Our excitement last night leads now to the morning of now what? I'm up early because I had a little trouble sleeping -- kept dreaming about car crashes -- and now I'm thinking about what comes next.
We expect that the van will be totaled. Blue Book is about $3500, and I'd be really surprised if it could be repaired for less than $2000, which is 57% percent of BB. I know that auto companies vary at the point where they total a vehicle, but this seems more likely than not. So the question then becomes Do we get a new or used replacement? We've been 'planning' to replace the van for the last five years. Financially, we're able to do it. But there's two gotchas.
First is that we're planning to go to France this year. I haven't given much thought to what the total cost of that is, but my guess is, about half the value of a new van, perhaps a little less. We could just blow off going to France till next year, but I'd rather not. So that means that we have two major expenses in one year. Ouch.
Second is that whatever we get, we're going to keep it for a while. The plan was that when we replaced the van, it'd be with something slightly smaller, preferably a hybrid, and definitely new, so that we could keep it for several years. I assume that a used vehicle has a shorter shelf life; plus, of course, we'd end up getting the new one later. On the other hand, Toyota has just announced that they are delaying the launch of the Prius minivan. Something about water in the factory. So we might not have been able to get that van when we wanted, and, therefore, maybe some kind of 'bridge vehicle' would be worth considering.
We need to do a little thinking...
Also need to thinking about how painful we will make this for our daughter. She's a good kid, and we don't want to enforce artificial pain. Also, her resources for paying us back in some way - money, time - are severely limited. Frankly, I don't think that we need to 'teach her a lesson'. I think last night did that. But we want her to clearly understand the effect of her momentary inattention (she had glanced down inside the car to check if she had, of all things, her driver's license), so we'll include her in all discussions about what do we do, what will it cost, all of that. That might be pain enough!
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Update: I talked with my daughter this morning. She asked me why I gave her back her phone (I had borrowed it last night to call for the tow truck; left the house too quickly to care about finding mine). I said that I was done with it. Don't parents punish their kids when things like this happen? (Last night, she told my wife that she wished we would just punish her and get it over with. ) I shrugged. You had an accident, kiddo. It happens. We'll talk about what we're going to do, and we'll involve you, but as for you, personally, we still think you're a good driver. You just made a mistake. She seemed a little surprised. To be honest, I was a little surprised. What a magnanimous guy! AKA, what a softie! But then again, maybe not so much. I'm just being the kind of parent that I would have wanted if this had happened to me. Years ago, we thought about whether we would ever spank her. Our conclusion was that once you've spanked the kid, you really can't go any further - so why not stop short of that, saving it for truly dire circumstances. And it worked. (Perhaps with another kid, it wouldn't.) In the back of my mind, there is still the thought of I hope she doesn't feel as if this isn't any big deal, just because she isn't getting punished. I guess I'm trusting in her judgement.
Besides, she has major-league tests in school today. I don't want her lingering over this.
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