How to handle the Mark being "totaled" ?

[Scallywag]

This might be a bit long. Sorry in advance....

I've had a claim with State Farm for 2 months now due to one of their insured side swiping the BA on the passenger side. The claim had been stagnant thus far because their insured hadn't given his statement to SF and they told me they have to give em at least 30-60 days to respond before they go off of the police report and my statement.

Fair enough.

Today they called me to let me know that they're going to go ahead with the liability since the time frame had passed and they still hadn't heard from their guy. So then the character began asking me about the car and what type of damage the Mark sustained.

I told him "Front fender indent over tire(somewhat creased), impact knocked HID out of place but operable, broken side view mirror, warped psngr door & rear 1/4 panel along with the residue of the cars paint on mine. No airbag deployment. Drivability, car is misaligned and influenced to the right. Late Sept '14 I got an alignment done and received the print out of everything in green."

He's like "Sounds like the front suspension might've been compromised... You may be looking at a total loss."
I was bewildered for a moment but managed to ask, "You mean 'Totaled'? Why?!?"

He then said that someone would call me by Friday to arrange when they can pickup the car to take it to salvage yard and proceed from there and then hung up quickly. I would've called back but I was at work and didn't want to spend any more time on the claim when work had to get done. LoL whoever picks up the Mark is going to see that it is still VERY much drivable, except for the alignment.

Why would SF go to "totaled" status of the vehicle off of a phone call without sending someone to apraise the damage? Maybe the rep imagined greater damage or thinks the cost to repair/compensate is greater than the Mark is worth at it's age and barely crossed 100,000 today.

What would you do or have you done? Should I let them "total" it and then buy it back with the $ they give me?

Thanks!!

 

[Bangster]

I had to deal with this as well, and i took the most they would offer without totaling it. I am once again with a wrecked car, the insurance wanted to be done with it, so they wrote me a check because no shops wanted to start working on it and get to apart they can't get.

Without an estimate or an inspection to find value, don't proceed. Did you get your insurance company engaged?

 

[Lownslowlsc]

Pictures would go a long way, without them it's hard to picture the extent of the damage. Since the front end is still tweaked after getting realigned and needs bodywork on multiple panels... I'm not at all surprised that they're going to total a rare-ish 16+ year old car.

If it were my car I'd take the money and run, assuming of course that they gave me a fair price...

 

[Scallywag]

I didn't get my insurance involved just yet but will call them tomorrow and see what opinion they offer.

I had thought about calling them because the alignment is the only thing that gets me nervous, especially with snow, and felt I couldn't wait for their insured to decide to show some integrity and call in to make things right. Driving the K4 is out of the question since it's torn apart getting cams degreed and so it was pertinent to a safe winter driving experience that it get dealt with asap.

I know that my insurance can restore and get compensated by SF, but truth be told, I'd rather take the $ and do the work myself or somewhere of my choosing, or add it to the coming tax return and get another daily driver Mark and part the BA.

It just sucks because I just had the oil pan filter gasket done, front suspension, used warranty on tires to get the BA through the snow since they were starting to look like pencil erasers/slicks meanwhile I wait for liability to be established and all so it can get salvaged!?

Yea I'm leaning towards just having them appraise the cosmetic and suspension damage and get the estimated $ vaue for it.

 

[Bangster]

This is what 2100 dollars in damage looks like:

This was also over 2000 dollars worth of damage:

Doesn't take much, and if everything lines up well, can be fixed for much less. I already have a totaled vehicle in my back yard, I didn't want another one to deal with safety inspections or not being able to carry full coverage on.

 

[Lownslowlsc]

I didn't get my insurance involved just yet but will call them tomorrow and see what opinion they offer.

I had thought about calling them because the alignment is the only thing that gets me nervous, especially with snow, and felt I couldn't wait for their insured to decide to show some integrity and call in to make things right. Driving the K4 is out of the question since it's torn apart getting cams degreed and so it was pertinent to a safe winter driving experience that it get dealt with asap.

I know that my insurance can restore and get compensated by SF, but truth be told, I'd rather take the $ and do the work myself or somewhere of my choosing, or add it to the coming tax return and get another daily driver Mark and part the BA.

It just sucks because I just had the oil pan filter gasket done, front suspension, used warranty on tires to get the BA through the snow since they were starting to look like pencil erasers/slicks meanwhile I wait for liability to be established and all so it can get salvaged!?

Yea I'm leaning towards just having them appraise the cosmetic and suspension damage and get the estimated $ vaue for it.

I'm confused, is the suspension still tweaked after the alignment or are you saying that you had to get it done because you couldn't wait for them to pay out? If the front susp is good i'd buy it back for <750, pocket the remainder and drive it till the wheels fall off.

 

[marked8]

Low mile Mark VIII's are pretty cheap. I would fight for a high payout then buy a low mile Mark.

 

[Necrosan]

Any interest in selling the rims if you decide to total it out?

 

[Scallywag]

I'm confused, is the suspension still tweaked after the alignment or are you saying that you had to get it done because you couldn't wait for them to pay out? If the front susp is good i'd buy it back for <750, pocket the remainder and drive it till the wheels fall off.

Last July after the changing Inner & Outer Tie Rods I had an alignment done, naturally. I paid for some 3yr deal where I can take the Mark for up to 8 free alignments within that 3yr period and figured I use 1 of those 8 to get the BA through the snow when it finally fell since I was still waiting. It was especially urgent since the condition of the front tires had deteriorated rather quickly but they refused to do the alignment because they said I'd have to fix other components to the psngr side for the alignment to be effective.

I certainly wasn't going to fix it myself yet so to get me through I just ended up buying 2 new tires and rotated the 2 in back to the front since they had 75% left.

Today I was told to empty the Mark of my personal belongings and remove the tags so that they can pick it up tomorrow and take it to a salvage to get appraised. That they got me on the rental because it's going to take about a week to determine the loss and the K4 is out of service at the moment, but neither of the local rental lots they work with had a car available.

Now this is all new to me because in past experiences they either came to where my car was at, be it work, home etc or had me go to Collision Revision or something similiar to estimate and send check thru mail. This time the Mark is being kidnapped for a while.

 

[Bangster]

Yeah, that is an odd process. One that you would expect if your car was inoperative from the accident and towed and sitting in a yard.

I have State Farm, and when someone pulled in front of me and I hit them with my 97 Cougar, they sent someone to my house to do the estimate and value assessment. The other driver had State Farm as well, and there was a lot of questions over the validity of her coverage, so that dragged on for months.

When the person pulled out from a stop sign and I hit them, crunching up my bumper cover, header panel, and headlight (and steel bumper once I got it all apart), they had some local specialty company, they didn't even have estimators, I had to take it to autobody shops to get estimates, then I had the one I felt understood the damage the best send it to them. That shop couldn't get the parts, so I had them cut me a check, I gathered up all the parts, and decided to do the work myself, so it isn't perfect, but I (and probably those on the board here) can tell, and the body shop asked about a spot I screwed up and scratched the header panel into the fiber.

This last one, with the person that drove into the side of me, they had Progressive, and they had a center I drove to and they took pictures and did an estimate. They didn't do a valuation as it was low miles and overall in good shape, so they didn't feel it was close to a total loss.

 

[num1bigguy]

KBB for my car is $2800. Fair condition of course. I would think any accident would total it.

 

[Scallywag]

Well, State Farm finally gave me an offer after having the whip for two weeks .

They consider the BA to be a total loss and are prepared to give me a check for $3506.24.

If I choose to retain the vehicle then the amount is reduced to $3271.43

LoL this is a no brainer!!

So now I'm torn between actually putting the $ into the BA, buying another daily driver Mark & part the BA, or add it to the tax refund & get a Marauder(there are 2 nearby under $10k).

 

[Lownslowlsc]

That's a fair price. Definitely get it back then take some time to think about what you want to do with it.

Sounds like it's all working out for ya! Congrats?

P.s. I still want pictures...

 

[BlackOnBlackCobra96]

Sounds like you should take the cash, get an alignment and fix the other minor things, and call it a day..

 

[Scallywag]

That's a fair price. Definitely get it back then take some time to think about what you want to do with it.

Sounds like it's all working out for ya! Congrats?

P.s. I still want pictures...

Thou shalt receive.

I just got it back from the salvage yard, ran in through the car wash real quick and snapped a few. I understand book value but still can't believe that they wanted to consider this "Totaled".....

 

[Scallywag]

This is what 2100 dollars in damage looks like:

Doesn't take much, and if everything lines up well, can be fixed for much less. I already have a totaled vehicle in my back yard, I didn't want another one to deal with safety inspections or not being able to carry full coverage on.

I'm sorry to hear that as that looks a lot more than $2100 worth of property loss than to what SF is giving me for mine. Granted the bigger damage to the BA is not really visible in pictures as it is an alignment issue due to the front left bumper impacting the passenger tire.

Before the impact both front tires were like so..... |__|

After the impact both front tires are now like...... |__ /

So there is work that needs to be done cosmetically and mechanically, but I'll probably just focus on the steering/suspension components and think about looking for another daily driver Mark before letting this one go.

 

[Scallywag]

Low mile Mark VIII's are pretty cheap. I would fight for a high payout then buy a low mile Mark.

Yea I've seen a few between 70k-98k asking for $3500 up to $9000 (Yikes!! ).

I've been wanting a BoB LSC for some time but this one isn't bad considering it's an LSC, low miles, decent paint and likely to be more mechanically sound than the BA.

http://www.cridermotors.net/1997_Lincoln_Mark VIII_Mishawaka_IN_239134501.veh

Black interior would've been a killer combo as I already have gray with the K4 & the tan/brown color combo in the BA.

A couple white/pearl Marks on CL & other car sites have popped up that aren't too far & fairly priced.

This is where I tear my mind apart in my futile attempt at deciding which Mark to go for and then feeling satisfied with that decision when I finally see the one I've wanted on sale for cheap right after I finished signing the paperwork.

 

[marked8]

Yea I've seen a few between 70k-98k asking for $3500 up to $9000 (Yikes!! ).

I've been wanting a BoB LSC for some time but this one isn't bad considering it's an LSC, low miles, decent paint and likely to be more mechanically sound than the BA.

http://www.cridermotors.net/1997_Lincoln_Mark VIII_Mishawaka_IN_239134501.veh

Black interior would've been a killer combo as I already have gray with the K4 & the tan/brown color combo in the BA.

A couple white/pearl Marks on CL & other car sites have popped up that aren't too far & fairly priced.

This is where I tear my mind apart in my futile attempt at deciding which Mark to go for and then feeling satisfied with that decision when I finally see the one I've wanted on sale for cheap right after I finished signing the paperwork.

How about this one?:

http://flint.craigslist.org/ctd/4860222530.html

 

[Lownslowlsc]

I pictured it to be a lot worse, Scally. But there is damage to the whole side so I'm not surprised they totaled it. Good luck on finding another M8.

 

[Scallywag]

So....

One week after retrieving the whip from the salvage yard does some young girl decide to take a red light and hit my front as I made my left turn. The impact did deploy the airbags and the reporting officer ticketed us both for "Failure to Yield" & "Disobeying a Red Light". However, the intersection is photo enforced and a quick look at the surveilance will show that my turn was pending since I was already in the middle waiting for my chance well before the light turned red.














LoL It's almost as if Life is re-affirming State Farms position of totaling the BA, which now it is thanks to this girl finishing the job.

 

[Lownslowlsc]

Oh my, now THAT'S totaled. Hope you're ok.

Wonder how the ins is gunna work out. Good luck.