insurance woes

[George Selby]

At 09:31 PM 8/28/03, you wrote:
>Maybe there's some insurance experts who want to weigh in with advice on
>self insuring ratios on property damage.  All of us have to maintain
>liability to remain legal.

 From what I've heard, when you car is worth around 2.5-3k dollars that you
should drop your collision.  I don't have collision on any of my cars,
however I am thinking about adding comprehensive to my Z car, you can add
it without adding collison, which basically means that they will not cover
damage due to me wrecking it, but they will cover everything else (theft,
storm, etc.)

I have had a couple of cars paid for by someone else's insurance company,
and have always been satisfied with the amount paid (I doubled my money on
the last one, the Audi 4kcsq mentioned in my last post.)  If the accident
was someone else's fault, and the ins co is dragging their feet, I'm sure a
trip to your doctor about some neck pain will change their attitude.  It
takes 3 days for the full pain of whiplash to set in, so you don't
immediately have to go to the hospital in order to make a medical claim.

Regarding keeping the car and selling it, many states have a set price the
insurance company must offer you the car for (in NC, it's 20% of what they
paid you) in order to prevent the ins co from lowballing you on the
price.   I did the math, and it wasn't worth me keeping my car for $600
less in money, I had them tow it off.

One argument I can think of as to why they should pay dealer rather than
private party value:  Time spent looking for the car.  You didn't plan on
'selling' your car to the person who totalled it.  In a private party sale,
typically a week or two passes from the time you start looking for a car at
a reasonable price before you find one.  If they want to pay you private
party value, they should also provide a rental car until you can find a
suitable replacement, and should compensate you for the time you now have
to spend looking for a car  (For instance, I drove 7 hours away from my
house to get that 4kcsq as cheap as I did, then had to tow it back
home.)  Alternatively, they can pay you for one day's rental, and dealer
value, because you should be able to find a car at a dealer more quickly.

George Selby
83 Audi Coupe GT
89 Audi 80
86 Nissan 300ZX
gselby4x4 at earthlink.net