The math says you have $4K in your pocket after the repairs. Do the fees for a salvaged car exceed $4K? If not, it is a win for you. Accept it and move on.
Yours isnāt an āAā one. Itās been wrecked.
3 Likes
Hi. The discussion is certainly spirited. I think both OP and the respondents have made their points, but consensus isnāt really in the cards at the moment. Letās try to keep the temperature down, though. Sometimes thereās no convincing someone (and truly, Iām not actually directing this at one side or the other ā I think it applies here), and rather than doubling down, itās best to say oneās opinion and just let it marinate.
1 Like
Iām not missing the point. Youāre not listening. The car was in a wreck. It will never be worth as much as one that wasnāt. If you put two identical cars side by side and one had been in a wreck but repaired, the wrecked car would be valued less by most people on the planet. That fact should always follow the car. Nobody cares if you say youāll never sell it. You could die tomorrow and someone will sell that car in your stead. There are many examples where it could be sold tomorrow regardless of what you say today.
Persistent salvage branding is NOT about safety. Itās an economic black eye. You have to prove it is safe to drive after repair and then they will let you do so. But the label persists because everyone afterward needs to know the history.
1 Like
I am listening to you but you are not listening to me.
Check with the DMV of CA and you will find out yes indeed a āSalvage Tittleā is a safety issue. A label that deems the car unsafe. The DMV cares less about diminished value. The DMV is on a roll to collect all kinds of fees and make it difficult for the registering party.
Find out for yourself. That investigation would clear this side of the debate.
The other point you are missing is about the power of determination the insurance company has when labeling a car a salvage and the lack of avenues the DMV offers to appeal or challenge that label
I am going to reduce the example to a Mazda only. No other cars to compare to in the example.
The Mazda in question is not repaired by the insurance company not because it is un repairable, but because according to it, cost exceeds market price.
So registration is reported as a salvage to the DMV and DMV does its side of the issue.
Same car, only years prior, I mean, a car that is 2 years old, or one year old.
In that case the cost vesus market price would dictate insurance company to repair the car rather than paying somewhere around 30K
Car would be repaired and registration would not be branded a āsalvageā
I know you and some others would respond to this analysis replying that it would had been a determination based on costs and market status at that time.
Lets say it is 100% true what you say, about that determination, one way or another, made by the insurance Co, a pure financial determination.
Thing is, to the DMV. At least the CA DMV thinks not.
If the DMV and the Insurance Co shared definition of a āsalvage vehicleā a mere inspection to determine road worthiness and a check on the registration to advise prospective buyers if a sale were to happen ever, that the car was involved in an accident.
I or anyone in my position should be able to do what the insurance Co does when, as in the example of the one year old Mazda, the insurance Co repairs it and returns it to the owner without a scratch to its finish and to its registration.
If the insurance co. can do that, why canāt I ?
Have a nice day.
You make a good point. To reiterate:
A year xx car with damage is totalled. The owner fixes it and now has a repaired car with a salvage title.
Same car, year xx+2, with identical damage is not totalled. It is repaired by the same shop. Now the owner has a repaired car with NO salvage title.
BUT, the law is not always fair. You are stuck with what you have. Accept it and move on.
PSā¦ How much are those CA fees?
b
Because the insurance company has millions if not billions of dollars sitting in the bank with which it can compensate people who sue it if it makes the wrong call about whether or not a car should be put back on the road.
The body shop has hundreds of thousands if not millions of dollars worth of insurance coverage to compensate people if it screws up a repair and makes a car unsafe, leading to a wreck.
How much money do you have socked away if your repair ends up killing someone?
I am not, to be clear, suggesting that your car with a damaged trunk is going to kill anyone, but the state does not have the time or manpower to individually look at every case to be sure things are ok.
Sure, you have a damaged trunk. The next guy might have a cracked frame and he plans to fix it with joist connectors and drywall screws. The state can be reasonably sure that isnāt going to happen with a professional repair authorized by an insurance company (because the insurance company is not going to authorize a repair by Honest Earl who works, and lives, out of his van), and they can be reasonably sure that if it does happen, someone will be able to pay out damages.
They canāt say the same for the random joe-schmo who comes along wanting to fix his car.
Iāll edit this to tell a story. I know a guy who got into a wreck. He was uninsured because heās an idiot. An insurance company would have totaled his Civic out. Lots of front-end damage, and the thing was worth maybe 4 grand before he ran into someone.
He chose to repair it on his dime (I told him to junk it and get something else, but he wouldnāt listen. See above about him being an idiot).
He called in 2 guys who worked out of a beat up 30 year old pickup truck to come and straighten his front end out. They did a predictably terrible job using only a hammer and some rope, and the thing was never right. It was a rolling death trap.
Had an insurance company been involved A) it would have been totaled and the unsafe piece of crap would never have endangered everyone around it on the road. B) had they decided to repair it, it would have been repaired at a real body shop, not two dinkuses who went around scamming idiots with fake body repairs.
This is an example of why non-insurance repairs can be dangerous. Itās also an example of how, in California where this happened, uninsured motorists can slip through the cracks, because the state couldnāt get involved since there was no insurance company to total it.
What really needs to happen is that a car needs to be automatically totaled if itās in a wreck and not repaired by a professional body shop, unless the owner is willing to go through a detailed inspection process, whether an insurance company is involved or not.
1 Like
This. This right here is the ultimate issue.
@jaimecidpedro - This wreck wasnāt your fault, but you are suffering long lasting ramifications from it. You had a well taken care of car and you loved it. Through no fault of your own, you were in an accident. Whatever the blue book value of your car, you arenāt ever going to be able to pay that amount of money to get another car just like your wrecked one- because you arenāt the one that took care of the other car.
Wrecks suck.
Even when you arenāt at fault- wrecks suck. The headaches from dealing with people that treat you like you are just a bunch of numbers. The frustrations of dealing with body shops, insurance reps, and those that wrecked you- and none of them care about your car as much as you do.
jaimecidpedro- your frustrations are real. but, sadly, there is only so much you can do about it. Unfortunately, this is life. Iāve been through this much same thing. I would bet others here have been, too.
Wrecks suck.
1 Like
Hi.
I will print all the fees and requirements in full after I finish all the process in a few days.
Have a nice day.
There you go with the big words again. I think I get it though but I once tried to find how long to boil corn on the cob in the cook book when the wife was traveling. Couldnāt find it anywhere.
Naw, you donāt have to bother with listing all the fees and such. We get the jist of it and time to āmarinateā. We canāt help. I remember we used to have a little old lady pulling a shopping cart visit us from time to time. I donāt remember what her issue was anymore but thought someone was trying to kill her or something. I dealt with her a couple times as others did. Then when Iād see her coming, Iād disappear and tell everyone else. The poor receptionist was left to deal with her. Just sayinā ya donāt want to get to the point with the DMV, the Governor, or the insurance agency, that everybody disappears when they see you coming.
If you have no time for forums move along.
Seems it is painfull to you to participate.
Have a nice day.
Have a nice day.
The safety aspect is up front and GOES AWAY once you have it inspected. Then they give you registration to drive it on the road. It never has to be inspected like that again (of course you have normal periodic inspections just like every other car on the road). The blemish on the title remains for the reasons cited numerous times already. Itās just not sinking in for some reason.
Your conspiracy theories about fees and whatnot is just that. Everybody realizes that CA is more fee oriented than most states. But itās not a conspiracy to get your moneyā¦
1 Like
Iām sorry but your wrong. Insurance companies ALWAYS take the least cost. REPEAT -ALWAYSā¦
2 Likes
Agree with you.
That is what my explanation says. Insurance takes the lowest expensive route, repairing a car versus paying off 30K to a party to a collisionā¦
We live in an imperfect universe. S**t happens. (or doesnāt). Life is not always fair. CA DMV sucks. It is known as realty. (1). Contact the head administrator of CA-DMV. Inform them the DMV salvage title policy conflicts with the insurance companyās policy and more importantly with your concept of what the policy should be. (2). Hold your breath.
None of any of this matters to your original question. All that matters is Californiaās laws as regards declaring a vehicle āsalvageā, the insurance companyās policies, and your right to appeal (if one exists). Thereās no sense in arguing with the suggestions on this thread. Doing so wonāt help you at all. Trying one or two of them might help. You only have two choices; appeal the decision or accept the decision.
I guess he is fighting to pay higher taxes on his vehicle! I hope he wins.
1 Like
OP took the money, kept the car, had it fixed, and financially came out ahead
Now he wants to double-dip, so to speak
Considering all that, I donāt see that he has a right to appeal
1 Like
I suspect youāre right, db, but IMHO the OPās energies would be better spent constructing a well-written letter requesting a review of the āsalvageā status (an āappealā) than arguing with people on an internet forum. I seriously doubt if removal of the āsalvageā could happen, simply because āsalvagedā is now a part of the carās history, but arguing with us is totally wasted energy. 
Iām not suggesting OP will do this . . . but people have been known to register a car out of state and wash the title
I wonder if some of them then eventually bring it back to their home state, with a clean title
Itās probably happened countless times
But wouldnāt a search show that, while the car currently has a clean title, it DID have a salvage title in the past
The knowledge of the titleās salvage history should instantly diminish the carās value, I would think
As always, buyer beware . . . 
1 Like