My (least) favorite game: Is it totaled? Elantra Edition

Wife met deer at 60mph yesterday morning. Wife is fine, deer not so much, car is looking iffy to me too:

It's a freshly paid off (naturally) 2018 Elantra base-ish model with 50k. Honestly it looks like it's worth more than I assumed but that still only puts it in the $10k or $12k ballpark. My pre-dawn roadside inspection makes me think the body is still straight but every panel on the front clip, the radiator support, radiator, overflow tank, etc need to be replaced and that's what I could see without opening the hood (which has a fresh 6 inch lift). The front fenders still seem undamaged and straight to my very unprofessional eye. The non obliterated body panels all still line up fine.

Additionally, the driver steering wheel and knee air bags popped, as well as the pre-tensioner on the driver's belt (not sure if the passenger belt goes off without a passenger). Mostly it's the air bags that I feel like will push it over the edge. It's fully insured so no worries there but I can't help but wonder how they'll call it while I wait.

Glad to hear your wife is okay, hitting a dear is a really crazy and scary experience. Have you gotten a chance to take it to a body shop or anything? You can try to get quotes from now until insurance tells you their decision. 

Yes, it's totaled.  No doubt.

In reply to Paris Van Gorder :

Yeah when I got there afterwards I was shocked how much damage there was. Waiting on insurance to tow it to the body shop so they can give us their verdict. Will shops hazard a guess with only pictures?

That sucks, except for the part that your wife is OK.

I don't even play an insurance adjuster on TV, but I'm gonna say that's a total.

Of course, that particular car was worth much more than book value to you because you owned it outright and knew it well.  It always seems to work out that way.

If your insurance company brings the car to the body shop, they're wasting time. In the industry, we call your car an obvious total loss.  It should go directly to the salvage yard and the total loss process started.

That's rather a lot of front-end damage. I cannot imagine that's not totaled. Hood, radiator, core support, wiper reservoir, headlights, fenders, bumper cover - I'm guessing $7 or $8k in parts alone, if not more, and double that in labor. Rough guess, though, and I am absolutely NOT a body guy.

She's a goner :(

SKJSS (formerly Klayfish) said:

If your insurance company brings the car to the body shop, they're wasting time. In the industry, we call your car an obvious total loss.  It should go directly to the salvage yard and the total loss process started.

They're towing it to a local Copart, they said for an estimate but I only know Copart for selling cars at auction so that seems telling.

She's been truck shopping lately but we were hoping to have our oldest use the Elantra when he starts driving here imminently. Sounds like he'll be driving something else. Appreciate all the opines.

My bodywork magic 8 ball says the outlook is not so good. Even if you can save the front fenders, it's likely ever bit of structural sheet metal ahead of the firewall other than maybe the engine cradle is damaged.

Yes, it's totalled

Sorry, it's a goner. 

SKJSS (formerly Klayfish) said:

Yes, it's totaled.  No doubt.

This. Low resale value plus that kind of hit it's done. 

EDIT: just some quick back of the napkin math, you're looking at $1500 in hood and a pair of fenders and liners (all parts before paint), $500 per headlight, $250 for the core support, $800 for all the parts to make the bumper and grille assembly, another $300 in condensor and radiator/fluids etc and then labor, paint and supplies. This is easily a $6-7k repair on a car with a book value around $7-8k. 

All that is hoping there isn't more structural damage on the upper rails. 

If it helps we just totaled a 2023 Transit that hit a deer the size of a cow. Blasted the fusebox, both wiring harnesses and every bit of front sheetmetal and glass. 

That looks similar to the damage my Toyobaru took when I slid the nose into a concrete pillar earlier this year. Mine had only the tips of the frame where the radiator support bolts on slightly bent, but even with me pinching pennies on replacement parts it's going to be well over $5k to get it back to where it was, and if I'd just let a shop get everything from the dealership it could've easily come close to $10k.

GameboyRMH said:

That looks similar to the damage my Toyobaru took when I slid the nose into a concrete pillar earlier this year. Mine had only the tips of the frame where the radiator support bolts on slightly bent, but even with me pinching pennies on replacement parts it's going to be well over $5k to get it back to where it was, and if I'd just let a shop get everything from the dealership it could've easily come close to $10k.

Yours was the thread where I learned about the pre-tensioners. Damage definitely has a similar vibe.

PubBurgers said:

SKJSS (formerly Klayfish) said:

If your insurance company brings the car to the body shop, they're wasting time. In the industry, we call your car an obvious total loss.  It should go directly to the salvage yard and the total loss process started.

They're towing it to a local Copart, they said for an estimate but I only know Copart for selling cars at auction so that seems telling.

Good.  So they also know it's a total loss.

Hey man! I was just wondering about you to other day and wondering if the blue LS400 was still on the road. Sorry to run across you with this thread, hope you get treated well by your insurance company.

In reply to dculberson :

Last I knew the LS400 was still bombing around southern Ohio. I've moved a couple of states since then and now I'm about 45 minutes west of VIR.

The verdict is in: $12,800 damage on a value of $14,200. She's already got a lightly used Tacoma picked out.

In reply to PubBurgers :

Worth more than you expected in the first post, so I guess that's good news. 
 

What's a lightly used Tacoma go for these days?

In reply to Woody (Forum Supportum) :

Definitely pleasantly surprised by the payout.

The Taco is a 2021 4 cylinder with 30k miles for $32k via CarMax.

I know I'm late, but 99% of the time airbags deployed = totaled. The time and labor to replace the airbags is insane, add to that any damage that would have caused airbags to deploy. 
 

1% possibility it's not totaled is if your car is over $100k. 

Just like ours from the end of September. 2018 Mazda 3 60k miles, just paid off. $14k in damage on $16k value. 

We got her a 2023 Mazda CX-5 Carbon Edition with 30k miles. It was $26k. But we were able to put $15k down thanks to the settlement.