Total Loss - Insurance Tips?

[crystalworks]

Originally Posted by sunny5280

No, I did not jump the gun. My comments were not about the offer itself but rather your comment the insurance company was being less than reasonable by dropping their second offer by $1,000.


From a financial point of view they have absolutely zero value to me. Maintenance records show someone has been maintaining their vehicle but they do not add cash value to the price. I will consider them in my decision as to if I want to buy a vehicle or not.

Now this is not to say that performing proper maintenance doesn't have value to me. However, as stated in an earlier post, it comes in the form of a higher asking price. I'm sure we're all aware that resources such as KBB have different condition ratings for vehicles. In the case of KBB there are four: Fair, Good, Very Good, and Excellent. Maintenance records or, more appropriately, maintenance itself might qualify the vehicle for excellent condition instead of merely very good condition. Therefore the value of the vehicle would be higher.

In fact I just performed a comparison of a 150K mile 2003 X5 3.0 with standard equipment (not sure what the OPs vehicle is so I just picked one at random). The very good private party value is $3,699 and the excellent private party value is $3,992 for a difference of $293. If I had just sunk $800 into the vehicle to keep it in the excellent condition category then I've just lost money.

This is exactly what is happening to the OP. He put money into the vehicle because he expected to use the vehicle for many years to come. Thus he was taking proper care of it. Unfortunately that's where the value of spending the money would have come from...using the vehicle for many years. To immediately turn around and sell it (a forced sale due to the accident but that's essentially what he's doing) a few months later will not recover what he put into it.

There seems to be a common misconception that he should receive the excellent value price for the vehicle plus additional money that was spent to bring it up to that condition. One cannot have it both ways. I'm surprised they insurance company is giving him $500 for a new battery. If I were considering the purchase of a vehicle which required a new battery then I would be deducting the cost to replace it from the price of the vehicle (assuming it had not already been done so in the asking price).

It sucks...I've been there but such is life. The good thing, as has been said by most everyone who has commented in this thread, is everyone is OK. That's something money cannot buy.

We disagree fundamentally. Which is fine. You would not buy a vehicle from me. As a seller, and a buyer, I will ask more, and I have paid more, for a vehicle which has had maintenance and repairs done to it.

Until I know the offer, I was jumping the gun on SF's reason-ability. I'm betting though, that like you, they are offering based on NADA and KBB type value systems. Those are wholly inaccurate as to the market value of enthusiast type vehicles.

Insurance companies' entire business model is to pay out as little as possible to as few people as possible. That's just how it works. If you let them, they will give you as little as possible. I hope jlwjacket is able to negotiate for a higher price as he will have to replace the vehicle, which is what insurance is supposed to be for. He won't find that same condition vehicle for $3900 (the excellent value you quoted) so insurance is falling short of it's purpose IMO if the offer is less than $5000ish.

Agreed on the value of everyone being okay after the accident. Obviously the vehicle did its job and that is the most important thing.