of course you should FIX IT!!!

20 years from now that car should still be on the road. Dont be the guy who sends another innocent SSEi to the boneyard/crusher.

I agree.....fix it!!!!!!!!!!


So what'* the guys condition.....he IS in the Hospital?? Isn't he????

its possible your going to need a 1/4 cut for sure but your looking at about 3k to fix it

Fix it.

That gar is beautiful Personally I'd also demand another insurance adjuster. The idiot who looked over your car probably saw the quarter panel dent and immediately assumed suspension damage. I had a similar experience with my father in law'* car.

I was making a left hand turn and some moron in a delivery truck who was doing 65 in a 30 tried to go around me and swirved INTO me and hit the quarter panel. The insurance adjuster tried to total out the car because the suspension repairs would be astronomical. I asked the guy if he was high or something. The hit was high and the suspension was fine. Wound up with another adjuster who agreed.

ummmm.... as far as suspension damage, I would assume that it will need some, atleast. very possible that the impact was directly on the wheel. especially sionce there are scuff marks on the rim.

it'* hard to say. I previously handled fleet subrogation claims for rental car comapnies. would beinterested in looking at the estimate itself. one thing to consider is extra stuff to claim with the insurance. you should be able to claim DIV as well. though will be hard with that many miles that are on the car. Oh, and your "X" factor of what they are giving you is also an important piece of info. can you share a little more info?

you know you don't even have to rent a rental car to get compesated for one, right? if you have a second car and another car to drive, fo that. the 3rd party still has to pay you for what is called loss of use. it is calculated by the per day rate of an equiv rental car (which a grand am is not) times the amount of days it will take to fix your car.

there are actually a lot of info I can share with you on the insurance side. if ya want, hit me up on aim sometime, and we can talk further. AIM:robmpulse

I say repair it. With 73k on that car she is just breaking in.

also i want to add look at the stress in the pillar who know that could travel all the way into the roof
but thats going make the esitmate more

Thanks for the advice thus far. I'm 90% sure I'm going to keep and fix the car.

To answer the "X" question, they're offering me $6500 and the car or $8700 and no car. The quote for the repairs is at like $6500 right now -- here'* what I'm proposing to take off the estimate:

Rear Bumper, $276 +labor & paint = $553.20
All that is wrong with the rear bumper that we can tell is one of the screws popped off and there are some superficial scuffs that would need to be buffed out.

Door Trim Panel, $559.94
This part looks like it might not even be broken. If it is, I'll find one at the junkyard and install it myself for that price.

Headliner, $406.19 + labor = $532.19
They tore a small hole in the headliner when "throwing the cladding from the rear door into car" For this price I can patch it and live with it.

Front door, $188.40 paint + labor
The want to blend my front door to exactly match the new door paint they're going to put on the back door. My guess is that I won't even notice, and if I do I can always have them do it later.

Wheel, $179 + labor = $191.60
There are some superficial scuffs on this that will probably come right off. If it'* not bent, I'm keeping it for now.

Tire, $125
All my tires are Bridgestone RE950'* and were purchased <3 months ago. They have minimal milleage on them (<2k). The tire that was hit would be fine except no one cleared out the wheel well before driving on it. It has some surface damage, but nothing deep. If it looks too bad I'll just go back to Costco and get a single replacement for less than this price.

The sum of these is $2150.33, which I feel should give me some play should there be any unforeseen problems once they get the door off, or with the suspension.

Opinions?

I did a similar "weeding out" of what needed fixed after I rear-ended a Cadillac. The money came in handy elsewhere.

are they paying you anything for diminution in value?