On Fri, 25 Jan 2008 08:25:03 +0000, Roland Perry
wrote:

In message , at 22:25:04 on
Thu, 24 Jan 2008, Adrian remarked:
You would probably pay less for "A Polo" than for "A blue Polo 1.4GL
with sunroof". In other words, replacing a car exactly is pricier than
getting something vaguely similar.

Not necessarily. It make take a little longer, but not necessarily
pricier.

Trust me, having been a prospective buyer of fairly specific vehicles,
it can take months, and even then you never actually find one that was
exactly what you were looking for.

I bought a very early people carrier, for example, and it was almost
impossible to find one for sale at the age/price I wanted (and that the
books alleged was correct) that hadn't been run into the ground [and
several gateposts] as a company shuttle van, rather than owned by a
large middle class family who had looked after it.

And if it is, then that's the price of replacement. Thus - the
value.

The insurance company may allege that you can buy a specific vehicle for
a certain price, but *they* don't have to spend months scouring Exchange
and Mart trying to find one.

They ususally offer the "Glass' Guide" trade value to guess the write
off value. This is the book the motor trade use to value cars at
auction. This price is usually below both private selling prices and
way below forecourt prices.

And the insurance company also don't take account of the reasons for
selling cars. IME Anything over 3-4 years old is worth so little to
sell that the only reason to sell it is if there is something
seriously wrong with it. This theory fits with my experiences.

This makes it almost impossible to find a suitable replacement for an
older car from the insurance payout. I know this from bitter
experience. After a long time of searching I paid a lot more than the
payout for a car that turned out to be inferior.

M.