Millions of cars hit serious accidents every year and get totaled. With the damage being massive, the drivers not only have to worry about their injuries and the passengers,’ but the car repairs also keep them invested.
Some accidents might result in the car being totaled. However, there’s certainly less awareness of the signs of a totaled car among the car owners and drivers. Knowing them right can save you a lot of repairing expenses and could certainly help negotiate coverage with your insurance company.
To help you understand when a car should be considered fully totaled, we’ve put together a list of signs in this blog post.
Five Signs Your Car Is Fully Totaled
Dive deep to know the signs reflecting that your car has been fully totaled!
Repairs Cost More than Replacement:
If you’ve recently had a car accident that left your car in no shape, consider taking it to a mechanic and getting an estimated repair cost. In case the cost of repairs exceeds that of replacement, the vehicle is fully totaled, and you cannot take the case to your insurance company. The ideal way to determine this is to compare the estimated car value of an almost similar model with the cost of your car’s repair; you’d surely know if your car is totaled or getting it repaired is the farther way out.
Fluid Leakage & No Running Signs
If you’re unable even to start your car and take it to the nearest repair shop, consider your vehicle completely totaled. A few reasons indicating your car won’t start may include –
- Fluids leaking from the car;
- Significant parts of the car bent down or unable to function, such as doors, steering wheel, etc.; and
- Parts of the car causing a blockage in the driver’s view.
Extensive Frame Damage
In case your car has hit extensive frame damage, there’s a massive possibility of it falling into the category of totaled cars. Most insurance companies have this policy that cars above five years of age and have hit extensive frame damage are totaled and couldn’t be covered for the repairs.
However, if your car isn’t that old, you can always negotiate with the insurance company and get a coverage amount.
Too Old To Bear Damage
In case your car is really old, like twenty years or more, and you hit an accident, there’s hardly a possibility that it could bear any kind of damage.
However, if you’ve got a vintage car, then that’s an entirely different situation.
Insurance companies usually don’t pay for the repairs of such too old vehicles and consider them totaled.
Ran So Many Miles
similar to the impact of your car’s image, the number of miles it has run also poses a negative effect. A car that’s run more miles and hits an accident is much likely to be considered a totaled car. And insurance companies don’t cover their repairs, most of the time.
What Are The Righteous Ways To Handle A Totaled Car?
While you’re already at a loss having your car completely totaled, you would probably want to make the most of what is left.
Here’re the five ways you can best handle a totaled car!
Let Your Insurance Company Pay
The best way to handle your totaled car is to let the insurance company pay for it. However, you must have a full-coverage insurance policy for that.
Based on the insurance policies implement across your state, your insurance company might offer two options. They include
- Replacing your fully totaled car with an almost similar model
- Paying you in cash for the estimated car value of your totaled vehicle
In case you think that the insurance company is paying less against the estimated value of your car, you can always challenge the offer.
In case you haven’t got your car insured already, you are still not in a total loss situation. There are several ways you can minimize the loss. Let’s take a look at them!
Let the Vehicle as It Is
Suppose your car is apparently totaled but is still capable of running. Given that case, you always have the option to keep your vehicle as it is and continue driving until it works. Though the way out is a little risky, you can stick to that until you’re not stable enough to pay for the repairing or replacement expenses.
However, it’s always a good idea to get your totaled car checked at an auto repair shop for quick fixing until the time you’re capable of affording total repairs.
Make Use of the Auto Parts
Left stuck with no insurance coverage at hand and a totaled car? Well, you can keep it at the back of your garage and make use of the auto parts. There are several things you can do with these auto parts, such as selling them to a mechanic against cash, keeping them safe for the repairs of your new car if the model and make compliments, or you may sell those parts to a recycling service that offers cash against plastic waste or metal scrap.
Sell Your Totaled Car to a Junkyard
Don’t want to keep your garage scooped with the junk from your totaled car? You can sell it against fast cash to salvage or junkyard. There are multiple junkyard services available across the town that offers amazing instant and fast cash deals in exchange for your old junk cars. Yes, you don’t have to dump them into the landfills against nothing. Instead, you can make money out of your totaled, junk cars while sitting at home.
These junkyard services often come with packaged including free inspection, estimation, towing of your totaled vehicle.
Donate Your Vehicle to a Non-Profit
Another great way to handle your totaled cars is to donate them to a non-profit. Various charity organizations are open to such donations and happily accept totaled cars – which they could utilize for multiple operations after making the basic repairs.
Apart from the idea of giving back to society by donating your totaled car, you can also use it as a means of tax deduction. The totaled cats donated to a non-profit often help to reduce a significant amount of your tax. However, you shall always keep the receipt of the donation as proof.
Putting together what we discussed, multiple signs reflect your car has been fully totaled. Most insurance companies do not offer repair coverage for cars that fall into the totaled category, such as the inability to drive, leakage of fluids, extensive frame damage, or exceeding repairing expense. However, if you’ve got a full-coverage insurance policy at hand, it’s always the best idea to let them play against the loss.
In case you’ve no insurance policy bought, there’re still few ways to minimize the loss, as mentioned above. But, no matter what’s the case, you shall always be aware of the signs of a totaled car and the ways to handle than to prevent further loss or damage.
