After a long day volunteering my time for a local comic con. I drove home, as I was about to turn into my driveway a kid driving his dad's Camry hit my car. His car had very little damage to it. That kid was sure speeding, he jump from pretty much out of nowhere.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/cadha13/5910583849/http://www.flickr.com/photos/cadha13/5910583849/ by http://www.flickr.com/people/cadha13/, on Flickr

My insurance accepted the liability. I had it taken to a nearby body shop where it stayed for 7 weeks for repair. The estimate had a long list of items totaling to some $7500, deducible for $500. My insurance saved my butt there.

Before the body shop did the test drive, the power steering failed on it, a short in the steering column. GM engineers were called on it and a group of insurance agents descended onto my car and looked at every square inch of the thing to determine if it was caused by the accident. Of course it was not, so had to get the repaired before I could get it back. That was very unexpected, some $1,000 for that.

From what I got from this, a list of things I have seen and a small debt. Yeah, it sucked. Just wanted to share.

 

That sucks, at least you weren't hurt and it is fixed now. My car got hit JUST like that, same spot and everything. I got it repaired and it got hit a WEEK later on the same side. How is that for luck?!

 

Glad you weren't injured and that you have your HHR back, but I'm really surprised the underwriters didn't total it, $7,500 worth of damage on an '07 is quite a bit of money compared to the replacement cost.

 

I got my HHR back from the body shop yesterday had it for 5 days $2700.00 damage whe an old man backed into me at a signal as it turned green, got a rental of a 2011 HHR 1lt I like my 2006 better. they could not get the Billitt grill that I had, as the company closed so they bought the T-REX grill much better.

 

well that ends well. In this sense, you have no problems now.
But I was also surprised by the amount of money. For $ 7,500 you can buy another HHR, and if you add $ 1,000 for steering power - is immoderate appetite of dealer. I think the U.S. dealers are trying to f*ck U.S. insurers as Russian dealers try to f*ck Russian insurers. I see - in your case, they did it with the appropriate arrogance and cynicism. And full lovegrooming for 7 weeks.

 

Hate to say this but if he was speeding, I think the damage would have been worse. From the looks of the damage, it looks like you just turned in front of him. Maybe you were more tired than you thought.

 

Well, all I can say when I looked at an appraisal for it, it was near 9-10K range for it. I thought they would have totaled it. Instead, they repaired it, and I got it back. The car market is terrible here anyways. Also, this happened around dusk, and from where I was, I can see the whole 1/2 mile a road and all I saw were parked cars. Oh well, I guess I will be faster on turning in or just wait forever.

 

Hey cadha13 My car an 07 Orange HHR was hit exactly on the same spot of the car,(both doors) but, on the drivers side and my body shop has had it 4 weeks tomorrow. The responsble party only had $5000 coverage and hit a truck and drove the truck into me so i had to pay my $500 deductable. Can you say small claims court and pray she pays.

 

I hope so too, $500 is not much to me, but what really ticked me off was that my P/S failed before they were about to release my car to me. So, I filed a complaint to NHTSA about the P/S failure. I hope that kid who drove that Camry would have got a butt whooping from his dad. That is all I want.

 

If it makes you feel better had it been my son he would be grounded until after 2012!!!!