Miata Mailing List: January 1996, Message #153
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   From: "Irwin, Chuck" 
Subject: Re: Salvage car
   Date: Wed, 3 Jan 1996 18:45:40 -0500

>>Thinking about buying a miata with a prior salvage title (the seller 
told me
>>the car had some minor front end damage done to it).  The asking price 
seems
>>high for  such a vehicle - 11,500 for a '93 with 30k miles.
>
> So if you have a car that is worth, say, $12,000 and the insurance 
company
> "totals" it, it would stand to
>reason that the cost to fix the car properly would be more than $12,000. 
 I
>doubt that enough damage to "total" such a relatively new car could be
>considered by even the broadest-minded person as being "minor front end
>damage."
>
>Now, beyond this highly questionable comment by the seller about "minor"
>front end damage, the thing that makes me figure this deal is risky is 
this:
> who fixed this car and why?  The person or company who fixed it may 
have
>been out to make some quick money.  Now most of the folks I have had 
contact
>with in the quick money car field do not exactly concern themselves with
>doing a top of the line job (or even a 90% job).  So if the insurance 
people
>already said the car can not be fixed properly for what it is presently
>worth, then how did the car get fixed with enough room to spare for 
profit?
The Insurance company assumes that the parts will be purchased from the 
dealer at list price.
I was looking into buying a Insurance write off and doing the R&R myself, 
but the car had way to much water damage from siting outside without a 
tarp or windows. The theft damage was what I would truly call light front 
right corner damage. I have spoken with salvage yards who could get the 
really expensive things like steering wheel covers and air bags "Real 
Cheap". I took this to mean they were either inferior aftermarket, or 
stolen. The theft recovery, fix with stolen parts, repeat cycle is really 
rather sick.  However if you can get legitimate parts at reduced cost, 
and the person doing the work is not looking to soak an insurance company 
for labor hours, then the cost comes way down, and there is some profit. 

This  still doesn't make up for the huge difference , so I bet the shody 
workmanship factor comes into play, not to mention the quality or moral 
dilemma of the "Real Cheap" parts

I appologize in advance for my latin spelling.

Some favorite sayings regarding used car deals
Caveat Emptor - Buyer beware.
Carpe diem - Sieze the day
Carpe Emptor -  Sieze the seller
Caveat diem - Beware the day

Chuck Irwin  I can't remember how many miles she has, as I haven't driven 
her in a month and Cover Girl Silver 90B Who likes looking at the snow, 
and leaves the driving to the Isuzu Trooper this time of year.
Dialogic Inc. 1515 Route 10 East  Parsippany, NJ 07054, 1-201-993-3000 
x6162, C.Irwin@dialogic.com
These are the ramblings of Chuck Irwin, a person who sees wonderful and  
bizarre things when he closes his eyes, and therefore should be taken 
with many grains of salt until something better is written.  ( It helps 
that I have bonked my head so many times while working on cars)