MMT WRX

Would you buy a repaired CAT D write off?

My daughter’s boyfriend is after an MG ZR 1.4.

Car search on Autotrader within 60 miles of Sheffield, have nearly all sold.

Went to view a couple and when HPI checked, come back as CAT D write off's, no mention of this in the adverts.

There are a couple that do declare 'CAT D repaired' and have already been sold with screen prices, if any, marginally cheaper than straight cars.

What sort off damage do insurance companies write £4,000 cars off for that can be repaired properly and without detriment?

Would you buy one?

I think he is geeting that doomed feeling, when you sell a car no one wants it and when you want to buy one there all, 'Sorry sold mate'.

bushiwarrior

erm nope not now not ever

Varboy

Don't know enough about the subject to have a valid opinion but bump as I would like to know the ins and outs of such an approach.

Brun

I wouldn' touch an MG made of gold, never mind a cat D

ditchmyster

iTrader: (7)

firstly he should buy the 1.6 mg its a very good peice of kit for what it is!
as for the cat d if its involved in another crash the insurance will only pay 75% of the value minus any excess and considering its going to cost the same to insure as a none damaged one thats not such a good deal! and the other more important issues are how happy are you about him driving your daughter around in a car that could if (god forbid) involved in another accident have issues with reguargs to its structural integrity? ultimatley if it was a bad enough accident to warrent it being written of then it could if not repaired correctly have very serious consiquences for anyony traveling in the vehicle. bare in mind the resale value and difficulty in selling as its a buyers market! just widen the search area and dont rush to buy the first one available.. sorry for the long post but if they were my kids it would be a definate NO!

rbaz

iTrader: (1)

Cat D is the lowest damaged write off so it depends why it was written off. Maybe it was just stolen/recovered or minor panel damage but I would ask why and ask for photos of the damage and make sure it was repaired properly.
Remember it will be harder for you to sell on too and not worth as much.

Am not totally sure but somebody may be able to answer this (from experience) can you insure a previously written off car for more than 3rd party only? Insurance companies don’t like paying out for the same thing twice.

Sorry the above post wasn't there when I started to answer.

drb5

iTrader: (4)

Nothing wrong with buying a cat-d write off, as long as you get it cheap enough and can be told be someone in the right position and who you can trust, that's has been properly repaired.

I'm a panel beater by trade and it wouldn't put me off buying a car, as long as i was getting it for £1500+ cheaper than a car that has never been in an accident and i overall WANTED the car.

You wouldn't be long in telling if it's been a proper repair. Just spend your time WISELY looking round the car and maybe even get an AA report done on it.

bmac800

The car may not have been that badly damaged as there are loads of Rovers being written off with very little damage as some of the panels are getting hard to come by and are very expensive for the genuine Rover parts - salvage sites like 4salvage have got loads of damaged Rovers each week.You will need to check it has been repaired properly and is a lot cheaper than the equivalent undamaged car.

Hoverbod

Cat D cars can be written off for extremely minor damage. The clue is in the definition, Cat D cars are "vehicle is repairable, cost of repair does not exceed the value of the car, insurance company chose not to repair"
So if the cars normal value is 4K, as long as the repair cost is less than 4K it will be D. Any hire car charges will be added on top, to create a claim that may be more than 4K, but the addition won't affect the cars classification.

The damage is assessed at main dealer parts prices + expensive body shop labour rates for a monkey with a bit of sand paper. "Most" cat D cars will have little if not no structural damage, if it did it would normally be a "C", because structural damage is more expensive and time consuming to repair.

I have seen cars with a dented door as a cat D, a second hand door the same colour will make it "As good as new", and this is adequate. If the reparier has photographic evidence of the before and after pictures, you can clearly see the damage and know what has been done to it.
I would be concerned about buying a Cat D car that had no photos showing the level of damage.

Think of it this way, if your car has small shunt, where someone runs up the back and cracks the bumper, it needs new bumper and paint, the assessment is the cost of the repair is less than the value of the car, and the insurance company chooses to repair it. They could however decide not to repair it, based on external factors, not neccessarily relevant to the damage.

If the car appears on the HPI list as CAT D inspected, it has been inspected by an authorised third party, as being repaired to insurance company standards, just like any other vehicle that has been through an insurance approved bodyshop, however these inspections are available to anyone, the repair work does not have to be completed by an insurance bodyshop, but the repair work will be judged aganist those standrds, if it passes this inspection HPI will change the status to CAT D inspected.

Jamie

stineal

no

M444GY

iTrader: (72)

depends on how badly it was damaged tbh , probably not though

COZZFATHER

buying a nice cheep cat d and then repairing it yourself or through a known
garage or mates is a great way of buying a cheeper car, but in my experiance
people assume when selling them repaired, they have been wrapped around a
post.
selling them without declaring it causes major headaches too as a cat d doesn't show on the v5 and many sellers hide it

nooobyscoooby

As has been said, parts are getting iffy for MGS and that is reason enough not to buy the marque unless you can afford, in the event of another bump, to have the car off the raod whilst parts are made in batches when enough orders come through which is what's now happening.

IMHO - NO, even if it is cheap!

Mifo

iTrader: (10)

no way
Id rather pay more and get one thats not been crashed.

L3OUDGIRL

me dad buys them all the time but he repairs them
you got to becarefull cos peeps out there dont repair them right

MMT WRX

Thank you everybody

He didn’t buy a cat D thank god. He has bought another which is HPI clear. Apparently the lack of MG panels is a major issue which is causing some cars with relatively minor damage to be written off. Some insurance companies wont touch cat D cars and it would seem that many that do, require an independent inspection amongst other things. This was actually the cruncher for him, because there was only one insurer at reasonable cost and they wanted everything including one of his ********* before they would go ahead. They've both just graduated and started full time work. I gave my daughter her own car a couple of years ago so no real bother on that point she works in Sheffield. He’s going to be travelling to some god forsaken place called Doncaster to work, so needs his own car now.

One thing is for sure don’t trust anybody when it comes to buying and selling cars. 2 people stood in front of us and said their cars were mint no problems never been in an accident, we know one of them was written off in the period the seller owned the car....bastids.

Despite all this, these cars seem to sell like hot cakes. Out of nearly 100 results the majority were sold, even the ones that were advertised as cat D.

Thanks again

Mick

chris666

Went to look at a 996 a few weeks ago ,got there to be told it was on a cat d but still at a price
asked what damage was done ,none stolen with keys great
untill i phoned insurence £ 1250
found another 996 same year ,same model ,same price 5k more milage
£ 520 fc
work out which i got
chris

badgersport

Reading through this thread that's just what I was going to post. Category D is the least damaged end of the scale and is for cars the Insurance company choose not to repair because the cost of the repair is too high or because they can't get the parts to repair it in an acceptable timescale. Now that MG Rover are no more, some genuine panels can be difficult to get hold of and a car could be written off as Category D simply because it needed a new bumper and the insurance companies repairer can't get a new one.

COZZFATHER

i have seen catagory x which shows on a hpi check and have been wrote off, i would like to see a official list from insurers which shows whats what
as things change

Dracoro

It depends on WHEN it was written off.

If it was written off when it was almost new then chances are the damage was extensive. If it was written of a month ago then chances are the damage was £3k or more..

Either way, I would NEVER buy a cat-D without having all the details on what was damaged and the repairing engineering report, if available.

finalzero

Depends on many things as per the above posts. My previous car was a Cat-D motor but the seller was very honest and had detailed photo's of the damage (prior and post accident).

The actualy damage was very minor, someone had stolen the car so broken window and lock, couldn't start the car due to the alarm doing it's job so the numpties proceeded to kick in all the body panels.

If you don't have any history of the car then you don't know what the Cat-D is for as it could be for anything so I would steer clear of car's with no history or details of the accident and repair.

salsa-king

60miles of sheffield.. does that go as far as HULL?

is a cat D write off cus it was flooded????

Terminator X

iTrader: (7)

I wouldn't. You never know for sure what's happened to it & the owner may be telling stories ie they often (always?) say minor damage only

Expect to pay 1/3 less than for a non Cat D car.

TX.

BooSH

Cat D could be as little as smoke damage, as long as they provide reciepts for all the work carried out thaen i don't see a problem but selling on could be a problem.

Shark Man

Thing is, when the car is worth so little. Only trivial stuff can write it off.

Which is very different to , say a brand new 996 being repaired on insurance.


I only say that, as I do know of a 996 that impaled itself into a lampost at high speed (which then fell on it) and was severely damaged. It was half way up the bonnet (past the centre line of the front axle), pulled in both chassis legs (so the front of the car was narrower than it was orginally), obviously wrecking everything from the front axle forward - that being subframe, subframe mounts, fuel tank, all the suspension and steering, brake lines, fuel lines, wiring loom, oil lines, coolant pipes etc.


But because of the car's value, it WAS repaired by the insurer. It was a boarderline case, but its on the road now, and because it was repaired by the insurer its NOT recorded! I have seen CAT B (classed as salvage only) cars that were in a better state. Its on the road, probably now being driven by someone completely unaware of the severity and amount of chassis repairs its had done - its HPI clear, has a squeeky clean record, so who's to know?


So moving back, here we have a car not recorded, but having suffered damage far worse than any CAT D car will ever see!

So whats worse: a Car completely clean (but possibly having had severe damaged that was repaired by the insurer), and thus unaware of its history (assuming the average seller won't admit to it - which most people will do). Or, a CAT D car, where you are fully aware, and thus can pay closer attention to the car's structural condition and repair workmanship.

MMT WRX

Actually we did go to Hull and that car was one of the cat D write off's, but I dont think it was flood damage. My daughters becoming a bit of a demon at fault finding.
Hey Dad, theres a bit of paint run here, a little dent here, this side moulding isn't stuck on right, that gap between there and there is a bit bigger than on the other side, if you look down that side - see all the waves in that panel etc etc. So we took all the details Chassis, reg and V5 ref number so we could do an HPI check. Boyfriend says driving back home, "I would have bought that". HPI cat D several plate changes, some issue with a car that had a plate on that had been on this car at some stage (HPI were going to investigate this further and come back to us).

We looked at another car in Huddersfield that also turned out to be cat D. Based on the findings of the car in Hull the previous day, we specifically looked and couldn't see any mention of cat D on the V5. HPI check also revealed that this car had had plate changes.

Should cat D be shown on the V5?

I think I read that only cat C needs an inspection before going back on the road.

Is this plate changing some loophole to keep the V5 clean?

BTW he has got one now. Went to Manchester last night to fetch it, bit of a 'baptism of fire' driving home last night for him. Manchester rush hour, persisting it down with rain, gail force winds, over the Peak Forest and trying to keep up with a proper car.

Thanks

Mick

turboDean

iTrader: (4)

I'd have no problem buying a Cat D (would even consider Cat C) depending on what damage was done and how bad it was, as long as ur getting it for a good price, IMO a Damaged repaired car is worth approximalty 65% of the value of a straight car of same age and spec.

I went to look at an 03 plate Cat D Saxo VTR a couple of weeks ago with only 36K on the clock that had light front end damaged (been repaired) the guy want £1600 which i thought was a very fair price.
But u get people asking silly money for them, like i saw a Cat D Boxster on ebay last week for about £25K and the book price for a straight one was only about £27K, i would want to save a lot more than £2K on car of that value.

turboDean

iTrader: (4)

Cat D doesn't show on the log book, Cat C does.
Cat C requires a VIC (Vehicle Identity Check) think there about £34 and think that includes the new log book

turboDean

iTrader: (4)

This is completly true which is why i wouldn't worry about buying a recorded car, at least u know thats been in a bump, u could pay top wack for a car from a dealer that had been in a bad accident and been repaired by an insurance company and u'd probably not be able to tell unless check by an expert.

I had an MGF once and it had a front repair before i owned it (found out after i'd bought it), i then spun it into a wall, causing quite extensive damage to the rear end (subframe, suspension and panel damage) should of been a write off IMO but was repaired by Insurance, i just P/X'd it for another car. Now somebody probably paid good money for it, thinking it's a straight car, but it's been in at least 2 accidents.

Hoverbod

I went and looked at a classic once, with very minor Cat D damage, I didn't buy it, because when I HPI'd it, it had been Cat D 3 times. Now that's an unlucky car!!!!!!!!!!

Jamie