- Jurisdiction
- Virginia
I am located in Virginia.
A rodent entered the cabin of my vehicle and damaged the interior, chewing up a couple of seat covers and a little bit of the carpet.
The insurance carrier's shop took 2 months to complete the estimate and never followed up, but the car is perfectly driveable so I just went on with life driving my car.
When my patience ran out I called the shop on a status and they were still working on the estimate, 2 months after the inspection?!
A few days later I get a call from the insurance carrier telling me the car is a total loss and they would need to pickup the vehicle and take it to their salvage yard - immediately!
Wait, I've never seen the estimate, no one's discussed the repairs, no one was in a hurry the past two months and all of sudden we need to act…. and you need to take my perfectly driveable car to your salvage yard!?
The estimate is for $15,000 to replace 2 seat covers and the carpet! There were two supplements written on the original estimate. The second supplement is a line item lump sum entry for $3,900.00 and is listed as dealer labor? This suggests to me that the shop was trying to get the estimate high enough to total the car?
The value of the car is $16,700.00.
The total loss settlement offer is sufficient to cover the lien with a couple grand more to me.
The car is a luxury end vehicle with super low mileage and is in better than excellent condition.
I want to keep the car……
I have the means to satisfy the lien in order to acquire clear title and get the payment made out to me directly.
My issue is the title status - the carrier informed me they would notify DMV that the vehicle is a total loss and provide them with the estimate to determine title branding.
As the estimate is 90% of the value, the title will be changed to a salvage title and will have to be inspected by a DMV inspector after repairs are complete in order to change the title to "rebuilt" making it legal to drive. The "rebuilt" status is permanent so value will be lost when I do resell the vehicle… and DMV stated the inspectors are 4 months behind on inspections!
In Maryland I found a law that allows the carrier to remove cosmetic damage from the estimate which hugely impacts the % of damage utilized for title branding. In my case, all of the damages are cosmetic and if I were in Maryland there would be no title brands as a result of the cosmetic damage law.
WHY IS THE INSURANCE COMPANY FINDING MY CAR TOTALED.
I've not been able to find a similar law in Virginia, but that is the ask of this community. Is there a cosmetic repair law similar to Marylands in Virginia?
A rodent entered the cabin of my vehicle and damaged the interior, chewing up a couple of seat covers and a little bit of the carpet.
The insurance carrier's shop took 2 months to complete the estimate and never followed up, but the car is perfectly driveable so I just went on with life driving my car.
When my patience ran out I called the shop on a status and they were still working on the estimate, 2 months after the inspection?!
A few days later I get a call from the insurance carrier telling me the car is a total loss and they would need to pickup the vehicle and take it to their salvage yard - immediately!
Wait, I've never seen the estimate, no one's discussed the repairs, no one was in a hurry the past two months and all of sudden we need to act…. and you need to take my perfectly driveable car to your salvage yard!?
The estimate is for $15,000 to replace 2 seat covers and the carpet! There were two supplements written on the original estimate. The second supplement is a line item lump sum entry for $3,900.00 and is listed as dealer labor? This suggests to me that the shop was trying to get the estimate high enough to total the car?
The value of the car is $16,700.00.
The total loss settlement offer is sufficient to cover the lien with a couple grand more to me.
The car is a luxury end vehicle with super low mileage and is in better than excellent condition.
I want to keep the car……
I have the means to satisfy the lien in order to acquire clear title and get the payment made out to me directly.
My issue is the title status - the carrier informed me they would notify DMV that the vehicle is a total loss and provide them with the estimate to determine title branding.
As the estimate is 90% of the value, the title will be changed to a salvage title and will have to be inspected by a DMV inspector after repairs are complete in order to change the title to "rebuilt" making it legal to drive. The "rebuilt" status is permanent so value will be lost when I do resell the vehicle… and DMV stated the inspectors are 4 months behind on inspections!
In Maryland I found a law that allows the carrier to remove cosmetic damage from the estimate which hugely impacts the % of damage utilized for title branding. In my case, all of the damages are cosmetic and if I were in Maryland there would be no title brands as a result of the cosmetic damage law.
WHY IS THE INSURANCE COMPANY FINDING MY CAR TOTALED.
I've not been able to find a similar law in Virginia, but that is the ask of this community. Is there a cosmetic repair law similar to Marylands in Virginia?
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