My Camry was in a fender, hood, bumper, and headlight bender

[Xist]

It was a beautiful day! I drove to Walmart to buy a new hot plate to boil my catalytic converters in acid, hoping to clear the CEL and resume driving my car:

Look! It's another fifth-generation Camry! You can see both ends of a Camry at once!




Someone tried to turn left in front of me. I skid into him. As far as I can tell, just my hood, headlight, bumper, and a bracket were damaged. The frame and other components seem fine, although I cannot open the hood.

Nobody was injured, the other driver stayed, and the police took a report, but how long before his insurance fixes my car?

I drove my Camry 2,136 miles in 6.9 months--310 miles monthly.
I am surprised that I drove it that much. I drove my Accord everywhere so that nothing happened to this one!

Kelley says that my car would be worth $3,398 in good condition. A friend has worked insurance for years and says they will likely total my car due to age and availability of parts, but her threshold is 80%. Eighty percent of $3,398 is $2,718 and since the bumper is out of the way I can see the frame! It looks great!

I certainly have had difficulty finding parts for my Hondas and painting is prohibitively expensive, but this LKQ Pick-Your-Part in Thousand Palms, California looks like it has the hood and bumper for $50 each!


I declined rental coverage. Maybe it had to do with having 3 cars. Unless the other guy's insurance offers me something, I still need to fix my Honda, and I sure hope that I finally make my Accord drivable before

[freebeard]

Were it not for bad luck, you'd have none at all.

[JSH]

Originally Posted by freebeard

Were it not for bad luck, you'd have none at all.

The party at fault stayed on scene and has insurance - it could have been worst.

[redpoint5]

I'd take insurance money and fix yourself. Those few items could easily be a few grand. Consider yourself lucky.

Today in Hawaii I was approaching an intersection on a green light and noticed a car in the parking lot on the right creeping aggressively towards the intersection. I lightly accelerated and moved towards the right to show that it's not his light and I don't intend to stop to let him bully his way in.

It was apparent he didn't see me so I relented and braked. Not only did he turn right in front of me, but accelerated hard into the vehicle ahead. Seemed strange for the person to not not see anyone, but they stopped after the accident, so I figured the 2 parties were exchanging insurance info and I continued around. After all, my sister has hit someone who was making a right turn before, and her excuse was "he took longer than I expected". Really bad drivers just exist.

Looking in my rearview, I saw 2 guys throwing punches, so I put the car in reverse and went back so I could help sort things out. As quick as the punches started it was over, and a shirtless man took off running and I pursued in the rental. My wife told me the cops were after him already, so I backed off, but it was only mall cops... I lost him in just that moment of backing off. So it was some sort of bizarre road rage...

Later at dinner, we witnessed a van parked right next to us have his mirror clipped by another passing vehicle. The waitress commented that we got some excitement with dinner, and I exclaimed "that's nothing, we just saw a hit and punch and literal run". She said a couple that was there just before us were the people that were hit. The story according to them was the shirtless man had robbed an O'riley's with his girlfriend and she was the driver. With traffic backed up, the shirtless man yelled at her to "just go", so she went and rammed into the people ahead of us. The O'riley's employee was chasing after, so the shirtless man got out of the crashed car and hit the employee a few times before sprinting through traffic and out of my sight.

So, my framing was continuously wrong in what I was witnessing. I thought it was a jerk trying to bully into traffic, then an inattentive driver, then a road rager... never even occurred that a robbery had taken place.

I wish my frame had been more correct initially, as I would have stopped immediately and been in good position to apprehend shirtless man. As it is, he's on the lam.

This is the intersection I observed everything;
https://goo.gl/maps/CWLiZJcgcLVE9Sxb6

Imagine that Red Nissan creeping out into the pedestrian zone while I have the green and then ramming into the car ahead.

[Xist]

That metal piece above where the passenger headlight goes:


I filed a report when I got home and called the body shop that is supposed to inspect my vehicle the first thing this morning, but nobody answered, and there wasn't voice mail. I e-mailed and haven't heard back.

I am sure that when I finally get a hold of the body shop they will love that I removed the broken parts, but I needed to make it drivable!

The pick-your-part doesn't show a front bumper assembly, but it has a front bumper cover, so I am sure that it has the small bent brackets that I also need to replace. If the hood and bumper are $50 each hopefully those are also reasonably-priced.

USAA called and said I should hear from the body shop within 24 hours.

The crash was 27 hours ago!

My insurance friend said that State Farm doesn't cover the deductible, but USAA said the accident wasn't my fault, so I am covered. They use the actual-cash value "Which is like Kelley, but not opinion-based."

Is Carfax opinion-based like Kelley? I updated my mileage and it says that in good condition my car is worth $3,300.

He said the computer automatically flags some vehicles as a total loss, but this didn't happen with mine.

Hopefully they have my Camry back on the road... eventually... but if they declare it a total loss I just hope there is a large difference between the salvage value and the check.

Then I would plan a trip to California and ask a lady in L.A. that I met on-line to meet me. She sent me many pictures from fixing her own cars the other day.

It was attractive!

I wouldn't necessarily ask her to help, although that would always be welcome, but it would be great to have some company, and meet her while I am in the area.

[freebeard]

I wouldn't necessarily ask her to help, although that would always be welcome...

He says with big, puppy-dog eyes.

[redpoint5]

Lady > Camry

[aerohead]

I've never met anyone who was fully compensated for their loss, unless they sued for the balance in small-claims court.

[JSH]

Originally Posted by aerohead

I've never met anyone who was fully compensated for their loss, unless they sued for the balance in small-claims court.

I've had it go both ways.

Best case was a 1991 Yamaha FJ1200 I totaled in a highside crash. The insurance company paid out straight bluebook + an extra $2000 for accessories. I bought the bike back for a couple hundred bucks and sold just the engine for 3x what I paid to buy back the bike. I bought a replacement bike, swapped the accessories over and ended up with a couple grand in my pocket.

Worst case was a 1972 Porsche 914 that was involved in a crash in 2000. Insurance didn't total it but also didn't want to pay for replacement parts to actually fix it in a shop. The big sticking point was the original chrome bumper. Insurance wanted to pay for either a rusty scrap yard replacement or a fiberglass replica. That went many rounds before they cut me a check.

Our 2003 Jetta TDI wagon also got rear ended lightly twice. Both times there was just a bit of paint damage and a few wrinkles in the paint. Both time I took the $1000 and pocketed it instead of fixing the car.

[aerohead]

It greatly pleases me to finally 'know' someone who was treated equitably.