AO1Cars

There's no fixed or written policy on it. It will vary from case to case.

A very general rule is the damages need to exceed 75% or so of the value of the vehicle.

It's not 100% because if the insurer was to buy your car from you (which is essentially what totaling a car is) then they would be entitled to what's left of it so they can sell it for whatever they can get for it. Generally what they can get for it averages about 20% of the value it had a split second before the crash. This means that it totals when the damages receive 80% of the value. The reason it was stated earlier as 75% is because they also need to take into account the 5% or 10% in supplemental charges that will occur during the repair. (This is all the stuff they left off the original estimate because they couldn't see all the damage or there were changes in the part prices, etc…)

It's part art and part science.

If I'm looking at your Kia and it's hit in the rear-end (where there's not a lot of parts), the car is completely apart in the shop, I know there's no other damages and the shop manager isn't going to screw me with a big supplemental bill in two weeks, I'm at 75% of the value, and you're begging me not to total it, I might just fix it.

If I'm looking at your Kia and it's hit in the front corner and sitting at "Shady Jim's Auto Body", it's not apart yet, and the shock tower looks like it is pushed into the firewall, it's at 65%, and you're telling me you don't want it back, then I call the salvage yard.

Given that car is around $18k new you're probably well within the "fixable" range. If it's not totaled and you really don't want it back you can do a couple of things. You can have it hauled to the dealer or have them send someone to look at it where it is, and ask them to sell you a 2013 or a leftover 2012 at whatever price you can negotiate minus what they'll give you for your car the way it is plus the insurance check. This sounds good because the car has a clean title but doesn't usually work out too well unless you're a pretty good negotiator. It's usually better to just fix the car and then go take it and trade it in.

Most of the newer Kias and Hyundais I've looked at recently were pretty easy fixes though. There's a lot of bolt-on toss-and-replace type parts on those. A lot more "replace" than "repair" work. Depending on the damage you might not even be able to see anything or notice any difference in the vehicle after the repair even with a trained eye.

The Kelly Blue Book link will help.