I was in an accident last night – I was not at fault, but the other party was an elderly man who was slightly argumentative about the facts. I have camera footage from the car and my house (happened as I was turning in my driveway). The police came and made a report, which I don't have yet. The officer suggested filing on my own insurance and letting them fight it out with his. The car is not currently drivable, so filing on my own makes sense since they can set me up in a rental car immediately. My main concern is, if the car isn't totaled (90% sure it will be due to the extent of damage and value of car), and they want to repair, then if I file on my own insurance I can't claim diminished value, which would surely be at play here. It's a 2021 Tesla worth around $24,000, I think the damage will be around $15k, plus whatever diminished value would be. If I wait to file on his insurance once I get the information from the report, I could be waiting a week while they determine fault, etc., but I could possibly qualify for diminished value claim IF the car is determined to be repairable. the other negative is that my rental coverage on my insurance is only $50 a day for 30 days – this will definitely be a long term repair if it is indeed a repair. Not sure how to proceed here, thoughts on this?
Posted by BirthdayAnnual1789
2 Comments
If your car is non-drive, always go through your carrier. If you think the car is a total loss, always go through your carrier. It’s much faster and easier.
In most cases, you can still file a third party DV claim against their insurance, even if you use your insurance for repairs. You generally have to wait for repairs to be completed and for them to subrogate against the other party’s insurance for the repair claim, though. And the repairs/rental would eat into their liability policy limits. So if the other driver has low limits, it could be an issue. You don’t say what state this is, but some states allow liability coverage as low as like $15k.