the Cost of Auto Body Repair

Our car needed to have the front bumper replaced, the front right wheel well and panel replaced and then some minor alignment issues had to be straightened out. Even though the damage was mainly in the front right area, the parts that were damaged couldn't just be 'hammered out' and HAD to be replaced. Because panels and whole parts were replaced, no paint touchups were needed. The total cost of the repair was four thousand: three thousand for parts and approximately one thousand for man hours. The total cost was exactly how much the initial estimate we received was. Our car was driven to the repair shop and after an initial check that took only three hours, we were given the option to either leave the car there and take one of their rental cars (free of charge) or drive the car and wait for the parts to be ordered. We were told that the parts could take two weeks to arrive but the parts arrived in three business days. Once the parts were in and repairs paid for, our car was repaired completely in less then a week and half. The repair work also came with a life-time warranty from the repair shop.

Our car was involved in a fender-bender on private property. An SUV turned left from the right-hand lane and crushed our front right bumper and the front right tire. While the speed of the fender-bender was only about 30 miles per hour and the Nissan Versa is a solid car, this accident appeared to hit the Versa in one of its weakest points. The front right bumper was crushed and the wheel well was almost concave. We took it to a locally owned Body Shop Repair place and they did excellent work! Because it is a locally owned business, the staff were courteous and not bogged down by some kind of corporate quota. They even dealt directly with our insurance on our behalf and supplied the documentation (e.g. the repair quote and parts list etc) for our insurance company extremely quickly. We paid our insurance deductible immediately but they offered to allow us to make payments, with the final payment coinciding with the completion of the car repair.

Because they are locally owned, they did not have any of the car parts on hand and had to order them, but they have a good relationship with the parts manufacturer's warehouse and were able to get the parts relatively quickly! We had our car looking and running like new in less then 2 weeks!

I wish that I had shopped around a bit more in terms of the price of the repairs needed. While I believe I spent a reasonable amount of money, I would like to have the added assurance that I did not miss out on a better deal somewhere else. So tip #1: always shop around for second opinions or even third or fourth opinions!

I also wish that I had taken the repair shop up on their offer of a free rental car as I ended up not liking driving my damaged vehicle (with alignment issues) around for as long as I did. If the parts hadn't arrived sooner, I would have had to have driven my damaged car for much longer! Tip #2: take advantage of free rental cars!

In retrospect I would have preferred to have taken my car to a shop that was closer to my place of residence; dropping off the car, picking up the car or going into the shop to drop off forms proved to be a hassle since the shop was pretty far from where I lived. Tip #3: try to choose an auto repair shop that is close to where you live!