You can wait. I wouldn’t recommend waiting a really long time, but you getting an estimate on your own first is nothing they will blink about.
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Damaged by 10 days old Tesla Model 3
- Thread starter curiouscow123
- Start date
Ehhhhh... agree to disagree? As I said, it depends on what you’re comfortable with as the final product. I’ve seen solid PDR folks perform miracles and doubt they could make this one factory perfect again. Could they get it “good enough” for the OP? Maybe.
Any idea as to what the cost of repair would be while going through insurance and using a Tesla certified Bodyshop. Would it be between 4K-6K or 15K-20K? Read several posts in this forum and Reddit and there are conflicting estimates of the repair cost for similar damage.
I am not fully sure the door is undamaged. If the door is damaged, which I gather is made of Aluminium, how much repair cost are we looking at?
I am not fully sure the door is undamaged. If the door is damaged, which I gather is made of Aluminium, how much repair cost are we looking at?
So sorry to see this. Unfortunately, I think you're just going to need to file an insurance claim. This looks like more serious damage than just a paint scrape. The rear quarter looks twisted a bit at the door frame. That's going to take some work, more than "just" a repaint. I'm guessing a few grand in repairs, unfortunately. :-(
I'd just file the claim and not worry too much ... if you don't have a horrible accident history, you should be OK.
I think there is almost ZERO chance that this OP would "save money" by paying for the repair themselves, even if insurance rates goes up. Said another way, even if insurance rates go up, they normally go up for "an amount" for 3 years. Lets say this OPs insurance rate goes up 1k a year for three years. In order for the OP to "save money" by paying out of pocket instead, the repair would have to cost 3k or less.
I doubt OPs insurance rate would go up 1k a year, and I SERIOUSLY doubt that repair is less than 3-4k, done by a reputable body shop, that is equipped / certified to work on teslas. Of course, OP might be able to find a shop to do it for less, but I have no idea why anyone with insurance would do that for something like this.
Say insurance rates go up 500 a year, thats $1500 over the three years that increase would happen. How many are looking at those pictures and seeing $1500 or less in damage?
Translation: i agree with @dmurphy , which is absolutely no surprise, that the OP should just file with insurance (which it sounds like they have done), and move forward, and not worry too much about if or whatever the insurance increase might be, because its very unlikely that its more than the cost of the repair.
I doubt OPs insurance rate would go up 1k a year, and I SERIOUSLY doubt that repair is less than 3-4k, done by a reputable body shop, that is equipped / certified to work on teslas. Of course, OP might be able to find a shop to do it for less, but I have no idea why anyone with insurance would do that for something like this.
Say insurance rates go up 500 a year, thats $1500 over the three years that increase would happen. How many are looking at those pictures and seeing $1500 or less in damage?
Translation: i agree with @dmurphy , which is absolutely no surprise, that the OP should just file with insurance (which it sounds like they have done), and move forward, and not worry too much about if or whatever the insurance increase might be, because its very unlikely that its more than the cost of the repair.
Thanks. I did similar math and went ahead and filed the claim. Reading posts everywhere (here, FB groups, reddit), my gut says it well be 8K+. Let's see what happens. If the damage to the door is significant, probably 10-15K.
Agree. I more or less feel the same. The more I look at the pictures and the more I read about the Tesla repair costs, the higher the possible repair cost seems.
Dolemite
is my name
If you took this to a PDR guy, he'd laugh in your face. That's body shop work... ask me how I know. The PDR guys in my area won't touch anything that has even a marginal crease in it.
OP - I did something similar to a cherished BMW of mine when I lived in a pointlessly gated community. Feels like *sugar*, but that's life. People have scars, too.
Tesla body shop in San Jose gave a quote of approx. $7400. This looks to be on the higher side. Do I have an option of choosing what repairs to perform and/or negotiating on the total cost. I am going with the insurance claim (with $1000 deductible). Do they charge as much as they can when insurance is involved?
I had a similar incident, though less damage.
Tesla body shop estimated approx $2000 based on photo, and wanted to keep the car for 2 weeks.
I had a local private tesla workshop take a look, and they fixed it up by touching up the paint damage on the bumper, and PDR the quarter panel. It isnt 100% perfect (due to the edge of the panel being involved), but not noticable at all to the untrained eye.
They did the job in 24 hours, and charged $480, and best of all no insurance involved.
Attached before and after
Tesla body shop estimated approx $2000 based on photo, and wanted to keep the car for 2 weeks.
I had a local private tesla workshop take a look, and they fixed it up by touching up the paint damage on the bumper, and PDR the quarter panel. It isnt 100% perfect (due to the edge of the panel being involved), but not noticable at all to the untrained eye.
They did the job in 24 hours, and charged $480, and best of all no insurance involved.
Attached before and after
Attachments
It depends. If you have a lienholder, you basically need to do all of the repairs. If you don’t, you don’t need to make any of them. You will still have the$1,000 deductible whether you do all of the repairs or just some, doing all of them seems to make sense.
