I heard that if your car needs 75% or more of the car repainted after an accident that the insurance company is obligated to repaint the entire car. Is that true?

 

Try calling your insurance company.

 

after u call, post the answer here

 

 

i worked in estimatics at state farm this past summer as an intern, and whenever the cost to repair was over 70% of the total value through NADA, we would total it out. it is really the estimator's choice, though. when somebody hit my camaro, it was around 80% of the total to fix, but they went ahead and fixed it anyways. most insurance companies use the 70% rule, or somewhere around there. never heard of 70% painted is a total loss, though.

 

I'm sure it varies from company to company, but I've heard something similar to what MattRS heard at work. I have heard the 2/3rds rule--If the damage estimate is more than 2/3rds the NADA value, then the car is totalled....again, I haven't heard anything about the 70% painted.

 

When my '86 Camaro was damaged in '98, the insurance company was using the 75% rule. They valued had an independant appraisal done which came out at $8000, and they were willing to pay $6000. I told them that I wouldn't accept a totaled title on my car, I'd rather go to court first, so we settled on roughly $7000, which paid for the majority of my paintjob.

The reason we settled for so much was that they had to pay for a complete repaint due to the nose, hood, driver's fender, driver's door and rear quarter all having paint damage (just a chip on the quarter panel caused by the door moving back, but damage all the same). They had to pay paint the damaged panels and blend onto each adjoining panel, so the only panel they wouldn't have been obligated to paint would have been the driver's door. Of course I wasn't going to let them get away with that on my showcar.