MX-5 OC Forum

Hi

not sure where to put this one but this seemd like the best place.

I am likely to have my '5 written-off by the insurers for excessive labour costs etc. I would like to buy the "wreck" and do a re-build with 2nd hand spares in a friendly workshop as she looks fine standinding there and I really don't want to lose her so easily.

My concern is that I am aware of the issues about getting an insurance write-off re-registered and something about having to go to a specialist testing station and so on. Can any members advise on the implications and, ideally, costs associated with this palaver?

Thanks in anticipation

Rick

I dont know how bad your damage is but my personal experience was;

3 yrs back i argued with a van which buckled the front wing, broke the headlight unit & front bumper. write off ....i costed it then bought it back, part of letter i sent to insurer below;

I intend to put the vehicle back on the road so I accept your offer for the perceived market value (£1350.00). 

Please find enclosed Current MOT certificate V5C registration certificate as requested & return to me with a

cheque for; £912.50  (£1350-00 less the excess of £100-00 less the retention value of £337.50)  

As the parts were only replacement work & respray, my son in law & I did the work & I also turned a profit of nearly £300, after paint/parts/mot etc..

at no time was i asked to re-register the car, only to re-MOT then inform DVLA.

If you intend to buy it back for rebuild, make sure you argue at least twice with the insurer about the buy back price.  they will sometimes reduce the buy back cost & increase the percieved value if you argue (politely).

good luck whatever happens

 welcome to the wonderful world of Cat D write offs. You will have to take the car to a VOSA centre and have a vehicle identity check done can't remeber how much about £80 and takes about an hour, then you will have your logbook revised to show that it's a cat d  and for some reason people will think your car is worthless and when you come to sell it no-one will want it.

I have had several Cat d's, buy cheap run until something major goes wrong then scrap. Thg best was a Mondeo that I bought for £100 put a second hand bumper on for £20 ran for two years (I got bored of it) gave it to a mate who ran it for another two years until the clutch went . It got sold for scrap for £120!!! Bangernomics!!!!

If you really love the car and are going to keep it then it's just paying for the VIC the loss of percieved value is immaterial. If you intend to sell it then the loss of percieved value is going to hurt as this can be a huge amount, as the price of 5's is depressed at the moment

Hope this helps

 All hail Cat-D

My 5 was written off in 2009 – internet blurb says Cat-D should be 40-65% cheaper than list price for a straight car. This meant I got my 22k Launch Edition for last September £4400 – so even after bunging a genuine new hard top on it courtesy of MX5 parts who had one in stock in the same colour it only stands me at £5700 all in… saying that it doesn’t have the right wheels or chrome around the grill but hey ho.

The reason it was Cat-D’d in the 1^st place is someone scraped a wall and it needed a bumper and wing.

Hmm.....

sounds like the only real fans of Cat-D are the people that buy the car after re-build....! Ha!

@ joecottrell - I'm interested in why you were able to retain the vehicle after w/o without ending up with a Cat-D. Is it something to do with the letter and pre-arranged agreement you had in place?

cheers

Rick

 A cat D does not have to be vosa checked . A cat C needs a vosa check .

The insurance company decides what catagory a write off is . A VIC notice must be sent by the insurance company to Vosa for A B C write offs .

A must be broken and not used for spare parts .

B must be broken and can be used for spare parts .

C can be broken and used for spare parts , or rebuilt . Must be VOSA identity checked .The fee is £41 . This check is only to verify the identity of the vehicle . The quality of the repair is not checked by Vosa .

D can be repaired and re used without Check .

JJ.

Its worth mentioning that the Cat D cars while not needing a VOSA inspection to be used back on the road will remain on the write off and Finance register so would be visible to anyne doing a HPI check.

 It really is getting to the point where any damage to an older 5 is CatD so don't worry about it.

Older TVR have a something like 20% chance of being CatD as body shops run a mile and quote high prices unless they are fibreglass specialists

A wing and a bumper on an older 5 makes it a CatD, yet a heftier repair may have been done earlier in it's life and not caused any record!