Thursday, January 05, 2012

You Know, I Was Born in the Wrong Millennium

It's been a week and a day since our car accident on the freeway. The insurance called yesterday to let us know that Jasmine is, officially, totaled. Repairs were estimated at over six thousand dollars. I told them  six thousand dollars worth of repairs was well worth it for that little car, but they said no. They said they would give me a check for a thousand dollars instead.

Sadly, I can't buy a used car for a thousand dollars.

I'm so confused by this...why do we have insurance again? Isn't is so they will pay for things in the case of an accident? Um, hello, I was in an accident, why aren't they paying to fix my car or to get me a new one? What was the point? Instead of paying for insurance every month I could have put it in a savings account. After five years that money would be more than enough to buy me a new used car.  To top it off, they said now that they have offered us the money (but we won't get the check for two to three weeks) they will stop paying for a rental car. So, we need to buy another car like, now.

I've tried to convince Drek that this is the perfect opportunity to ditch the car altogether. We can ride the bus! We can bike! We can just stay home! But since the buses here don't really go a lot of places and biking isn't really feasible with the long distances and the hills, he said no. I tried to sweeten the deal by telling him we'd buy him a motorcycle, so he could still get around. But that still leaves us with no way to get to church on Sundays, so he still said no.

So I've spent all day today trying to get us a car loan. I'm so irritated by the whole thing. I don't want a car, but I have to buy one. I don't have money to buy a car, so I have to borrow the money. And then I'll still have to pay for insurance on that car that I didn't want.

It's days like this when I truly wonder if I wasn't born in the wrong millennium.

2 comments:

  1. CAUTION: use autocheck.com. It is totally worth the fee they charge! Seriously better than Carfax! It has saved us endless grief on used cars, and if we had known about it before J bought his car, it would have saved him from getting one he couldn't even trade in when he was ready to sell it. Check out Craig's List and AutoCheck.com for cars like Jasmine: maybe you can find a similar one for the $1000. I think the problem is that we are used to the foibles of our old car, and a "new" one of the same vintage just looks old to us. Then, we want to go better so we take out a loan.

    We did that after our Buick got totaled by a stupid drunk driver before T's mission, (4 years ago) and we are still paying for the newer one. There was one of the same year we could have gotten for the same price the insurance gave us, and then it would have been paid for, but it looked ratty. It was also green, but isn't that a silly reason.

    Keep in mind that not only are there car payments, but insurance goes up because the lender makes you carry comp and collision. It takes years before you are not upside down.

    ReplyDelete
  2. I'm sorry, that's miserable. And that insurance pay-out is a joke. Why are they only paying you $1,000 for your car? Is that seriously the value they came up with? I thought a car with a working engine and no significant under-hood issues would put it at least in the $3K category, you know?

    How lame.

    I'm sorry you are without Jasmine and I am sorry you are car-less. I know how much you would like to be using public transit, too, so I feel for you not being near a bus stop and not having the buses go near where you need to be. I also feel for you paying insurance when they give so little back. Seriously, that's a ridiculous payout. Just thinking about it is irritating.

    I know that buying a new car will probably be a hassle, but I hope you manage to handle it with minimal fuss overall.

    ReplyDelete

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