Tennessee Car Accident Settlement Calculator

In Tennessee motor vehicle accident cases, you can recover damages only if your fault is less than 50%. If the jury finds you equally at fault (50/50), you recover nothing. This threshold makes the fault determination in car accident cases especially consequential — the difference between 49% and 50% fault is the difference between receiving compensation and receiving nothing.

Tennessee gives you 1 year from the date of the incident to file a lawsuit, which is shorter than the national average of 2.7 years. This compressed timeline means you need to consult an attorney and begin gathering evidence quickly. Tennessee applies a discovery rule, meaning the clock may start when you discover (or should have discovered) the injury rather than when the incident occurred.

Tennessee caps non-economic damages (pain and suffering, emotional distress, loss of enjoyment of life) at $750,000 for this type of case. This means that regardless of the severity of your non-economic losses, the maximum you can receive for those damages is $750,000. (Tenn. Code Ann. § 29-39-102)

Drivers in Tennessee must carry at least 25/50/25 in liability coverage — that’s $25K bodily injury per person, $50K per accident, and $25K property damage. While this meets the state minimum, a single ER visit can easily exceed these limits. The at-fault driver’s policy may not fully cover your losses in a serious accident.

No Tennessee statute, high court decision or insurance regulator statement settles whether diminished value, the resale value a properly repaired car loses because of its accident history, can be added to the cost of repairs in a claim against the at-fault driver. Tennessee authority also allows the claim under your own collision coverage. No Tennessee statute, supreme court decision, or insurance department statement on diminished value could be retrieved, because the Tennessee courts website blocked every request. The diminished value guide in the related reading below carries the rule for every state and how to document the loss.