Insurance after accident is totalling us out, sad day!
Got sandwiched a week ago between a 92 Toyota pickup truck and an 2005 Acura TSX in stop & go "heading home from work" traffic. The pickup had those stupid dark filtered lenses on his brake lights (legal in TX) and I just saw his brakes lights in time to stop with a foot or so to spare. The Acura was not so lucky, guy was on his phone and slammed into our rear bumper. Interesting outcome, the kid in the pickup had a custom welded metal bumper which bent a little down but no other damage. Our car has a nice square hole in the bumper skin above the license plate from his hitch receiver and our rear bumper is scuffed and has a crack in the skin. The Acura had major front end damage, a deployed passenger airbag and a broken windshield; the driver was pretty shook up indeed!
The insurance company for the guy that caused the pile up sent out a field rep and while he thought we had a great little Avalon he said it would have to be totaled out due to age and the 245+K miles on it. Having been unemployed for awhile last year I told him we want to keep the car and he said they would make us an offer for the car minus what they think they could have gotten from a wholesaler or junk yard and we can keep it.
From what I can see from underneath, the main damage is to the bumper skins and Styrofoam and some slight damage to the crush box reinforcement part of the bumper. Hoping to get some aftermarket plastic skins and have them painted at the local body shop and swap out. Heck the car only has 1/4 million miles on it!
These cars are really easy to total! But I know how you feel, I have 240K miles and its "derp the miles kill the car derp derp"
A pickup truck sniped my Avalon from his driveway, and it was less than $200 from being writen off!
After getting it fixed, a month later some goof backed into it in a parking lot! And it was another "near totaled" experience, my Avalon world was spiraling out of control!
However, it pays to have friends in the auto business.
I can say my aftermarket bumpers shatter really easily, but OEM take one hell of a beating. www.toyotapartscheap.com was ok to me, but my favorite is ebay! (scrapyard is always ebays runnerupper)
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I'd be very wary, though, of damage that may seem benign. I had an Acura Legend some years ago and had a woman in a Suburban back into my front end in a parking lot. Although the damage didn't seem that bad--a cleaved hood, busted radiator and grill work, and a dented fender--the impact was enough to throw the entire frame off. After that my driver's door never closed properly again, nor could it be sealed properly against the weather. The engine also had some vibration issues. In the end the car was screwed up enough so that I had wished it had been considered totaled.
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2008 Highlander Base 4WD
2002 Avalon XL
1987 Suzuki Samurai 4X4 - Treading where no Jeep can follow....
I'd be very wary, though, of damage that may seem benign. I had an Acura Legend some years ago and had a woman in a Suburban back into my front end in a parking lot. Although the damage didn't seem that bad--a cleaved hood, busted radiator and grill work, and a dented fender--the impact was enough to throw the entire frame off. After that my driver's door never closed properly again, nor could it be sealed properly against the weather. The engine also had some vibration issues. In the end the car was screwed up enough so that I had wished it had been considered totaled.
Acura's are pretty complex in terms of body work thought. My dad has the Legend's succesor, an RL (97) and I was looking at the tech manual and by god, there are so many minute welds and panel junctions and stuff!! I can imagine doing collision repair on an Acura isn't easy!
But yes, sometimes that does occur. When it comes to front end damage, I usually say get rid of the car. That's what I would do with mine! (3 things will send my car to the scraper: headgasket failure, transmission failure, or a front end collision).
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1995 Toyota Camry V6 LE-6M1 250K Miles, Fun Car
1997 Acura RL-Gone
2007 Acura RL SH-AWD, Technology Package, Opulent Blue Pearl- Fun Car/Daily Driver
mine was considered "totaled" but since i didn't have full coverage and the accident was my fault my ins company had nothing to do with it. i took it to 5 diff shops all quoting from 3-6k in damages. a civic clipped my rear end and threw my whole rear end frame out of line. i talked to some friends of friends and they fixed it for 1700 in cash. coming up with that wasn't easy for a 16yr old then 5 months later i worked my ass off and went boosted. a few months ago i broke up with my ex-gf, she wasn't happy, she rearended me with her 2009 corolla. the first check they wrote me was for 1200 which was JUST bodywork, i went back and complained and they wrote me another check for 1000 for mechanical problems, then they looked deeper and said if i got one big lump sum they wouldve totaled it. they even gave me an option now. needless to say, i said im keeping it all the visisble damage was a few scuff marks, crack in the bumper, bent trailing arm, and snapped my flex pipe in half.
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Although the damage didn't seem that bad--a cleaved hood, busted radiator and grill work, and a dented fender--the impact was enough to throw the entire frame off. After that my driver's door never closed properly again, nor could it be sealed properly against the weather. The engine also had some vibration issues. In the end the car was screwed up enough so that I had wished it had been considered totaled.
then 5 months later i worked my ass off and went boosted. a few months ago i broke up with my ex-gf, she wasn't happy, she rearended me with her 2009 corolla. the first check they wrote me was for 1200 which was JUST bodywork, i went back and complained and they wrote me another check for 1000 for mechanical problems, then they looked deeper and said if i got one big lump sum they wouldve totaled it. they even gave me an option now. needless to say, i said im keeping it 
all the visisble damage was a few scuff marks, crack in the bumper, bent trailing arm, and snapped my flex pipe in half.
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