Hi guys - I'm a non-traditional college student who is changing careers. It's a lot to explain but long story short, I have a LOT of student loans from my previous career choice. All this is to communicate how much I cannot afford to purchase a new vehicle right now, and why I'm turning to the internet for help.
Back in 2013, I felt like the luckiest girl in the world when I got a KIA soul 2013 for my birthday in 2012. My parents were going to get a used car, but since they were so expensive at the time the difference between new and used was pretty low so they purchased this new one.
A few years later, I was T-boned by someone coming out of a side-street and not paying attention. The passenger side door was crushed and needed to be replaced. It was.
Many years later (i.e., earlier this year in late Spring) my mom noticed when she came to visit that the passenger side door was rusting quite a lot... and there was no damage to that door or side since, so nothing to explain where all this rust was coming from.
She talked to insurance about it and after much digging it turns out that the body shop that repaired the car had actually used a 'bad' door that had rust already on or inside the door somewhere. We took it in and as a result it turns out that the rust had spread to other parts of the vehicle and had now started to eat into the roof and other parts of the car
We found the old paperwork from the repair, and it turns out that the insurance company (Traveler's) had "Guaranteed" the repair...so we filed a claim and it has been in the body shop in IL (my home) waiting for parts from Korea (since it's a KIA and covid-19 has slowed down shipping of parts) ever since.
In the meantime, it's been stressful as hell and I even went through a move to New Mexico (we never expected it to be in the shop for MONTHS, so the insurance company agreed to rent me a vehicle to move and to use down here in Albuquerque, NM until the car is fixed).
Despite all the parts finally making it there, I recently learned that apparently the car is going to be totaled. I only learned this because I called the body shop itself to ask since Travelers would NOT get back to me despite several phone calls and voicemails over the span of almost 2 weeks of radiosilence. I'm totally devastated and also really scared about what this means financially.
I'm also concerned - could they really 'total' a car that wasn't even in an accident but is instead in repair because of a faulty repair that THEY guaranteed?! That HAS to mean something, right??
I'm afraid that if I buy a new used car, it'll come with some other troubles that I'm not aware of and maybe not last as long as my KIA would have lasted me... I took it in twice somewhat recently before all this happened and asked them to be honest with me about its condition - how was it doing? Both times, I got great feedback.
The car means a lot to me in and of itself, but on top of that I've recently invested $600 in new tires, and have also gotten weather tech floormats for it and a spare key fob just in case. I take really good care of it - always make sure to be on time for oil changes, take care of tire pressure issues immediately if they arise, and anything else I'm told needs changing or fixing.
Is there ANYTHING I can do?? Could we take them to court over this or would we even have a case? I don't really want to - I just want something to defend myself if they lowball me the way insurance companies are notorious for doing... Please help I've been stressing over this for months now
Back in 2013, I felt like the luckiest girl in the world when I got a KIA soul 2013 for my birthday in 2012. My parents were going to get a used car, but since they were so expensive at the time the difference between new and used was pretty low so they purchased this new one.
A few years later, I was T-boned by someone coming out of a side-street and not paying attention. The passenger side door was crushed and needed to be replaced. It was.
Many years later (i.e., earlier this year in late Spring) my mom noticed when she came to visit that the passenger side door was rusting quite a lot... and there was no damage to that door or side since, so nothing to explain where all this rust was coming from.
She talked to insurance about it and after much digging it turns out that the body shop that repaired the car had actually used a 'bad' door that had rust already on or inside the door somewhere. We took it in and as a result it turns out that the rust had spread to other parts of the vehicle and had now started to eat into the roof and other parts of the car
We found the old paperwork from the repair, and it turns out that the insurance company (Traveler's) had "Guaranteed" the repair...so we filed a claim and it has been in the body shop in IL (my home) waiting for parts from Korea (since it's a KIA and covid-19 has slowed down shipping of parts) ever since.
In the meantime, it's been stressful as hell and I even went through a move to New Mexico (we never expected it to be in the shop for MONTHS, so the insurance company agreed to rent me a vehicle to move and to use down here in Albuquerque, NM until the car is fixed).
Despite all the parts finally making it there, I recently learned that apparently the car is going to be totaled. I only learned this because I called the body shop itself to ask since Travelers would NOT get back to me despite several phone calls and voicemails over the span of almost 2 weeks of radiosilence. I'm totally devastated and also really scared about what this means financially.
I'm also concerned - could they really 'total' a car that wasn't even in an accident but is instead in repair because of a faulty repair that THEY guaranteed?! That HAS to mean something, right??
I'm afraid that if I buy a new used car, it'll come with some other troubles that I'm not aware of and maybe not last as long as my KIA would have lasted me... I took it in twice somewhat recently before all this happened and asked them to be honest with me about its condition - how was it doing? Both times, I got great feedback.
The car means a lot to me in and of itself, but on top of that I've recently invested $600 in new tires, and have also gotten weather tech floormats for it and a spare key fob just in case. I take really good care of it - always make sure to be on time for oil changes, take care of tire pressure issues immediately if they arise, and anything else I'm told needs changing or fixing.
Is there ANYTHING I can do?? Could we take them to court over this or would we even have a case? I don't really want to - I just want something to defend myself if they lowball me the way insurance companies are notorious for doing... Please help I've been stressing over this for months now