Yesterday was one the worst days of my life. I have a red 2001 RT in MINT condition almost concours that has been my garage queen. Only 9000 miles on it. I never use it because I absolutely love this car for the 10+ years I have owned it and never get tired of looking at it. It literally had no scratches on it and sat under a cover in climate controlled garage, never seen rain even. Have not used for about 1.5 years other than around my neighborhood once every 2-3 weeks to keep tires in check. Well I did a stupid thing yesterday, I DROVE IT. There was the usual stop and go traffic on the highway during rush hour and Of course I came to a complete stop. Woman behind me was texting or something and did not. SLAM!!! My mint unblemished RT got rear ended. I did hit the back seat headrest, nothing seemed to hurt at first, later I started to stiffen up and have some neck and back pain injuries so going to the doctor to get looked at. The car actually does not look that bad. Bumper is scratched badly all over and the rear deck lid (trunk) is pushed in and up. Some paint has been chipped off as well but there is no frame damage or fender damage. I was at a standstill and hit at about 8-15mph is my guess by a jeep patriot SUV that suffered scratches to the bumper. The car is an easy fix and like I said the damage looks minimal, rear deck lid and new bumper (which is not cheap I know). Police report has assigned 100% of the fault to her.

My questions:

1) My perfect no questions asked car that I was planning to keep for appreciation and future show car now has an accident on its title/carfax and now will be a difficult sell (even if I am the second owner). My insurance company has advised me I can sue her insurance company for this Diminished value of the car. How do I determine what that diminished value will be? I checked haggerties and they report values of these cars are rising... I would rate mine somewhere between Concours and Excellent. Has anyone done this before that you know of? I am in the process of trying to find the correct attorney in the Jacksonville Fla area that can help but I need to know how do I determine diminished value?

2) How do I document the accident history and repairs the correct way (other than pictures) to show any new perspective owner the damage was fixed and was cosmetic and he should not be concerned about potential issues?

3) How do you now sell a vehicle like this that has been in an accident?

4) I live in the North Florida jax area now can you recommend a repair shop that has top notch no worries work for a viper?

Thanks~~~

 

1. You can get a statement of fact from a appraiser on the diminished value of the car as of right now. Your not going to get future appreciation built into that. Small claims court or through their insurance is the best. Its a hard faught case on cars that are not super rare.

2. Photos are fine make sure that they are date stamped. As a 8 Viper owner I could care less about the damage only that it was repaired properly. If you saw what some 7 figure cars started out this is nothing. I have seen cars built up 90% from basically VIN stampings.

3. Document and put it in the ad. Most viper owners are looking for originality but honest there are so few 100% stock cars of your year and at that low of mileage its not like they have a lot of choice if they are looking for a 100% car or an investment piece.

4. Cannot help you there, in California I could.

FYI you can pay cash for the repair or have them cut you a check and not have the repair shop report the accident. Goes against my morals but it happens all the time. Even new cars have this done before delivery with minimal or no reporting.

FYI drive the car, it has 9000 miles as long as you don't go nuts and use it as your DD your not going to deminish the value that much. If it was say a GTS-R with 900 miles yeah it matters but for a stock car its not that big a deal.

 

Sorry to hear, if the damage is not that bad, i would document the damage so prospective buyers can see what the damage looked like.

 

Here's a pretty good Q & A site http://autodiminishedvalue.com I think that any diminished value claim is a fight so knowledge is power. Good luck.