Inside the Numbers, the Nuance—and Why No Calculator Can Tell You
If you’ve just been in a car accident and pursuing a lawsuit for your losses in the accident, chances are the physical pain is only part of the story. There’s the car. The medical bills. The time off work. The texts from friends asking how you’re doing—and the gnawing question in your own mind:
What happens now? And how much is this all going to be worth?
It’s the number one question we hear at Popham Law. It’s also one of the hardest to answer off the cuff—because the value of an auto accident lawsuit doesn’t come from a calculator. It comes from context.
You Can’t Ballpark Pain
Online calculators love to give you a “settlement estimate.” They’re fast, simple, and often completely wrong.
How do you plug in the price of not being able to lift your kid after surgery? Or the cost of therapy for the anxiety you have every time you get back behind the wheel? Or the long stretch of unpaid leave you had to take when your recovery didn’t go as planned?
Car accident settlements are shaped by the actual impact the crash had on your life—from the cost of surgery, to the months of missed work, to the ripple effect of physical and emotional trauma. A number that one of the online calculators come up with might not come close to covering what you’ve lost. It also might be too high.
Injuries Are Only Part of the Settlement
We’ve worked with clients whose medical bills were “low”—but their injuries kept them out of work for half a year. Others walked away with bruises but were hit with thousands in car repairs, or ongoing therapy costs, or unexpected complications that didn’t show up until weeks later.
That’s why no two car accident settlements look the same. A good attorney doesn’t just count receipts—they get to the bottom of what was taken from you, and what it will take to rebuild. That includes lost income, future costs, and—yes—the pain that doesn’t show up on an invoice.
Insurance Isn’t On Your Side
Let’s be clear: the other driver’s insurance company is already figuring out how to pay you the least amount possible. Their entire business model relies on how well they can lower payments.
You might get a quick offer, which can be tempting to take. But early settlement offers almost always leave out key pieces of your recovery, because insurers are hoping you don’t know what your case is really worth.
And if you go it alone, you’re not on equal footing with the insurance company. They know loopholes and language that gives them an advantage (after all, they have an entire industry behind them). People who hire personal injury lawyers statistically walk away with much more—because they’ve got someone pushing back with their own deep knowledge of the law and the industry when the insurer tries to undercut them.
So… How Much Will You Get?
We wish we could answer that question right here. But the honest answer is that it depends—on your injuries, your prognosis, your losses, your insurance policy, and even who’s at fault.
The good news is, you don’t have to figure that out by yourself. At Popham Law, we’ve helped thousands of clients in Kansas City figure out what their case is worth—and then fight to get it.
If you’ve been in a car crash and you’re wondering what comes next, let’s talk.
Not every case leads to a big payout. And not every crash leads to a case. But every person who has been injured deserves a fair shot at recovering their losses—and when we know we can help, we're here for a real conversation about what that looks like.
📞 Call us at (844) 243-2288 or use our contact form to schedule a free consultation.
