Settled with insurance co.

I hate to be cynical, but given you were obviously not at fault, it sounds like they were in total ass saving mode... and somewhere in a glass sky scraper, a sorry souless accountant, in conjunction with an equally souless lawyer, said to their collected reprehensible selves... "if they are not suing yet, give them an extra 20% to close the deal..." and somewhere in the same building a vice president was smiling at the spreadsheet in front of him...... Folks it's why I ALWAYS vote Democratic.

Why didn't you replace it with an equally well serviced, low-mileage 93 240, for around $3,500, and use the remaining $4,500 to start your babies' college trust fund?

Just ribbing you, a little.

Pat Q Loves the old bricks, and cheap, too. :-)

I paid $3700 for the 850 at a car auction ( here in NC ) a few days before hurricane Isabel hit. Kept a lotta buyers away. That amount only settled the property costs . The wife wrenched her arm and back and that will be settled later.

AJ

Dunno where you'd find a well serviced low mileage '93 that cheap, I've seen a few for sale here and there in the $6000-$7500 range and they always go quick.

The economy around eastern NC is pretty bad off and it is reflected at the auctions. I was a used car dealer ( everybody steps away :> ) and went to a dealer only sale with a buddy.

We all vote democratic. Else no votes.

I live in a Canadian province where we have publicly funded/controlled mandatory insurance. Two things wrong with this set up: high risk drivers subsidized by the rest of us and max pay outs much less than in provinces with private insurance.

On the high risk side, we have teenage street racers killing pedestrians regularly (if they kill themselves shows that Darwinism, like gravity, is perfectly and fully functional) with their rates being subsidized by the rest of us so they aren't descriminated because of age (and experience). So then we have lots of inexperienced, high risk racers endangering us all. And at the other end we have 80 year olds losing control and killing pedestrians. High risk at both ends of the driving spectrum.

On the pay out side, we get about 1/3 for a similar accident in a neighbouring province. Payments are capped. Too bad dad or mom with three kids at home being killed by an 19 yr old asshole in a souped up RSX. And of course the courts are lenient when they do kill a pedestrian.

Public insurance is bad in the only two quatitative measures that matter. But socially, oh baby, we are all so friggin' equal.

Vote Libertarian. The choice is obvious.

Seeing it's Friday afternoon, why not stray a little bit off-topic, and philosophize a little?

The fundamental theory behind insurance is to have all of the insurance policy-holders (i.e., premium-payers) subsidize the few poor shmucks that find themselves in the unfortunate position of having to file an accident claim. Granted, different setups vary in the degree of subsidy, but it's still a structure of a community of individuals pitching in to help an individual member of same community. Still, I resent the percent of commission that the insurance company takes right off the top.

Bitch, bitch, bitch...

Pat Q

James,

I agree, you can find several low mileage vehicles at the price you mention. But, with some effort, there are some terrific bargains to be found these days on good 240s. Like this one:

My "new" car - '91 240 - I bought 2 1/2 yrs ago, with 80,000 miles, well-serviced, for $2,900 in Dallas, TX. From a frickin' dealer, no less. And I don't mean a GM dealer. It was a very established Volvo dealer. Face it: the buyer market for outdated style of 240, though very loyal, is very small.

My regular car is '70 1800E, so my new car is still pretty "new".

Occasionally, I think about trading it in for a brand new 940, simply because the 240 style is so out-of-date. (Now, I'm being a little sarcastic).