So many people misunderstand what write off means!!
A "write off" is because the car is beyond economical repair, as far as THE INSURANCE COMPANY ARE CONCERNED.
For a car to be so, the owner must have already accepted the insurance money for it, as it CANNOT BE WRITTEN OFF WITHOUT THE OWNERS PERMISSION AS HE OWNS IT AND NOT THE INSURANCE COMPANY, if he declines to accept thier offer it is NOT and CANNOT be written off.
Everyone DOES HAVE THE RIGHT to buy back the "salvage" if he/she accepts the offer made in respect of the claim as a TOTAL LOSS, or "WRITE OFF", this is normally around 10% of the pre accident market value.
IT IS NOT ILLEGAL TO DRIVE A WRITE OFF, some cars, including my other halfs are written off for scratches, or a few dents, in my case the damage came out at £365.41p, so we accepted thier settlement figure for the damage, after we got assurance "they had no further interest", this means that it remains our property to do with as we like, we still drive it mot it insure it etc, it has dent around 1/4" deep and 3 inches long with some other colour paint now "T" cut out!!
I always buy cat d "write offs", the one before this was a 5 year old astra with 11,000 miles for £600, spent 3 day replacing a few bent suspension parts, other parts, total of £280-£300, car had all the toys full service history, sold it for a lot more!!
The man on ebay is telling porkies though, insurers do not pay for repairs, then write off a car, they do one or the other.
If the car has MOT you can still use it as well.
tabetha