intro: got into an accident, my fault, and i have a 1000 dollar deductible on my insurance.





Now, the damage doesn't seem that extensive (i guess....). i mean, the major losses are the front bumper, driver's side headlight and fender. The hood was miraculously free of any chips or dents.

The advice i wanted to ask was.. Since i was going to get some aftermarket body parts anyway (kaminari front fascia, angel eyes), should i just get it now outside my insurance? i'm going to be paying at least 1K anyway, might as well put that 1K to good use and spend like 1.5-2K on making my car look the way i want it to.

Not quite sure how it works. Wondering what you guys/gals think.

 

i have the same thing... my "best" friend backed into my car with me in it (sounded like the crumpling or aluminum foil). I could pay $1000 for the damage, but since I am waiting for that AIT widebody kit, i can just hold onto the cash... my damage isn't as bad as yours though, so you gotta decide if you wanna roll around with THAT for a while. I think legally you have to get that light put back in though...

 

yeah, i was thinking about just not driving around at night, so there's less of a chance that they care about my missing headlight. Plus the torn fender looks like a pair of daggers sticking out waiting to cut some pedestrian.

anyway, the most likely thing is me getting my insurance to pay for it (and i'm sure their estimate will be pretty high, but if i'm paying only 1K, then that's that). i was just hoping i'd spare myself the higher insurance premiums and put my money to something that i'd eventually get anyway. Anyway, thanks for the feedback.

 

what happend?

 

well, that will cost you to fix out of pocket a bit over 1100 i think.. the same repairs but NO damage to left fender/structural components = $780 with paint/parts/bodywork.

I bent no metal luckily.. just a new front fascia, headlight assembly, and paint/labor. it wouldnt be worth taking it to insurance for saving a few hundred... insurance companies get their money back if they ever pay it out... its unavoidable.

edit: just thought id share the prices for parts with you:

These are prices from www.autopartspeople.com / www.scionpartspeople.com from their collision catalog.

Headlamp assy Left
(List) $179.39
(your price) $134.81

Fender Left
(List) $208.91
(your price )$157.00

Not sure what structural components you need for the fender, but you can research it here: LINK

Anyways, this is what I did when I needed to fix my car to get prices... I just let the shop order the parts and paid list for the parts, but I think you can just order the parts and give them to a body shop to paint and install.

 

i would take it to a local body shop and ask them to check it out n see what kind of damage it is. that way, u know exactly what's wrong with your car.

 

Well, it's stupidity on my part.

i went out to go get some KFC. Didn't know where it was so looked it up on internet. Got a general idea of where it was and i was on my way.

So, i didn't know if it was on the left or right and i didn't want to pass it because the way the road is set up, it's really annoying to have to turn back around because it has a split median (though i'd do a thousand u-turns instead of having had the accident).

Anyway, i was driving along, saw the KFC, passed the KFC, but saw a parking lot i could enter to turn into and cross a street to get to the KFC. Well, i guess i took the corner too fast, because all i ended up doing was going straight and skidding right into a car. It's kind of a hard thing to explain because of the way the road/KFC/parking lot all came together, but yeah...

Because it all happened so fast, i'm not quite sure what the heck happened. i don't feel like i was going that fast. (probably about 10-15) at the time of impact All i remember is pushing my brakes down and feeling it grind (possibly ABS, but felt different from what i remember) and turning the wheel and the car not changing direction. The physics of it all probably didn't help. Not blaming the tC as much as i'm blaming my random craving for KFC that night.

Thanks for the advice, guys. i'll probably take it into the shop today to get an estimate from them. Accidents suck.

 

if you can avoid the insurance that would be best considering they might up your charges per month.

check with a body shop and see what they say. if they price you under 1500, i'd suggest doing it without the insurance. but if it's over it... that's what insurance is for.

good luck in any case.

 

KFC? were u high?

j/k

 

munchies....

 

believe me i am going through the insurence thing right now...............just go through your insurence. there could be unseen damages. I had almost $4000 worth of unseen damages and my car doesnt lok as bad as yours.

 

So you were doing 10-15 and you went skidding into another car and did that much damage? What about the damage to the other car? Something just isn't adding up.

 

ouch

 

loook at my car ((in the gallery) that accident looks like nothing... BOOM 11K!!!!

 

its pretty funny.. i got my accident 2 days ago cause i was going to go meet a friend at KFC O_O...

KFC should die.

 

Hmm.. i might've been going faster, it's hard to tell when you hit someone while you're supposedly decelerating (but the skidding probably doesn't help). Well, i took the headlight off because it was cracked. And the front bumper for the most part is empty behind the area where i impacted the other guy (well, except for some hard styrofoam). i actually have the plastic/urethane/whatever material that came off my car and got caught inbetween where i hit him. The fender got ripped back because the most forward point on the fender got caught inbetween the other car's fender and door and the forward motion of my car kind of pushed MY fender back.

Anyway, the other guy's car was dents/scrapes along his fender/wheel well and door. It actually didn't look too bad on his car.

And so, yeah, something might not be adding up, but you tell me because i don't know the math of accidents.

Yeah, i actually looked at some of the areas around the inside and there were some tears and bent things that didn't look like they were meant to have those tears and bends. i'm pretty sure the insurance is going to take care of it and i'm going to have to bite the cost of the increased insurance if it comes to that (i suppose i can't argue since it was my fault).

And thanks again for all the feedback. It's been helpful and almost therapeutic in a way.

 

Go to a few body shops and get some estimates, they are free and it'll give you a good idea what your cost would really be to fix it. They may need to put it up on the rack to really determine if there is any other "unseen" damage (such as frame or unibody damage), thats where it gets expensive. If your quote ends up coming out to something like $1500 like everyone else said, just pay out of pocket. With a $1,000 deductible, you'll pay $1000 and you'll have your premiums hiked so you'll end up paying the same if not more within a year or two.

If you can afford to go with aftermarket parts and thats what you want to do, then go for it, now's the perfect time becuase you're going to pay that money anyway, avoid paying to replace the front end twice.

But definitely at the very least go down to a few body shops and get some estimates - it is completely worthless to look at a picture and speculate the repair costs, don't believe anyone until you've got it in writing.

 

if you were thinking about doing the body kit anyway, it seems like fate is telling you yes.

might as well do your upgrade now, if sure beats having you car in the body shop twice. once to replace the stock stuff and again when you decide to put the body kit.

so, in conclusion, i can't wait to see the pictures of your car with the new body kit on it.

good luck.

 

well heres the problem i see


you hit the guy .. so its your fault... guess whos insurance is going to be paying to fix HIS car .. YOURS .. so you are going to get hit with a surcharge whether you claim the damage to your car or not because they will be paying out to fix the other persons car

so you might as well claim it on the insurance .. since you are going to get a surchage anyways and that will save you the hassel of wondering if its going to cost you more then 1k out of pocket ...

 

Good point. Still waiting for him though. He went to get a quote from a body shop and get back to me so i could see if i could take the cost of his car outside my insurance too. If it was too much then i was going to figure that it was fate telling me that it/he/she wanted me to go through my insurance. The damage really didn't look as bad for his, but with cars... who knows. His car was an '89 240SX. There were already dents on his car, but i added a pretty big one.

He hasn't called me back yet (this all happened on Wednesday and i tried calling him, but he didn't answer). So, not sure what my options are. It's like a crap shoot now, i guess, with the waiting. i'll give him a couple more days while i do some research on parts. But i'd rather not be driving my car if it rains. And i'm all exposed like that. i still cringe when i look at it. My poor baby.