Appraisals?

[shadango]

I am not looking to buy or sell  but figured this is the best section to ask the question since it deals with valuation....

I have thought about, for a while, the issue of how much to cover my Barracuda for......I have agreed upon value thru JC Taylor.

Had run acorss a vendor offiering appraisals a couple years ago at Carlisle and considered it but life got in the way....

Fast forward to THIS Carlisle , I ran across a different outfit and they were offering an on-site event special.

I ended up having the Cuda and my son's Volare and Diplomat appraised after they offered a multi-car discount. I am a sucker for savings....LOL

I figure this way if someone t-bones the car at least I have a good pre-accident number to use as a "pay me this " number......

Anyone else have an appraisal on their car and has anyone ever had to use it for an accident? Was it worth having?

[303 Mopar]

I have a agreed value with Hagerty on all my cars without the need for an appraisal. IMO appraisals don't carry a lot of meaning or value and often times the appraiser will just put down whatever the clients wants.  You are better off watching the market value, what cars similar to yours actually sell for, then try to get that value.  In the end, it is doubtful you will be able to rebuild your car for the insured value anyway if something were to happen.

[70 Challenger Lover]

I switched over to Hagerty recently and I just plucked values out of the air. They didn't sweat it one bit. I'm sure in their mind, you get charged more for a higher insurance value for an event they will probably never pay out on. The Hagerty valuation tool puts my 71 Barracuda convertible at around 46-47k but they insured it for 60k with no photos and no questions.

AAA on the other hand was a complete PITA. They insisted on personally seeing my car in the garage before insuring my 64 Vette at a medium insurance value. I had the door panel off to replace a window weatherstrip and they wouldn't approve it until I reinstalled the door panel. Which meant I had them at my house twice. I'd never bother with AAA again.

[blown motor]

Has anyone every had a full claim with Hagerty? Do they they pay out the agreed upon value? Insurance companies are notorious for trying to wiggle out if paying. Just because you have an agreed value doesn't guarantee that's what you'll get IMO. I'm just curious what anyone might have experienced.

[chargerdon]

A Friend of mine had a 48 Anglia, that he insured with Hagerty for $42,000.    The car in its condition was probably worth a true $25-30,000.    He had an accident (his fault driving too fast in the rain and spun out on those huge Mickey Thompson cheater slicks, and Hagerty claims agent wrote it up for $17,000 to have it repaired with the understanding that if there was additional unnoticed damage that it would be covered.     

My friend took it not to a collision repair shop, but, instead to a classic car restoration shop.   There it sat slowly getting worked on, and the shop finding problem after problem with the car..   Things like the Mustang II front end hadn't been properly welded to the Anglia frame.   The passenger door wouldnt shut right (wouldnt before the accident either).  Thinks like the car had a single stage paint job (with orange peel), and the restoration shop refused to try to match the single stage (house of Kolor) paint, and instead put a full 2 staqe paint job on it.   During the two years of the restoration, the shop did try to notify Hagerty of the additional "damage" to the car.   But, they never came to the shop to inspect the claims.

When it was finally finished 2 years later, it had a great looking 2 stage paint job, frame fixed (wasn't crash damage), and the shop charged $150 per hour for labor and the total came to $48,000.   After submitting the residual bill to Hagerty, and waiting 2 months for them to come to grips, they paid out the total of the $42,000 as per the insured value.   My friend refused to pay the out rest so the garage eventually, settled for the $42,000.    Now, i was a bit peeved...my friend got back a car that was much better than it originally had been, and the insurance paid out $42,000...   THIS IS WHY INSURANCE IS SO EXPENSIVE... Sometimes they get ripped !!!     

His wife refused to ride in the Anglia anymore saying "it was a death trap", and he eventually sold the car for $38,000...four thousand less than the "accepted" repairs of $42,000 and $10,000 less than the amount the restoration shop tried to get.   

[70 Challenger Lover]

Wow, what a story. If the Angelia had been damaged to a point where it was obviously totaled, or stolen and never recovered, I wonder if Hagerty would have paid out the full $42k right away.

In that particular story, it's hard to throw fault anyone's direction. The insurance company shouldn't be forced to pay out full agreed upon value if the car seems repairable for less. The driver shouldn't suffer financially when he has insurance (that's the whole point of it), and the shop shouldn't be forced to make substandard repairs to keep the repair bill low or accept less than their full rates.

He may have insured the Angelia for more than it was worth but Hagerty charged him a higher premium for that. Everyone accepted that deal just as if he put that money on red. They recognize they will only pay out on one car of a thousand they insure. If they ever believed they were destined to pay on every single car they insured, they would charge insane premiums or risk going under.

I had a nice offshore boat once and some cattle boat ran into it doing a lot of damage. If it was a new Honda car, it could have been repaired in a week at the local collision shop and returned to the owner. Those shops are okay with settling the bill directly with the insurance company after the fact because they all speak the same language. Boats, like classic cars, can't be repaired very quickly and the people who repair them don't have a regular business relationship with the major insurance companies. In my case, I had two options: pay the bill out of my own pocket and the insurance company agreed to pay that bill in full when it was done or: settle with the insurance company ahead of time for an amount that will probably pay the bill. I didn't want to fork out $17k and wait a year so I took the check for a slightly higher amount and hoped for the best. Took nine months for the repairs and the bill came in at 16k so I got to keep 4K for the risk I took. Sounds crazy but the boat insurance company held all the cards. They were actually okay with me getting a few thousand more than the estimate because they didn't want to risk getting a much higher bill in the end. They actually preferred to settle the claim early for more than less later on.

The problem in classic cars that are not obviously totaled is simply that we want our cars to go to a specialist shop and those specialists shops can take years to do a job right. You would think Hagerty would employ adjusters who know the repair workings of older cars so they can go to these shops and represent the insurance company.

[71-440]

Last year My Challenger had the right rear quarter smacked. State Farm said $1500.00 damage to fix. The body shop I took it to does high end cars. The estimate was more than State Farm wanted to pay. So they gave me three body shops to call that they have approved. Not one would even look at the car. A'71 no way they would touch it. Single stage paint also.
State Farm payed it to the only shop that would touch it..... Anyone want to guess what the actual cost was?

[70 Challenger Lover]

I could see a high end shop wanting to put on a new quarter followed by painting the entire car just to guarantee no color mismatch. So if that were the case, $15k

[70 Challenger Lover]

Not sure how insurance laws work in Georgia but in California, the owner of the car has the right to take it anywhere he/she wants. No second appraisals. It's kind of nice because many collision shops bang out the repairs so fast that some get a horrible reputation for bad work. And yet they are still recommended by the insurance companies because they will do work for less than the other guys out there.

I had a new Toyota truck get smacked in the quarter when I was in my 20s. I got an appraisal from the shop my insurance company recommended but then I listened to a coworker and took it to a collision shop that specialized in high end cars like jaguars and the like. They did an amazing job but the estimate was like 50% more than the first place. The guy told me it was his job to deal with the insurance company and he did. They came to some sort of an arrangement (don't know, don't care) and my new truck was made new again. And they banged it out in like 10 days too.

[71-440]

Well your a little high. The total cost was $8000.00.

Some pics of it finished.

[70 Challenger Lover]

Looks like pretty nice work. 8k seems reasonable knowing what's involved to do it right. It takes labor to do it right and 100 bucks an hour adds up fast. I can only imagine what a hack job it would look like for a $1500 repair. You'd get a couple pounds of bondo followed by some mismatched substandard yellow paint.

[71-440]

I know nothing about body work but I am happy with the job they did. And it didn't cost me a dime out of my pocket.

[70 Challenger Lover]

As it should be...especially if it wasn't your fault to begin with.

[shadango]

I switched over to Hagerty recently and I just plucked values out of the air. They didn't sweat it one bit. I'm sure in their mind, you get charged more for a higher insurance value for an event they will probably never pay out on.

I did the same thing for my car with JC Taylor.

Thing is, the way I feel, if I get t-boned by some moron and its 100% their fault, I dont want to even involve my insurance company......I figured an appraisal would be good ammo to have so I could contact that guy's insurance and say "here ya go"......

AAA on the other hand was a complete PITA........ I'd never bother with AAA again.

I had a similar experience with AAA....for newer vehicles.

They gave me a good rate compared to who I was with so I switched.....had them a few years.....it got more painful each year.....so I switched to the lizard company.    Been with them now  a while and they are becoming just as painful with random increases and poor customer service --- the last concern I had, I talked or emailed with 10 (yes 10) different people....every time I would respond to an emailed answer to a question, someone else would reply back.....EVERY TIME.

Hate that.

[shadango]

Not sure how insurance laws work in Georgia but in California, the owner of the car has the right to take it anywhere he/she wants. No second appraisals.

Thats the way PA is too, but the thing is this --- if your shop says $5k in repairs and the insurance company decides your car is worth $3k, they will total it out and you are screwed.

I figured that with the appraisal at least I have some ammo in establishing a value of my cars.

Especially for my sons' cars.....the "blue book" on an 81 Diplomat is gonna be hard to figure and insurance companies will always estimate value on the low end to cover them.

Ran into this with my motorcycle...........it got hit in a parking lot and I did it all thru the guy's insurance company....at first they low balled me and totaled the bike....I fought back, went out and found actual comparables etc....luckily my legwork paid off and I was able to get the bike repaired and not totaled......a totaled vehicle CAN be put back on the road, but in my state at least its a real PITA to get all the paperwork done to do so. SO i was glad to avoid that.