About a month ago, as some of you know, my wifes 'parked' car was hit in the grocery store parking lot. She called the guys insurance and they ended up trying to total it out for about $1,800 (even after submitting paperwork showing its value, like recent sales of vr-4's at around $11,500...regardless of mileage, a private party appraisal showing its worth at $12,000 from Hagerty insurance, and a list of work I had done).
There was no way we were going to accept the car being totaled out...especially at that price. And according to our states law - NRS 487.730 (declaring fair market value) - they have to give us fair market value using recent sales (Section 1), or estimate by a private association (Section 2), or national data base, NADA (Section 3). But only the base model Mitsubishi Galant was in their database (We know this because the original MSRP of the base model was $10,500. The VR-4 was 23.500)
So, we filed a complaint with the NAIC (National Association of Insurance Commissioners), since the insurance company was basically breaking the law. As soon as the NAIC contacted them about the complaint they totally changed their attitude. The insurance company agreed to repair the car and cut us a check for $3500 instead of totaling it out like they had originally tried to do.
There was no way we were going to accept the car being totaled out...especially at that price. And according to our states law - NRS 487.730 (declaring fair market value) - they have to give us fair market value using recent sales (Section 1), or estimate by a private association (Section 2), or national data base, NADA (Section 3). But only the base model Mitsubishi Galant was in their database (We know this because the original MSRP of the base model was $10,500. The VR-4 was 23.500)
So, we filed a complaint with the NAIC (National Association of Insurance Commissioners), since the insurance company was basically breaking the law. As soon as the NAIC contacted them about the complaint they totally changed their attitude. The insurance company agreed to repair the car and cut us a check for $3500 instead of totaling it out like they had originally tried to do.