Recently we purchased a used 2002 Grand Caravan, last week while driving home from town someone turned in front of us and hit my van head on (driver's side). My question is does anyone know if this may present a problem with the front wheel drive or transmission? The body shop and insurance says it's not totaled, damages estimated at about $4000.00. My problem is I have not even made a payment yet, I don't want to pay for a van that may have problems down the road. Anyone out there ever had this happen? If so how does the van run now??
Thanks so much!!!!

Well you van may get fixed but your resale value just droped alot.
Because of the vin registery on smashed cars now, when ever some one looks up the vin they will see it was smashed. Alot of people dont want post smashed cars. So you wont get any money when you resell it. But they are good vans nad make sure you are 110% satisfied with the fix.
If you are thinking of selling it later I would see you insurance company and argue with them about this.
I never had to do this. Every accident I was in, the car got tottally wrote off. (not by me)

Make sure to get an estimate and have it fixed at the dealer. This happened to me in an older model pickup and I wanted it towed to dealer, but towdriver talked me into letting it go to bodyshp close by instead. What they do in under estimate so that insurance wont total it, then tear it apart and keep calling ins for more money because they found this broken or that bent. After all was said and done the money ins spent was over the total amount and the truck was still a pos.

Recently we purchased a used 2002 Grand Caravan, last week while driving home from town someone turned in front of us and hit my van head on (driver's side). My question is does anyone know if this may present a problem with the front wheel drive or transmission? The body shop and insurance says it's not totaled, damages estimated at about $4000.00. My problem is I have not even made a payment yet, I don't want to pay for a van that may have problems down the road. Anyone out there ever had this happen? If so how does the van run now??
Thanks so much!!!!

$4000. is not a lot of money for a front end crash repair. If both your airbags activated, that is close to a grand in repairs and it doesn't reflect any structural damage. Was the engine/transmission assembly displaced to the rear by the impact? Things get really complicated when the half-shafts contact the back of the front wheelwells. That type of impact results in $8K to 10K in repair estimates before considering any damage to the transmission or engine block. Most major insurance companies will write off a car with that kind of damage. If you pay to start repairs and then find a craked engine block or transmission case when you dissassemble the fron end, the picture rapidly changes for the worse. They won't take that kind of risk.

Best Regards

Well you van may get fixed but your resale value just droped alot.
Because of the vin registery on smashed cars now, when ever some one looks up the vin they will see it was smashed. Alot of people dont want post smashed cars. So you wont get any money when you resell it. But they are good vans nad make sure you are 110% satisfied with the fix.
If you are thinking of selling it later I would see you insurance company and argue with them about this.
I never had to do this. Every accident I was in, the car got tottally wrote off. (not by me)


Sounds like another crooked shop and bunch of people ripping off company's and people of their money!