2 months into ownership, and I get backed into at a red light!

Holy Moly that's awful...is there a way that you can buy the car from the insurance company?

 

There is a way to do it from what he told me, but then its a salvage title and not sure if I want to invest money into it at that point. From what I understand once its salvaged you can't get that off.

 

don't count the eggs before they hatch.

 

Look into the fine print a bit more. Maybe Krash could help with info...keep in mind every province as in my case and your state laws may differ but.... while myself in hospital our old Merc Fox body was stolen and smashed, clearly a joy ride theft. My wife held her guns and when the police came knoking she called BS and demaded my wagon site unseen be towed home, and it was. Once I was able I had the car looked over by friends, drove it to the insurance adgusters. They went over the car with a fine tooth comb and wrote it off. But I knew of a loop hole through body shop friends.....they, insurance deemed the car road safe but to pay for body damage...it's a write off. I was able to take 70% of Value as a payment and keep the wagon. This not only gave me some $ for what happened but because insurance deemed the car road safe because no frame, etc damage happened but just cosmetic I was able to keep the wagon. Along with that there were no title/isurance red flags on the car because it was inpected and road safe,,,,,just looked like crap. My fine print was that in no way could I come back at insurance for damages to the car re-previous accident, BUT THE TITLE IS CLEAR..yada, yada

 

How much difference is there between the repair estimates you are getting and the approximate market value of the wagon? If it's not much, there might be things you can do.......

 

fair market for its condition, and repair price is only about $100 difference. This is the body guy going as cheaply as possible.
Driver side fender is not salvageable so that has to be a new piece.
The front clip is bent in and down, but the body shop was unable to find one of these so he said he would have to try and bend it back to shape and replace grill with a new one.
My hood is bent as well so that will have to be bent back to shape as well.

I also noticed my radiator had been messed up a little bit by the grill that was smashed in. Did not pop any holes in it but the vents are all mashed up. Pretty sure the guy coming Monday will want to add that into his figures as well as the front clip, which will put me in over its fair market value based on the cars current condition.

 

Update:

Monday the insurance company of the lady who hit me in the rental car had an inspector come out to see/document all the damage on my vehicle. He told me he was 99% sure they would total it, also pointed out damage I did not notice before.

Fast forward to friday, I gave the insurance adjuster a call to get an update on the status of my claim. He told me that he was still waiting on a finalized report from the inspector, something about the file being too large and their servers kicking it out and working to fix that issue. The woman claimed fault of the accident, so its a non contest and I also told him I wanted to keep the car so they will be deducting its scrap value from the check they end up writing me for the wreck.
Was not sure on how much they we're giving me back yet, I'm hoping its more than what I paid because I feel like what I bought was worth more than what I paid.

I'm not sure what I'm going to do at this point, only one shop was willing to take on the repair and that was with them bending the hood, and front clip back as good as they could get it for 1000$. I kind of feel like I can do this repair myself, much cheaper with a new front clip and fenders. They did not know about the core support being bent though, so that might change how much they would charge me.

The inspector also pointed out to me that the bumper is twisted and my core support between the front clip and the radiator took a huge hit and is bent very badly. None of this effects the driveablity of the car but just another thing I have to replace.

Unrelated, but hit a pot hole on the way home today and now I got a huge bump rising on drivers side tire. Tire shops we're closed so I had to drive it home very carefully and wait for Monday. :banghead3:. Just seems to be one thing after another since the accident.

Depending on how much I get back, I may yet again pick up a different daily driver and start tearing apart this one in the garage to get the front end ready for new parts. Not really looking forward to that, but would be the smartest thing to do!

The wife happened to find a really nice wagon being sold in a used car lot not too far from here. Think its a 79 oldsmobile custom. Its in really good shape, a lot better than the malibu when I first bought it. Had 1 spot of rust about the size of my fist. They are asking 3300 I think but I feel like that is high (I am very cheap too, so maybe its more that lol).

 

Thanks for the update. Regardless of how you do the repairs, made sure you either replace the radiator support with a good piece, or repair it properly. All the other sheet metal attaches to the radiator support, so if that's not right, nothing's going to fit.

 

KK that is a big 10/4. If I do the repairs myself I will definitely be pulling the radiator support and front clip as once piece. I'm hoping to get lucky at pull a part/pick a part and find a Malibu with no front end damage. That would be the perfect scenario...

 

Krash is correct 100%

I feel for you about the wagon, but try to keep it on the same thread page so every one knows whats going on

http://www.stationwagonforums.com/forums/showthread.php?t=12965

 

Good idea.