Hmm. Are you sure your plate isn't too dirty to read lately?

I wonder if there's been a rise in car thefts or if they were stealing plates. Or if MGM is implementing tighter security because of the shooting lawsuits. But most likely they are making it harder and probably doing a study to see if the players club card used for parking is actually used for play in the casino because too many people are probably using borrowed or stolen players club cards to park.

It really sucks being tracked everywhere nowadays, online and offline. Even if you don't use your players card they know when you come in and when you leave by tracking license plates. I have nothing to hide but it just feels so wrong. It's more fun to gamble when it feels anonymous.

The cars they recover are probably rental cars with trackers, joy ride cars, or cars stolen to use to commit another crime, then abandoned. Your car was probably stolen specifically for its parts.

Or maybe they know you play poker and they thought there might be $$$$ hidden inside. Especially if there are a bunch of people hanging out in the garage all the time and you park there 4x/wk, maybe they track people.

I feel for you man, the practical value of the car was a lot more than $1500. Good reliable used cars are few and far between, and they cost a whole lot more than that. I also lost a good reliable car that I could've driven many more years and the amount paid by insurance was far less than I would've needed to replace the exact same year and model car. So I consider that the actual value I really lost was at least 8-10k more than the Blue Book value.

Interesting. What kind of car? I wonder if they see the cameras and think there must be something in there worth stealing, including the cameras. Or maybe you park in an area where criminals are always walking by, like on a route to a convenience store?

You’re probably right that it has more to do with preventing people from stealing cards and leaving without paying. People constantly leave their cards at slot machines. And people do borrow/share players cards.

I’m sure it’s not just me either because I’ve seen other cars have the same issue with not being able to leave as quickly as they used to.

There are two holes in their parking card strategy;

(1) you get free parking if you have an MGM credit card, for which gambling is not a requirement, and

(2) if you park there, there is an incentive to leave your parking passcard in your car for exit use if you are not really interested in tracking play to get their hourly $2 comp for poker.

then that is your fault for agreeing to a ****ty insurance payout. you are allowed to decline an offer btw. and parts? you can spend $20 at any junkyard and probably could rebuild a mid 90s nissan from ground up assuming you have something to carry a motor out.

why is everyone highroading this guy? hes just making a very kind psa. as he said multiple times, not asking for sympathy, just letting people know.

Yeah pretty much what cap Boomer said, have had issues in the past where my bcm (computer) was failing and when shutting the car off, the anti-theft system was engaged without any way to disable it (meaning every turn of the key starts the ignition and then kills the engine after 3 seconds)

Also if I'm running into the post office to check my PO box for 2 minutes or into CVS to grab a gal of milk I'd much rather throw the club on...harder/more wear on older cars to constantly turn off and on especially driving short distances

No, you generally eat it pretty bad if you have an old but reliable car and it gets stolen/totalled or whatever.

I had a 2009 car with 230k miles on it get totalled last year. Had literally put $0 into it for anything other than basic maintenance. I got $3700ish for it. Most cars I buy for $3700 are going to end up having significant repair costs soon, or not be reliable enough for me to have, as I drive 35k miles or so a year.

So now I have a car payment and increased insurance payments that I wouldn't have had without the totalling, and no insurance company ever is going to compensate you for things like this.

But at 230k miles, your chances of continuing to use it for year after year for 35k miles at a continued $0 cost other than maintenance...were not that great. Can experts can chime in, but an engine, transmission, CPU, or something else was more than likely to go up in your next 35k miles. That is my guess.

Sure, I don't disagree. But, given that I knew the maintenance history of this car, that a huge majority of the miles were highway miles, and that there weren't any current defects, the chances of those issues with this car would be lower than a random $3500 car I purchased.

I also agree with your current and previous statements. I think your overall point is correct; insurance companies don't know or don't care to give you fair value.

If insurance companies gave you "fair value", they would charge you higher premiums.

I agree. My main overall point is that insurance companies can be very profitable at the expense of fair value. I understand that we pay vig for the transference of risk; however, I just think that the vig is often times too high (which is why you can see drastically different rates offered from different companies for the same driver that has a low risk profile). I am not saying they are crooks or cheats; its capitalism, which I am fine with.

You can replace that stuff for a lot less than the cost of a new car.

im not sure why your post starts with "no" when what you quoted was clearly true. you can negotiate a payout of your car and refuse any offer, although not always the best choice.

would you pay 3700 for any 2009 with 230k miles? i wouldnt. sounds like you did well. a 2k honda and 1k aside for repairs (aka never) and you're up almost 100% of a "new" car.

you also have the option of not taking a 3700 payout through your insurance if you think that 3700 will cost you more in premiums over x years.

My point was you can try to negotiate but you don't get paid for things like having a known reliable car. I wouldn't walk up and pay 3700 for an 09 with 230k miles. I also wouldn't have taken 3700 to give up my car and try to find another car that I can rely on for 35k miles a year. And that isn't even counting the actual hassle of the process.

The increase in premiums is due to my purchasing a newer more valuable car, the accident wasn't my fault. So refusing the $3700 would have done me absolutely no good.

Yeah, it's sad. It kind of feels like your car is an old reliable friend and then one day unexpectedly it's just gone and you have to pay all that extra money for another one. OP is a victim even more because he has to live without a car now. Brutal.

thats getting closer to correct at least. like someone said above, at some point, things break. if you put 200 of the 230k miles on a car, you are obv better off to judge than buying a random high mile car, but otoh, you have no idea when you'll be hit with a 1.5k bill on that one, and insurance wont do a thing then.

increase in premium on a more expensive car is to be expected, because, inherently, they are insuring more. taking out any claim on insurance also will raise your premiums, and that part can be avoided, which is what i was talking about.

i pay a bit under 200 a year for min coverage on a nice ish car, i paid cash, and if i have to replace it, itd be cheaper to do so again than raise my premiums for the next 10 years or w.e they do from a claim or waiting for that day to come.

This is not meant, by any means, to defend insurance companies so don't misunderstand my point. The only reasonably objective standard that can be used is the current fair market value for a "similar" vehicle. The definition of "similar" is usually based on objective criteria such as the age of the vehicle, the number of miles on it, accident history and a very rough definition of the pre-accident condition of the car.

If the insurance company asks the owner what condition it is in, it would be a very rare owner who would reply "terrible, lots of maintenance issues" The more typical answer would probably be "great". Many times that would be true, but how do they really know? So in that situation they resort to something objective like blue-book, want-ads, etc.

Thus, the OP's decision to not purchase the additional insurance because of it's -EV based on his personal evaluation that the likely payout from the insurance company would be less that it's "value to me".

I didn't say that he did. I was simply responding to his statement that he did, in fact, save $1,500 during that period of time. I was simply pointing out that he didn't because there was no possible way that he would have spent that much on his coverage. I don't think that there is any way that you can disagree with my contention.

I definitely get the whole reliable car is worth more than what the insurance company will give you.

But I did somewhat win in my situation. I drove a '06 Honda civic. Bought it new. Gave it to my daughter when she turned 16. It had 179K miles on it. Inside was really worn. She got into an accident. Wasn't her fault. Insurance company gave us $5950 for it. Never would have gotten that on the open market or as a trade. I did find a Mazada 3 '10 with 126K miles for $5600. It works, but I do worry about it breaking down.

I was just so bummed about the loss. I knew the history of that Civic and wasn't worried.

It's capitalism-lite because of a caveat: drivers are required by law to carry insurance, so the market can't be 100% efficient. And there's good reason to require insurance, as otherwise the insured would end up paying for the uninsured.

That's unreal...wow.

Good point.

Holy **** where do you park? Hopefully it isn't Aria or some place I play at often.