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Advice on body damage from accident today

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My wife got into a low speed accident yesterday (other driver's fault) where the other person's rear tire brushed up against the right rear tire well at about 20 mph. Lots of rubber slag and it seems to have taken off some of the autofilm I had installed -- a definite endorsement for the film again. Can't tell if there is underlying body damage without cleaning off the rubber. Questions:
1) Anyone know how to best remove the tire marks to better assess damage?
2) We called insurance and other driver admitted fault, but with the complaints of slow delivery of body parts, I wonder if it's worthwhile filing a claim. Anyone know what the turnaround is lately on body work? I live near one of the Brooks auto body shops and would like to know any experience with them, as I couldn't find much on a search here.

thanks!
 

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I would say do the claim always, then have it appraised for repair. WD40 will take rubber off but I wouldn't do it until you have a body shop waiting on parts. Do the WD40 so you don't have the unsightly mess while waiting on repair.
 
I wouldn't mess with trying to remove that rubber yourself - as the other driver's insurance company might say you damaged the paint removing the rubber (it's damaged). Since it was the other party's fault - I would let a body / repair shop do the removal and, at a minimum, replace the film and detail the car. If there's paint damage under the rubber - there's no claim that you caused it in removing the rubber.
 
my installer said the film should always be removed with caution on tesla's as the paint and job is really the worst you can have as an automotive standard. He's had owners from accidents pull on it, and litterally take away a chunk of paint underside.

So dont touch it, until the adjusters come out and take pictures of it, or the other party has accepted in signing a contract saying they will cover the bill which the body shop and PPF installer will give u an estimate for.
 
My wife got into a low speed accident yesterday (other driver's fault) where the other person's rear tire brushed up against the right rear tire well at about 20 mph. Lots of rubber slag and it seems to have taken off some of the autofilm I had installed -- a definite endorsement for the film again. Can't tell if there is underlying body damage without cleaning off the rubber. Questions:
1) Anyone know how to best remove the tire marks to better assess damage?
2) We called insurance and other driver admitted fault, but with the complaints of slow delivery of body parts, I wonder if it's worthwhile filing a claim. Anyone know what the turnaround is lately on body work? I live near one of the Brooks auto body shops and would like to know any experience with them, as I couldn't find much on a search here.

thanks!
Absolutely file the claim. In addition to advice from others on waiting to rub out marks, keep your car and drive it while waiting for body shop to get parts. Otherwise you are stuck in lame rental for potentially months.

Once the claim is filed, you can get professional detailer to polish out marks if the aesthetics bother in the interim.
 
Yes weird pattern. Other driver was in an exit only lane on the highway, then tried to merge back on.

Interesting responses but we called Geico (other driver's insurance) and they said they'd assess. We had to force them into allowing us to use a body shop of our choosing. They first wanted to steer us into going into a shop of theirs where they said they could fix it quicker, which didn't make sense since they had no idea what they were dealing with.
 
I’m pretty sure diminished value claims are only valid if the vehicle has a substantial amount of damage where it’s on the borderline being totaled out or not. Meaning you know your car has been highly refurbished, and has been in a accident therefore diminishing its value. I doubt they will give you diminished value for some rubber transfer on the side of your rocker panel
 
I’m pretty sure diminished value claims are only valid if the vehicle has a substantial amount of damage where it’s on the borderline being totaled out or not. Meaning you know your car has been highly refurbished, and has been in a accident therefore diminishing its value. I doubt they will give you diminished value for some rubber transfer on the side of your rocker panel

Absolutely not. There are many previous posts from those who have claimed and received thousands in diminished value because body panels had to be repaired and repainted.

Most people would prefer to buy a car that was previously not damaged or repainted no matter how small the damage.

If this goes through insurance, there will likely be a CarFax report about quarter panel damage and there is your Diminished value. It is also not unusual for Diminished value to be higher than the actual repair in certain cases. If you had car worth $85K and the entire quarter panel had to re repainted or repaired the Diminished value can easily be $5K or more because some buyers will no longer event want to consider a car with that damage.
 
I would say do the claim always, then have it appraised for repair. WD40 will take rubber off but I wouldn't do it until you have a body shop waiting on parts. Do the WD40 so you don't have the unsightly mess while waiting on repair.

Agreed. Don't do anything until you have an estimate in hand. If you remove all the tire transfer, it might look pretty good and a body shop won't write the estimate as high.
 
I’m pretty sure diminished value claims are only valid if the vehicle has a substantial amount of damage where it’s on the borderline being totaled out or not. Meaning you know your car has been highly refurbished, and has been in a accident therefore diminishing its value. I doubt they will give you diminished value for some rubber transfer on the side of your rocker panel

Any accident no matter that how minor will diminish the value significantly if it appears on Carfax. I'd only buy a car with an accident on record if I could get it for a steal.
 
A Carfax indicating damage/collision/accident WILL decrease the value of the car. Carfax won’t disclose the source of their information so I can’t tell you if a police report will trigger the Carfax. Carfax isn’t particularly accurate about the damage, they will say something like “collision left side” so no way to tell if it is a minor parking lot scrape or something more. Once you have a Carfax report indicating “collision” the car value diminishes. Most people looking for a used car will simply skip any car with a Carfax collision report on it. Carfax is not receptive to correcting or specifying exactly how much damage there was. They are in the business of selling Carfax reports, not ensuring the accuracy of the reports, nor specifying the amount of actual damage. You are a source of income for them, nothing more. Know that Carfax is not your friend.

I believe it’s likely any insurance claim will result in the Carfax “collision” report.

So, if this incident has caused Carfax to include a “collision”, now associated with your car VIN number, that will make your car less valuable, independent of the actual amount of damage sustained by the car.

Whether or not the other guys insurance company chooses to address the diminished value due to the Carfax isn’t really relevant. The simple fact that the other driver’s action has caused a Carfax collision notification attached to your car’s VIN is financially damaging to you. If you ignore this, you’ll find out when you sell it that the value is fairly significantly decreased.

As you might surmise, I’ve been bitten by this Carfax service in the past. I had a BMW convertible. I won’t bore you with the details of how pristeen this car was, the trip to Germany before ordering, the factory visit, the special order, nor the details about the dull witted cretin that creased the side while it was parked. I got it repaired, the repair was absolutely perfect including matching of the factory orange peel in the paint. I checked with the BMW dealer to see if this Carfax report would affect the value when I would sell it in the future. No problem I was told. I believed them. Later when I did sell the car I found out how wrong the dealer was. The car took a big hit. Thousands. There was no structural damage, no replaced panels, no panel spacing issues, you could sight down the sides, the car was perfect. That Carfax is poison.

If the other guy’s insurance chooses to ignore this, you can go after the other driver. Basically his insurance protects him from liability, so it’s his insurance policy that insulates him. They will do all they can to minimize their payout. They’ll tell you not to worry about it, they don’t cover it, that isn’t a problem for them, etc. Be aware of statutes of limitation, if you sell your car 3 years from now, the usual 1 year statute will have expired so you’ll have no recourse. Be aware of anything you sign, especially anything that releases the other party from liability. Do check to see if there’s now a Carfax collision report on your car, and if so, find an expert on diminished value.

If there is no Carfax report on your car, and you suspect there’s no actual paint damage, no dents, or metal deformation, then it might be worthwhile to see about removing that rubber and see if you can avoid the whole insurance/Carfax process.

Good luck.
 
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I had an accident with deer a few years ago and filed a police report over the phone. I hit the left corner and it caused some damage, but since I have a high deductible, I never filed a claim for insurance.

When I went to sell the car, I was told that since it had been involved in a 'major' accident, the value was low. It wasn't that major and didn't impact how well the car drove. They must have gotten that from the police report. Only reason to do a police report is if you will need them or your insurance to pay.
 
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