Well...At least it was fun while it lasted.

octavious said:

My daily is a 08 manual GT convertible so I feel for you.  

 

As far as 4 seater manual convertibles I only found a few

- Mustang

- BMW 3 Series

- Mini Cooper

- Wrangler

-Infiniti G37?

- VW Beetle

- Camaro 

 

Do they need to be new?  If not:

FC Rx7

Various Maserati's inc Quatroporte (both the 80's/90's versionand the new onese.  3000GT with that lovely Ferrari engine

( guess we can leave out Rolls nad Bentley here, but they both have several.

XK8's

BMW 3 series going back to the E30's

Mitsubishi Eclips

Mitsubishi 3000GT 

Triumph Stag

Various old Ford's

Audi A4's

Ferrari Modial

Toyota Celica 

SAAB 900's

Various sad sad 80's and 90's GM err, I was going to say offerings, but let's call them sacrifices instead, some things are best left forgotten.

etc. etc.

How is that 7K worth of damage?  Is the floor in the trunk bent?  Did it bend the Unibody to the point that the door gap and / or the trunk gap is out?  

He said "if." It was a hypothetical, showing how the numbers worked for the at-fault party's liability.

dean1484 said:

How is that 7K worth of damage?  Is the floor in the trunk bent?  Did it bend the Unibody to the point that the door gap and / or the trunk gap is out?  

I was just giving an example.  Hard to tell with the rear bumper still on, but I wouldn't be surprised if it was around $7k.  Quarter alone is close to $2k, including paint, etc....  Then possibly add the rear body panel, inner quarter, trunk floor, rear bumper.  Where this got hit is an expensive place to hit a car.

I don't get the reluctance to use insurance, that's what you've paid all those premiums for.

Salvage value will be right around $2250-$2500, maybe a touch more or less

stuart in mn said:

I don't get the reluctance to use insurance, that's what you've paid all those premiums for.

Because statistics show once you've made one claim, you're much more likely to make another. 

When I had my accident in BRZ last year, which was completely my fault, it was the only claim I'd ever had with State Farm in 12+ years of doing business (with car and home). My car insurance nearly doubled for 1 accident. And it will still be about 15 months until it drops back down. 

But even then I don't suspect it will drop back down all the way.

In reply to z31maniac :

Then what's the point of having insurance?  

Pay a bit extra for actually using it, or throw away all of what you pay to not use it at all. 

Cooter said:

In reply to z31maniac :

Then what's the point of having insurance?  

Pay a bit extra for actually using it, or throw away all of what you pay to not use it at all. 

I answered his question with my interpretation from having been a claim rep in a past life. Especially on small claims. 

Some quick back of the numbers math show that the rental car, deductible, and increased coverage price for the 3 years the claim stays on my record will have saved me roughly $1100 over just paying for the accident out of pocket. 

So making a claim with your insurance is not being civil to the guy that hit you?  I don't see how that jams him up, it just makes sure you get taken care of in a situation where if you don't make the claim, you certainly *won't* be....

I haven't had my rates go up here in Colorado because I made a claim.  They did in Massachusetts but that was a single car incident that was entirely my fault.

I'll pay out of pocket for some things to avoid making a claim on insurance, but once you start getting close to and going over $2k I think you use it.

What is the purpose of insurance (aside from the fact that it is madated in some cases)?  It is a financial tool to limit short term, large financial impacts.  In the case of the OP, without insurance he would be looking at paying to replace his car within 24-72 hours.  Most of us are not prepared to do that.  That is what insurance is for.

Companies run many computer models to predict and balance the premium you pay with the likelihood of having to pay out.  In a perfect world, they would set the premium at the value of your car so they wouldn't lose money.  Everyone would just self-insure in this case, so they have to lower the rate to a balance point where you will be willing to pay and they can stay in business if there is a loss.  It's pretty simple from an economic/business point of view.  How those rates are set rival the airline industry and how they figure out seat pricing.

Part of the rate is based on claims history.   Sadly, even if not your fault it will count against you.  Not a lot you can do, other than not file claims for events that you can easily handle out of pocket.  This accident seems to go beyond that level.  You have insurance for cases like this, and the rates may go up but the financial tool is doing its job.

Always, always, always get a police report.  I learned my lesson when a very polite, well dressed young dude in a newish Lexus changed lanes (assume he was on the phone and missed seeing me on his flank).  We did a NASCAR rub a couple of time so the damage was minor.  He apologized profusely, took full responsibility, and gave me his insurance info.  

His story to the insurance company was that we were at a red light at a place where three lanes of traffic merged to two.  I was in the lane that ended and I tried to race him to the merge and then drove into the side of his car.  He couldn't "remember" where this particular event happened.  When I gave my statement I provided my airline ticket, the address on the road where the impact was, and demonstrated the timeline and location aligned with my flight landing and the path to my apartment.  Without a police report, they said it was his story against mine.  Went all the way to court where his side finally made a settlement offer fifteen minutes before the case was to be heard.

Klayfish said:

Salvage value will be right around $2250-$2500, maybe a touch more or less

Cool, thanks for the info/help. Is that related at all to how the buy back price is typically determined?  That is getting dangerously close to Challenge territory...Although it seems that prospect is proving less interesting to the GRM community than I had anticipated.

Typically the buy back price is a percentage of the settlement cost; usually 25% or so. If they total the car and give you 10k, the buy back would 2.5 large if the percentage is 25%. Obviously...

I'm currently in the process of buying back a 2016 BMW R1200GSAW a buddy had the rear wheel collapse while riding on the freeway at 75. The payout value was just over 22k and the buyback is 5.6k. According to my buddy, the insurer established the buyback based on the payout. I had the same thing 13 years ago with a GS I crashed on Hwy17 when I hit sand on the road. Buyback was 25% of the settlement cost.

YMMV...

Driven5 said:

Klayfish said:

Salvage value will be right around $2250-$2500, maybe a touch more or less

Cool, thanks for the info/help. Is that related at all to how the buy back price is typically determined?  That is getting dangerously close to Challenge territory...Although it seems that prospect is proving less interesting to the GRM community than I had anticipated.

Yes, directly related.  I looked up similar Mustang GTs with mild/moderate rear end damage that have sold at Copart recently.  That's how most carriers come up with a salvage value for owner retention.

Driven5 said:

Cool, thanks for the info/help. Is that related at all to how the buy back price is typically determined?  That is getting dangerously close to Challenge territory...Although it seems that prospect is proving less interesting to the GRM community than I had anticipated.

I think most of us are like me - very interested but the location is a serious challenge. Getting a car from Seattle to Ohio is expensive and/or very time consuming. Getting it to Florida is even crazier! It's sure a good deal though if you end up with it for $2000.

In reply to dculberson :

Some of us in Florida are crazy enough.

Adrian_Thompson said:

octavious said:

As far as 4 seater manual convertibles I only found a few

- Mustang

- BMW 3 Series

- Mini Cooper

- Wrangler

-Infiniti G37?

- Camaro

Do they need to be new?  If not:

FC Rx7

Various Maserati's inc Quatroporte (both the 80's/90's versionand the new onese.

( guess we can leave out Rolls nad Bentley here, but they both have several.

XK8's

BMW 3 series going back to the E30's

Triumph Stag

Various old Ford's

Ferrari Modial

He said RWD so I culled the list a bit. This is basically my list too. Well, with the exception of Ferraris, Triumphs, stuff like that. There are also some convertible Merecedes sedans - are none of them manual?

@P3PPY  Interesting question on the Benz, I don't know if any manual 4 seater cabs were available in the US.  

And how did I forget...

Porsche 911 and all it's younger sisters.  Duh...

While the guy was unable to come up with the money, as expected, there was no funny business on his part and it cost me nothing to extend the courtesy of that opportunity to him. Contrary to what pretty much every other person I told about this situation assumed about him, in my dealings with him since the accident he has shown himself to be a fair and honest individual.  He genuinely wanted to be able to 'make it right', and when he realized that he was not going to be able to do so on his own, there was no animosity when he agreed to go through insurance.

So now that it's going through insurance, it has (unsurprisingly) been declared a total loss.  

Insurance is (surprisingly) valuing it higher than I expected...Which will be a big help with replacement.

They are also valuing the salvage of the car at $1900...So it's hitting the $2k Classifieds at that price through Sunday, before just letting insurance keep it.

I'm currently deciding whether to replace it with something of equivalent-ish value to what I'm getting as a third car again, or also ditching our Fit to bump the price range up a bit and making it a daily driver. So far, the most likely candidates are looking like S197 Mustangs, BMW 1-Series, and BMW 3-Series...With the occasional budget stretcher over into 996 Porsche-land. Currently kind of leaning towards holding out for a 128i convertible with manual and sport package. There is also a G37 retractable hardtop with manual advertised locally that is somewhat intriguing as well. I'm in no hurry though, so we'll see what happens after I do some test driving.