Dealing with insurance co. help.

[piecesparts]

Originally Posted by BillGent

Guys.. the LAW says that they are only obligated to restore you to what the truck was worth before the accident.. no more. The company they will use will show what trucks like yours are worth in your area.

YOU will have to prove why it was worth more than what they are offering. It won't be easy but try. Read my previous post of what has to happen. Even if you take them to court it probably won't make a difference because they can gather more info than you can.

Take the time to research what I said above if you can do without the money for awhile.

He is right, but you should be able to get the necessary stuff to replavcce or repair that bedside. If ordered through LMC, the price is around $350.00 and then shipping. If you can't get one with the fuel tank door, then there is the modification cost to put one in, whic would be another $350.00. So now we are at $700.00 and have not sprayed a drop of paint. Figure $60.00 a mixed paint quart for a general cost and then add labor for the paint booth. That is what you should be getting for reimbursement from her insurance.

[kevinr1970]

Do your research on other trucks like yours (PS, there is a shorty for sale on this site just recently for I believe $5500 or $6500). Look on Autotrader, classic car Trader, Craigslist, etc. Print the ads out so you have records even if the ads go away.
Don't be foolish and show thaem ads for "show" trucks and try to use that as leverage as they are not stupid. But do find as many "like" vehicles as you can.

Don't even talk about a "buy-back" from them as in your opinion the amount to repair the truck doesn't exceed the value (the amount it will take you to replace the truck).

I would call the adjuster today and tell him:
"About that rental car, I thought this would be a simple deal and we would have settled by now. Since this is going to drag on for a while I need to get a rental and it needs to be a full size truck, like the vehicle your insured damaged."
Don't mention anything about your other cars as that has nothing to do with this. You need a full size truck and and yours is down for now.
Do you use your truck for business? Even better as you can't conduct business in the truck with the dents in it. Although I would be carefull with that one. If your not paying the insurance as a "business" vehicle that may bite you in the hieny.
The rental car starts to ad up real quick and encourages them to make a fair offer.

[jdurant]

Yeah, thats the thing though--You really have to be careful what you say to these creeps. I have already told them it was drivable.

Here is the other thing too--I think I actually told them it had 320,000 on the odometer, I'm not sure, and that is my best figure. It reads 88,000, though. Like we established earlier I should have just told them I don't know and let them be the judge of that. Let that be a lesson to those reading. Originally I was trying my best to be truthfull and cooperative to move this along swiftly.

Plus I took two weeks to get a quote. Like I said, I've got time. Plus, I have a 9month old--so getting anything done is a miracle. That's why I don't want to deal with this $#!+. Thankfully things have been slow at work. I got the quote on Thurs.--so they sent an adjuster on Fri. And it is only Monday. So I really can't throw a fit yet, about a rental.

[jdurant]

Are you ready for this?

$1300.00----Is what they say the total value of my truck is.

Thats them only taking $250 off for the unrelated damage (dent in the door, bent bumper, and a little dent in drivers side bed rail). And them assuming that the Mileage was 188,000mi.

B.S.

[JoetheMobster]

Originally Posted by jdurant

Are you ready for this?

$1300.00----Is what they say the total value of my truck is.

Thats them only taking $250 off for the unrelated damage (dent in the door, bent bumper, and a little dent in drivers side bed rail). And them assuming that the Mileage was 188,000mi.

B.S.

Looks like even the dog in that one picture smells BS too! (Or maybe he wants to bite the lady or the adjuster's ass for screwing up his/her owners truck, or at least piss on their pant leg )

$1300 for THAT truck?! No f---ing way! Those idiots need to put down the books and actually LOOK at the damn thing. My judgment in car value is not great but am sure that fine looking truck is worth more than $1300

Same old crap no matter where you go. Up here it's a legal racket. They're jacking up the prices one day and then the next they are announcing record profits! No duh! I'm sure there are some who need a kick in the pants and need to pay more for speeding tickets/accidents etc. but record profits?!? In Cuba Gooding Jr's words: "Show me the money"

[marcuspboldt]

You might be able to get a couple hundred more out of them but that's it.

You can call them and raise all kinds of He!! but your not going to get them to budge very much.

[rambler]

tell them to recommend 3 places to fix it, and that you want to choose one of them, have them repair it and bill THE INSURANCE company direct, and also give you a rental while you wait, and you want a warrantee on the work... have them get it done for $1300 ....

[jdurant]

Just so that it is clear:
They are calling it a total loss and offering me $1,300 to buy my truck at fair market value. So now my job is to prove to them that it is worth more than their lowball estimated value. I just faxed them a letter arguing my point and 13 different online for sale adds to discredit their claim.
Lets see what happens.
If you want to see my letter, I'll post it, but be warned it is a page and a half long.

I know that according to some of you, they (other party's insurance co) don't have the right to total my vehicle.----I will play that card after I see this pan out.

By the way, thanks for all of yall's help.

[piecesparts]

Originally Posted by jdurant

Are you ready for this?

$1300.00----Is what they say the total value of my truck is.

Thats them only taking $250 off for the unrelated damage (dent in the door, bent bumper, and a little dent in drivers side bed rail). And them assuming that the Mileage was 188,000mi.

B.S.

Those guys will give you $1300.00 for your truck and have it crushed which will earn them $1500.00 in tax credits, for taking a gas guzzling inefficient vehicle off of the road, from the federal Government and they are $200.00 ahead. Not to mention that they will raise their rates on the lady that hit you and collect that $1300.00 from her in the next two years --thus raping both of you and getting a credit to boot.

They don't have the right to total your truck, BECAUSE YOU OWN IT; UNLESS you want the money vice the truck. If you are tired of the vehicle, then give it to them for a fair market price. They will not use a price that is on a car lot, but they will use trade-in value from NADA or Kelly Blue Book. You are going to dislike your dealings with the guys that are nothing but investors at heart--they win you lose. Have you talked to anyone like a lawyer or even your banker for advice? (What would your bank loan you for a purchase of a truck of the same year) Your insurance company may even provide some info, but they will want to stay clear of it. I am here to tell you that if you do the repairs yourself, you can put a whole bedside on for about $600.00 (that would include shipping) and get a paint job from MAACO for another $600.00 to $800.00 and have a shiney truck that is only worth about $1700.00 on a trade market. The age, mileage, style, and economy rating will kill it's market value. The true value is in your eyes or another owner of trucks such as you. Maybe it is time to move on to a later model and some lower mileage.

[jdurant]

Well, this is how it turned out:

Yesterday the insurance ladies boss man called me. He pretty much laughed at my estimated value of $5,500. I estimated a little high, hoping that we could compromise close to $4,500. After all since they are totalling it they are supposed to pay fair market value, not trade in or anything like that. As stated before many times, I always planned to buy it back. If I were to sell my truck in preaccident condition, I would feel pretty comfortable listing it for $5,000. Especially after looking at what was out there for sale and comparing.
The guy argued that I can't compare to trucks that far away, and all the trucks had 25,000 miles, and they were show trucks, oh and that you can't compare GMCs with Chevys. The highest he would go to was $2,300.

My points were that I first ran 100mi radius searches and found 0 GMCs and 1 Chevrolet. So I broadened my search to 500 miles, naturally. The one Chevrolet that was within 100miles was very comparable--unlisted miles, flaws, 350, swb--for $5200. Everyone knows chevys and gmcs are the exact same market. Of the 13 ads, I included one 25,000 mile truck that was listed for $17,000 to show them that these trucks are collectible and what the value of a low miles clean truck is. Only two trucks that I submitted had less than 100,000 miles, the other one had 97,000 and was a sufaced rusted LWB for $2,500!---All of this stuff was in the letter. This guy just wasn't hearing me though. It was like arguing with a tree. I ended up cussing him out and telling him I would talk to my lawyer. Then hung up.

I got to thinking about it and cooled down after a couple of hours and called back. I spoke calmer and got him to shut the **** up and listen. Anyways, I have a check coming for a little over $3,000 after I bought it back. No Salvage title because the title never changed hands. They still didn't really move off the value. The difference came because I didn't have a rental. So he added 30days rental value to the auto value.
I am pretty happy with that, after all my original quote for the damage was $2600--so there you go faithful readers.

[kevinr1970]

Glad it worked out for you, mostly!

I still wonder about the part about having to buy it back though.
I had a friend go through something similar quite a while back.
Through repeated back and forths he was able to get them to increase there offer to a point ($X). Once they hit that point ($X) they wouldn't budge any further.
He was finally able to get them to write a check for their offer ($X) but they didn't take the car; they settled on it being "damaged" for $X, not totalled.
This was about $500 difference and no title issues.

But if you are satisfied with the final offer than that is all that matters.
I didn't go back and look at the pictures of the damage but seem to remember it only being bed damage. If that is the case you should be able to get the bedside (or a complete bed?) and have plenty left over to get it back to the same color again.
If thats what you want to do?