is that I don't think they'd want to go through all the trouble to replace the whole quarter. They'd strategically pull it out, get it as close as they can, work the metal, and use a minimum of filler. Door... a used one, no biggy. Hardest part would be blending that color, but they do that all the time.

I'd try and fix it. Can't buy a new one!

 

[740GLE]

Our ideal goal will be to have it repaired an motor on. I have an appointment tomorrow afternoon.

It'll be up to the estimate and bean counters to see if it can remain on the road.

If it's totaled I'll see what the buy back price is, as someone needs to scoop it up and put more miles on it than we are, sadly only put 10K on it last year (again now the wife only commutes 15 miles a day vs 45-50 she used to for the first 5 years of service) .

 

[740GLE]

As of monday she's in the hands of the auto body shop and the bean counters.

Im 99% sure shes done, just waiting on the low ball offer for pay out.

Anyone have advice on fighting their initial offer?

wife has a 2023 Camry 'winston cup edition' she says it smells like cigarettes, cat pee, and someone made fajitas in in.

 

[pedroYUL]

....hmmm fajitas!


...good luck. Try to find comparables in your area ahead of time, they usually take just dealer listed cars, no FB marketplace and alike, which should help, because dealers usually have higher prices.

 

[740GLE]

I did look up KBB for trade in as the absolute low ball i hope they don't start with, was around 8.5K

I do have invoice of the timing belt from May that i hope pads the offer.

 

[Lightflyer1]

I got $18k on my 2015 Beetle tdi due to hail damage not long ago. Mine was low miles (60k) and still under warranty for some time. I used these to get them to raise their offer from the initial offer. Try finding a Beetle with 65k miles and 4 or 5 years and 100k left on the warranty. 2b still hasn't been done yet either so might have an extension if things work out right. Bought it back from them and still driving it dented but glass all fixed. Good luck!

Considering I bought it for not much more than that, it worked out pretty good. Clean title too. Bought it new in 2017 after dieselgate. I had to drop to liability only instead of full coverage but that just dropped my rates lower.

 

[Outlier]

I was in the same boat with my 2014 Passat. I was rear-ended this Tuesday going home from my mother's house. Got the call from my insurance company yesterday that they were totaling the car. While I'm bit disappointed, I felt I didn't have good reason to refuse. I purchased the car in 2018 for about $1000 less than what they are giving me for it. Hopefully everything works out in your favor.

 

[740GLE]

What'd they offer you? how many miles were on it?

It's been a week and we still haven't heard anything from state farm or from the autobody, shop.

 

[740GLE]

Well the fork was stuck in her, she's done, she's a total loss, per state farm.

Someone buy up that car VIN: 1VWCV7A36FC009418

Now the battle to find a price state farm will make us happy with. Their initial offering was 9.5K

I'll prob be posting up some maintenance items i have squirreled away for her, oil change kits/fuel filters and such.

 

[turbodieseldyke]

I purchased the car in 2018 for about $1000 less than what they are giving me for it.

Your 2018 dollars were worth way more than today's. They're ripping you off.

 

[Outlier]

Your 2018 dollars were worth way more than today's. They're ripping you off.

Auto insurance itself is the ripoff.

 

[Outlier]

What'd they offer you? how many miles were on it?

It's been a week and we still haven't heard anything from state farm or from the autobody, shop.

$9.8k w/ 108k for the mileage.

 

[Lightflyer1]

That looks to be the top of the range from Kelley Blue book valuation. Surprisingly my KBB value was way more than that. Don't know if it was because of the reduced mileage or something else though.

 

[x1800MODMY360x]

Well the fork was stuck in her, she's done, she's a total loss, per state farm.

Someone buy up that car VIN: 1VWCV7A36FC009418

Now the battle to find a price state farm will make us happy with. Their initial offering was 9.5K

I'll prob be posting up some maintenance items i have squirreled away for her, oil change kits/fuel filters and such.

If you are not buying it back, it will go to an auction yard and typically not available to the public.

 

[turbodieseldyke]

Just because they totalled it, doesn't mean you can't still buy it back.

 

[oilhammer]

Yep.... good profit made on totaled part outs, too. You can EASILY triple your money, and often folks will just come to you and take the parts off they are buying from you.

But you do have to have a place to do that sort of thing, and then a way to scrap whatever is left.

 

[740GLE]

yeah time effort and means are road blocks for that option, seeing its the wife's car shes cut her losses and is now on the hunt to drop 30K for a replacement.

Anyone know of standard time the a fault insurance is required to provide a rental car after deemed a total loss? They are telling us 3 days from today.

 

[JonA]

That's way too low, although my understanding has been that your own insurance covers it? Not clear on that. When my last car was totaled (I was not at fault), my insurance gave me like 10 days which still wasn't great.

Either way, after the insurance runs out, you should be able to extend the rental if necessary at the insurance rate. They get a much better deal than us yokels. When I extended my insurance rental, I think it was around $35/day, instead of something like triple that.

 

[740GLE]

I spoke to the friendly state insurance division and they said we have 5 business days after a good faith offer was made.

Which places us till next Tuesday. State farm is looking into it . . . as thats against their policy.

The State also offered up some advice on the adjusted market value of the car, we'll see where we go. State Farm said we could only look at 100 mile radius I found zero SEL Premiums, the state says to find a comp of an SEL Premium within 100 miles that they need to open it up to 500 miles or something. Even if they assess an SE and adjust a certain $ more to this car being an SEL, they should really look at SEL Premium vs SEL Premium.

BTW those state employees love to chat when you get to just chatting with them picking their brain, I was expecting a 10 min conversation but she really opened up and 30 min went by, going on how much she despised the CCC One assessment system the insurance agencies have orchestrated.

 

[740GLE]

Pulled the plates last Thursday

After spending way too much time debating between a mint 2023 Volvo S60 Ultimate in "thunder gray" with 9K on the clock, a 1 year lease return for about 38K (MSRP of 54k), and an platinum gray 2024 Tiguan SEL for about 37K, we went with the "sensible" Tiguan.

We drove around Harverhill MA going over the pros and cons of each car, with kid in tow for about 4 hrs after a test drive of the Volvo, it just made more sense for another family truckster vs a cherry Volvo that would slowly get destroyed. the wife really really wanted something really nice (had the $3200 upgraded radio) heads up display, but the SEL is good enough and should last us another 5 years or so.

Despite what Oil hammer says we're doubling down on the EA888 TSI Gen3B.

Got the SEL for 37.5K out the door, MSRP was around 41K. Thankfully we were able to pay all cash so we avoided the pressure of the finance guy and "so tell me what kind of payment can you afford".

Id4 were placed on a stop sale, last friday so that took those off the table, way to go VW an your fancy door handle modules. They were offering 7,000 of sticker plus the 7.5k fed credit, it would have put the ID4 Pro S AWD very close to the SEL Tiguan.

 

[oilhammer]

Hey, I double down on them, too:

I can't stand the newer Volvos... the shifter, the ergonomics, just seem to have suffered.

You couldn't give me an ID.4.

 

[740GLE]

Insurance valued receipts of the timing belt job in May 2024 $1050, plus new pads and rotors June 2023 as only adding $151 to the payout. . . .

I did provide the warranty receipt work for stage 2b emissions full replacement but they didn't see that anything more than "good standard maintenance" that all cars on joe schmoes used car lot already has accomplished. . . . .

The "independent" fair market value adjuster CCC One they use is still reviewing the comps provided. They are digging in

 

[740GLE]

once provided with SEL premium comparables, state farm per cc one, state they don't alter the assessed fair market value of the vehicle, "there's nothing they can do".

 

[calimustang]

noooooooo save the car. I need Passat fog lights. ours dont have it. annoying.

 

[2004LB7]

If it was mine, I'd shop around for repair costs at insurance approved shops and use that as an argument against the assessers/adjusters value. You can show it will cost less then what they are saying it's worth they might let you get it repaired instead

If they don't budge then I would buy it back and get it repaired myself. Replace the door with a used one. Replace any suspension, arms, struts and anything else that may be bent or damaged to get the wheel running true again. And if possible hammer out as much of the dent in the quarter panel as possible and live with it as is.

You know it's maintenance history. How it drives. Reliability and any other issues. So you know it's real value vs what anyone else thinks

 

[pedroYUL]

OP already bought a Tiguan SEL (post #21), keep up guys!

 

[740GLE]

If it was mine, I'd shop around for repair costs at insurance approved shops and use that as an argument against the assessers/adjusters value. You can show it will cost less then what they are saying it's worth they might let you get it repaired instead

If they don't budge then I would buy it back and get it repaired myself. Replace the door with a used one. Replace any suspension, arms, struts and anything else that may be bent or damaged to get the wheel running true again. And if possible hammer out as much of the dent in the quarter panel as possible and live with it as is.

You know it's maintenance history. How it drives. Reliability and any other issues. So you know it's real value vs what anyone else thinks

Wife's car.

She's been driving a NMS Passat since 2012, while we'd still love to be still driving it and had plans to for at least another year or two, it was time to move on. We're only a two car household and we had the Tiguan the same day we dropped of the rental car. Since her new job is only 7 miles away, we've only put ~10K/year on it. Nov 2022 I did the 90K oil change on it, I did the 110K oil change June 24.

I still feel State Farm are dirtbags in absolutely low balling the car. Other than having a lawyer go after them they just shrugged their shoulders saying they won't value the car anymore than what they did. Least I know I wasted their time with a formal complaint with the state insurance department that State Farm had to formally respond.

 

[740GLE]

https://usa-auto-online.com/en/auction/70638534-VOLKSWAGEN-PASSAT

buy this car!!!

lol

 

[turbodieseldyke]

why the hell would they remove the door?