Today I’m going to talk about property damage as it relates to automobile accidents. Uh, this is one of the first things that our clients really come into contact with when they’ve had an accident. The first thing is you need to make the claim, make a claim with your own insurance company, and if the at-fault party has property damage coverage, uh, your insurance company will subrogate or essentially ask the at Fault Party’s insurance company to pay for the property damage. And that scenario where there is a subrogation from your insurance company to the at-fault insurance company, you’re able to potentially get your deductible back. So that’s a good thing. That’s number one. Make the claim number to by and large, you can take your vehicle to whichever body shop you would like. Um, oftentimes big carriers, progressive, Geico, they’ll actually just go and do the estimate at the body shop where you’ve dropped it off.
And so that’s very easy for our clients to do that. So go to the body shop, you choose, it’ll help in the long run. Uh, from a logistical standpoint, number three, rental coverage. Oftentimes people need a rental car because their car’s undriveable check with your insurance company to make sure you have rental coverage before you incur that cost. And perhaps sometimes the at-fault party’s insurance coverage does cover rentals. It’s a case by case basis, so you’re going to have to check that out and see if it works for you. Um, one big thing we see oftentimes in these types of cases is where a vehicle was towed from the accident scene, a to a tow yard. You need to act quickly to make sure that your vehicle is not incurring storage charges at that tow yard. So if your vehicle has been towed to a tow yard, you need to act within the first couple of days to make sure your vehicle is taken care of and you’re not incurring massive storage charges.
Finally, uh, by and large, these insurance companies on a total about vehicle, they’re generally looking at the Kelley blue book value. You can definitely get a repayment for any upgrades to your vehicle, but obviously you’re going to have to be able to prove those upgrades. For example, I could just put new tires on the vehicle, grab those receipts I did any angst, uh, exterior, uh, upgrades. Bring those receipts and you’ll be able to get, should be able to get reimbursement for those. So that’s a brief overview of property damage as it relates to automobile accidents.
*The above has been transcribed by a third party service and has not been checked for accuracy.
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