Question to those who've had a car accident before

Clockworkmike

Clockworkmike

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So, tonight was the first date night with my wife in a while. We went to dinner and saw a terrible movie that literally put us to sleep. Went outside to leave and I was parked beside an empty handicap space to my left while there was a large SUV to the right. Parking lot was largely empty but when I went to leave, instead of backing out I pulled forward and was trying to keep clear of the SUV. I turned the wheel left a bit and didn't see the concrete bollard to my immediate left ( I could blame the blindspot in the window, i could blame it on being tired but whatever the case, i messed up and its my fault.) Long story short, I smashed my wife's left fender and door badly ( door won't close correctly either now).Called State Farm immediately and of course I admitted what happened and I know I'm at fault. Now I gotta take it to get an estimate Monday and dish out a $500 deductible.

But my question is, what can I expect now? I've never been in a real collision, least not where I was at fault. I hit two deer on different occasions but those were listed as comprehensive claims and so I wasn't penalized. But I know for sure they'll probably raise my rates right? Only claims I've ever had with them in 6 years were two windshield damage claims on each vehicle ( one a truck did by tossing a rock, the other just cracked on its own while sitting parked for a month) and I had a hail and wind damage claim to the house roof after a bad storm.

What I'm afraid of is not only will they raise my car premiums but possibly even drop me altogether. I hope I'm wrong but like I said, never had an accident where I was at fault, so I don't know what to expect now. I'm sick to my stomach, I know that and I can't tell my wife how sorry I am enough. I feel like complete and utter $hit over this and take every bit of responsibility for it.
 
Doesn’t State Farm have accident forgiveness?
Or am I thinking another company?
I would doubt they will drop you, that most likely won’t happen unless you are a bad driver or have tons of points on your license.
Your rate may increase and that depends on their accident policies.

I wouldn’t worry about it.
Right now your biggest headache will be getting your wife’s car fixed and the butthurt from feeling like you messed up.
 
We’re State Farm. We’ve had some things happen and had to submit claims. Didn’t get canceled. Hard to tell if rates went up since they’ve been going up yearly anyway.

As Gator said. Don’t let it eat you up. Things happen. It’s why we have insurance.
 
Appreciate it fellas. Guess now the next step is take it Monday morning for an estimate at the place they gave me. Worst part of all this is it was HER car and it was my momentary lack of judgement that caused it. Hitting deer happens around here and you just take the licks, comprehensive covers that anyways so no biggie. But this is a whole new thing to me and screwed up 24 years of clean driving. If it had been my truck? Big deal: be angry about it and move on. But ruining her's just brought this to the ultimate low

Even better, we were supposed to drive this to Cincinnati this upcoming weekend and I was gonna have brakes changed out this week beforehand.
IMG_20240330_085432115_HDR_copy_3060x1722.jpg
 
Clockworkmike said:
Appreciate it fellas. Guess now the next step is take it Monday morning for an estimate at the place they gave me. Worst part of all this is it was HER car and it was my momentary lack of judgement that caused it. Hitting deer happens around here and you just take the licks, comprehensive covers that anyways so no biggie. But this is a whole new thing to me and screwed up 24 years of clean driving. If it had been my truck? Big deal: be angry about it and move on. But ruining her's just brought this to the ultimate low

Even better, we were supposed to drive this to Cincinnati this upcoming weekend and I was gonna have brakes changed out this week beforehand.
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That don’t look so bad
 
Clockworkmike said:
Appreciate it fellas. Guess now the next step is take it Monday morning for an estimate at the place they gave me. Worst part of all this is it was HER car and it was my momentary lack of judgement that caused it. Hitting deer happens around here and you just take the licks, comprehensive covers that anyways so no biggie. But this is a whole new thing to me and screwed up 24 years of clean driving. If it had been my truck? Big deal: be angry about it and move on. But ruining her's just brought this to the ultimate low

Even better, we were supposed to drive this to Cincinnati this upcoming weekend and I was gonna have brakes changed out this week beforehand.
View attachment 98718
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Bring er over, quick body work, prime & shoot the paint, have it back to ya Monday AM .
 
LiveeviL2000 said:
Doesn’t State Farm have accident forgiveness?
Or am I thinking another company?
I would doubt they will drop you, that most likely won’t happen unless you are a bad driver or have tons of points on your license.
Your rate may increase and that depends on their accident policies.

I wouldn’t worry about it.
Right now your biggest headache will be getting your wife’s car fixed and the butthurt from feeling like you messed up.
Click to expand...

:what:
 
The only accident I've ever been in was when I was sixteen years old. I was on my mom's policy. The accident was my fault.

My rates did go up, but I was not cancelled. Since I was only sixteen years old and had essentially no driving history, the rates went up quite a bit. Our insurer was Allstate. This was around 1982. I don't know what State Farm will do as far as rates in your situation, but I would not expect them to drop you.
 
All insurance companies are pushing rates up. I've been with my car insurance for a decade, no accidents and they almost doubled our rates this year. I checked a few others and they are all super expensive. It's not a guarantee it will go up, but I'd be surprised if it didn't.

Good luck out there buddy.
 
BFT Gibson said:
Bring er over, quick body work, prime & shoot the paint, have it back to ya Monday AM .
Click to expand...

Okay, @Clockworkmike , Brother BFT brings up a good point. You could choose to have the damage fixed entirely out of pocket. Sure, it would probably be more than the $500.00 deductible, but you would not have to file a claim; hence, no black marks on your insurance record, if that is really a big concern to you. If another driver was involved, there would most definitely be a claim against your insurance by the other driver. That's why you trade insurance information when you have an accident involving someone else. The primary purpose of automobile insurance is to protect the other driver. Since this is just you, you have a bit more flexibility; it's entirely up to you as to whether you have the insurance company cover the cost of repairing your own vehicle. Since you've already contacted your insurer, I don't know what the process is for cancelling/rescinding a claim, but this may be something you could check into.

When you take your car for an estimate, ask them what it would cost if you paid it out of pocket and didn't go through insurance. They may give you some discount since getting paid directly by you saves them the time and hassle of going through your insurance company. I don't know that it would be any less, but it's worth asking.
 
smitty_p said:
Okay, @Clockworkmike , Brother BFT brings up a good point. You could choose to have the damage fixed entirely out of pocket. Sure, it would probably be more than the $500.00 deductible, but you would not have to file a claim; hence, no black marks on your insurance record, if that is really a big concern to you. If another driver was involved, there would most definitely be a claim against your insurance by the other driver. That's why you trade insurance information when you have an accident involving someone else. The primary purpose of automobile insurance is to protect the other driver. Since this is just you, you have a bit more flexibility; it's entirely up to you as to whether you have the insurance company cover the cost of repairing your own vehicle. Since you've already contacted your insurer, I don't know what the process is for cancelling/rescinding a claim, but this may be something you could check into.

When you take your car for an estimate, ask them what it would cost if you paid it out of pocket and didn't go through insurance. They may give you some discount since getting paid directly by you saves them the time and hassle of going through your insurance company. I don't know that it would be any less, but it's worth asking.
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Good points. I've considered this actually. If the damages reach X amount of dollars and becomes just impractical to pay outta pocket, I guess I'll go forward with the claim. If it's within reason however, I can see what I can to do to cancel the claim and pay it direct.

Years back with Nationwide Insurance, I hit a deer in the middle of the highway. Comprehensive took care of it and I think it was $100 deductible if I remember right ( state farm as a zero deductible on comprehensive amazingly). But the car I was driving was pretty dated, despite being low miles and in great shape. They actually wrote it off as a total loss due to the value of the car being less than the damages received, despite there being no structural damage to the frame or drivetrain, just the body. They cut me a check and I was able to buy the hood, fender, headlight assembly and windshield washer reservoir for almost half of what they wrote out. The parts I had ordered came painted ( white again) and I put them on myself within a couple hours actually. So, technically I MADE money for that wreck lol
 
Clockworkmike said:
Good points. I've considered this actually. If the damages reach X amount of dollars and becomes just impractical to pay outta pocket, I guess I'll go forward with the claim. If it's within reason however, I can see what I can to do to cancel the claim and pay it direct.
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We considered this on my wife's SUV. One of us..... she's convinced it was her.... drove thru some white highway marking paint. Not sure where. There were no traffic cones marking wet paint. Covered the left side of the car and the back gate. I believe we have $500 deductible. Took it in for the estimate. Well north of two grand to repair since the side of the cars was going to need a repaint by the time they got the white speckles off. We said nope. Call State Farm and here's $500. Have a good day. Part of the issue is with the paint used today. Compared to cars I grew up with as a kid, today's paint is paper thin. Manufactures don't even suggest waxing the cars anymore for fear of waxing the paint off. And I can tell how thin the paint is looking at the hood. It has rock chips clear thru the paint that wouldn't have left a mark on a car from the 90s and older.
 
Clockworkmike said:
Lol in all the chaos and misery of being berated berated by my wife for hitting the bollard, I swear I thought of this very scene in that instance but I wasn't about to press my luck
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Another movie I haven't seen in a long time. Although listening to Margaritaville Radio I get to occasionally hear Jimmy sing "I Don't Know (Spicoli"s Theme)".... which as it turns out, Jimmy wrote for the movie.
 
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