Background: Wife was rear-ended last week, and we were surprised to learn the car was deemed a total loss. State Farm has offered $8,700, and dipping into our emergency fund would give us about $14,000 total. That can stretch a bit to include taxes/fees but I'd like to keep my all in around there. I'm comfortable spending to that amount in order to get a car that doesn't add years or miles to what my wife was driving.
I would think that I should set my search over $14k with a plan to negotiate down, but is there any guidance (or anecdotal experience) to tell me how high I might look? IE is it a safe rule of thumb to expect there should be 10% or so of wiggle room on the "internet price" of a listing if I'm ready to hold fast with my offer? We do have the luxury of being able to juggle one car for a while, but I can't sit it out forever.
If relevant I'm looking almost solely at Hondas (CRV or Accord) and Toyotas (RAV or Camry) from around 2012 or newer and no more than 80,000 miles. So certainly not brand new or CPO cars, or anything particularly rare in our area.
Thanks for any thoughts.
Submitted May 27, 2018 at 08:12AM by JustCallMeTomHanks https://ift.tt/2LywcYl
