Car has appreciated in value. Insurance paying out the purchase price

What value is on the insurance policy? That's the first thing to look at.

If it's higher than €900, you can appeal the insurers valuation, so long as you can support it with ads for similar cars. If you are doing this, you need to bear in mind two things:

a) Asking prices are just that, and

b) Your car has no catalytic converter

You will only get paid the lower of market value, or the value insured, regardless of what value is put on it.

You can bet it was not a 'precision removal' and even if it was, the days of an indie doing anything more that a lightbulb change for €50 are well gone. Hardly worth writing this off for a relatively easy & cheap repair though.

Not sure it differs back home but we had very similar in the UK a few months ago. Wife's CR-V (2010 petrol EX) got rear ended and insurance written off - damage not that bad but the car was only worth £5-6k. Same story, insurance only paying out the "market" value i.e. Parkers book value etc. Absolutely no fault of hers, she was waiting to enter a roundabout and young lad in a TT RS forgot where his brake pedal was. Anyway, with the prices of 2nd hand cars, the offer was nowhere near what was needed. It took quite a lot of arguing and there were some increases but still a solid £1k short of being able to get a direct replacement (but actually still more than we paid for it 3 years earlier) - it didn't help that petrols are like hens teeth. We ended up going a year older and a diesel but 20k miles less and with quite a bit of change left over. I made sure we stung them for the expensive kids car seats also when we knew we were being screwed. Apparently, had she gone through her own insurance (I don't know why you would in such a case) you can actually go to the ombudsman if they low ball but by the looks of things, this is standard practice.

This is another reason never to value a car at less than €5k. Insurance will only pay out market price if you are over insured or what you valued it for if market price is higher than insured value. OP you were under insured and that isn't the fault of the insurance company.

The other reason to over value cheap cars when getting quotes is because its cheaper.

The OP is seeking to be in the position he was in before the incident - having a dated, but usable car - not to profit.

Not arguing that, and not suggesting what's happening is just. I was highlighting how us normal folk get screwed either way.

They had it insured for €900, if they had it insured for more then the insurance company would of paid out more.

Insurance is paid on market value or the value you've insured it for if less than market value. It's the reason why people with classic or customised vehicles pay more for an agreed value when getting insurance.

BTW have you checked your home insurance recently? The cost of building has drastically increased over the last few years, if you haven't increased the rebuild portion of your insurance and your home is destroyed you'll have a bigger problem than the OP

The OP told us in his first post that the insurance valued his car at €900.

Based on his later admission that he was underinsured, I’m inclined to believe that they offered him €900 because that was the level of his cover but they actually valued it at more than that. So you’re probably correct in that he would have been offered more if he had had a higher level of cover.