Cars damaged in hailstorms are tempting to buy, as they often come with deep discounts. Plus, hail damage tends to be superficial, affecting only the body panels and glass, leaving the vehicle’s key functions intact. If you just need a way to get to work every day, a dimpled roof, trunk and hood may not matter. Before you seek out hail damaged cars for sale, though, you should take the following risks and drawbacks into account.
Why Dealerships Sell Hail-Damaged Cars
This is a great place to search for a new car. Dealers opt for fixing any damage they can. Fixing the damage helps the car find a new home. Paintless Dent Repair (PDR) specialists often fix hail damage at wholesale rates for dealers. Sometimes the figure to buy a car the salespeople may give you can be exaggeratedly low since they want you to buy the vehicle. This number should tip you off as to how bad the damage really is. Make repairing the car a condition to buying it. This is generally a good idea. Dealers may have a PDR specialist on site to make the repairs but these specialists don’t always have the necessary experience to fix dozens of hail dents.
Does it come with a Warranty
A warranty or money back guarantee should be given. If there is no warranty it may suggest the damage is worse than it looks. Additionally if you get a vehicle with a salvage title be sure that is has a “hail” designation to distinguish it from more severe damage such as floods or accidents.
What’s the Likely Resale Value
Resale value will be impacted if you buy a hail-damaged car. Buying a low cost damaged car initially may cost you the same as buying an undamaged new car. Make sure lenders cover hail-damaged cars if you plan to finance your purchase.
Inspect the car carefully before making a purchase. Taking care to avoid unwanted surprises. Get a background check to look for undisclosed damage as well. Sometimes a car may be already repaired before you see it, hiding the extend of the original damage. Using the vehicle identification number, plug it into Carfax, AutoCheck or similar site.
How Will Affect Your Insurance
Ask your insurance agent if the hail damage puts your comprehensive insurance at risk. If you don’t have the initial damage repaired, you won’t get the future damages covered or your insurance my deduct the damage from any claims. For example, you have a fender bender. It results in a $1000 claim, you might only receive $500 if you have $1500 in unreported damage.
Before Buying, Ask Yourself…
Never drop hard-earned money for a hail-damaged car before asking yourself: Who does this benefit the most, the dealer or you? Once a dealership suffers a hailstorm they have little or no choice but to sell their inventory at deeply reduced rates. Now you’re in a position to haggle more than ever. By the same token, could you sell that damaged car to someone in the future? Try to see through sales techniques to get the real value of the car.
A Good Option for Your First Car
For your first car, a hail-damaged one may be a good option. Basic transportation, students, folks who don’t drive much and tight budgets might benefit from hail sales.
Whats the Actual Cost of Fixing The Car
The average cost to repair hail-damage to a car is $2500. This cost can vary widely from shop to shop. Take the car to an independent shop for an estimate before you purchase. But remember, with every dealership discount there is usually a trade off. And that trade is…dealers are able to get their inventory repaired cheap because they have so many cars to repair. Often times it’s around 1/4 of the actual repair cost. And when you have someone who is repairing cars for 1/4 of the normal repair cost you will get a job that it reflects.
Summary
You can never do to much research when buying a hail-damaged car whether is new or used. If you don’t fix it you’ll probably always be upside down in it. Never sign on the dotted line before you thoroughly inspect it yourself and maybe by another PDR expert. An expert will spot missed dents. Check for “broken paint” along the edges. How they will repair the paint? Will they use a traditional body-shop or a “paint touch up vendor”? The difference is huge. So leave no stone turned. Your due diligence is mandatory.
Teslas are the future car, and they are such a fun car to drive and repair. Electric vehicles are becoming more and more prevalent. They are not like repairing any other vehicle. The Tesla is made of an all-aluminum body, and this makes it very difficult to repair.
Aluminum is eight times harder to move than steel, which is a typical metal used in manufacturing. Only the most skilled technicians can work on Teslas because of the difficulties of repairs. We here at Texarcana Dent Repair have years of experience and a lot of experience working on this specific brand of cars.
Unlike steel, which remembers its original position, aluminum does not. It needs to be reformed, which can take more time, patience, and skill. To repair and pull the damaged area, the panel must be heated to 400°F to allow the metal to soften. Aluminum dissipates heat very quickly but can become permanently changed if heated past a certain point, and that point is approximately 750°F. It’s a fine line of heat, pushing and ensuring that the metal is in the perfect condition to repair.
We are IMI certified to repair these cars, and what does that mean. To repair an electric vehicle, we have to power down the cater to ensure that we do not combust, start a fire, or damage the Tesla. The battery system moves through that car, and we do not want to cut or damage any system that controls the entire vehicle. We power the vehicle down for the safety of you, the tech, and your vehicle.
We work on all Tesla makes and models, including the Tesla Model 3, Tesla Model X, and the Tesla Model S.
Paintless dent repair on your Tesla can usually be finished on the same day as you drop it off, and in some cases, with minor repairs, it can be done while you wait in a few hours. We love repairing these cars! It is such a fun brand.
Our goal is always to get things done in a timely fashion so that you are back on the road enjoying your Tesla! We would love to take a look at your damage and get you an estimate. Swing by the shop or give us a call anytime.
If you have questions about the hail damage process, door dings, dents, creases, or damage to your vehicle, please reach out to us at the shop. We would love to help clear anything up and understand how you want to proceed with your car’s repair. We are here to make your repair easy, seamless, and we are here to help. We want to get you back on the road with your Teslas restored to their factory condition. Please give us a call or stop by the shop to estimate the damage. We want to explain the dent removal process to make things seamless and easy and get you back on the road and cruising. Call Us Today at 903-280-8190 or fill out our contact form here!
You’ve run to the grocery store to run an errand and come back to a horror scene… a runaway cart that a careless person has haphazardly discarded has smashed into your brand new car and left a massive dent on your door. What are you to do?
There are two primary methods to repairing dents on a vehicle. You have traditional body repair, which includes the use of paint filler, and you have PDR, which requires the skills of a trained technician with specialized tools to pop the dent back into place.
So, which is better? Let’s look at both methods of repair in detail.
Traditional repair uses paint filler, a.k.a Bondo, to fill in dents, creases, and other damage on your vehicle to ‘restore’ the shape of the body panel. The vehicle is then sanded, painted, and buffed before being put back together.
Sure, your car looks as good as new, but is it?
The problems with paint fillers are numerous. Bondo will crack over time if not mixed correctly, leaving the repair looking worse than the original damage. Not only that, but the paint will fade differently over Bondo than it will over the rest of the vehicle, making the repair more noticeable after some time.
PDR, or Paintless Dent Repair, is a more conservative approach to fixing dents. Using specialized tools like dent rods and blending hammers, a certified technician will gently massage a dent back into its original shape, often in a matter of minutes, restoring the look of your car. No fillers or painting here!
Wait a minute, is it really that easy?
Well, yes! PDR is the simplest, easiest, most cost-effective way to get rid of a dent. In fact, it’s the preferred method by most insurance companies when it comes to repairing hail-damaged or dented vehicles. In the case of our shopping cart mishap, the customer can come out paying less than their insurance deductible if they choose the PDR route over the traditional repair!
In every possible case, it’s always beneficial to see if PDR is an option. Its ability to retain the integrity of the body panels and paint is a massive advantage to the vehicle owner over invasive body repair. It’s more cost-effective, and it retains the value of the vehicle better over time.
In this case, the answer is clear, chose PDR!
If you have questions about the hail damage process, door dings, dents, or damage to your vehicle, please reach out to us at the shop. We would love to help clear anything up and understand how you want to proceed with your car’s repair. We are here to make your repair easy, seamless, and we are here to help. We want to get you back on the road with a car restored to its factory condition. Please give us a call or stop by the shop to estimate the damage. We want to explain the dent removal process to make things seamless and easy and get you back on the road and cruising. Call Us Today at 903-280-8190 or fill out ourcontact form here!
As we progress into the future and technology improves, more car manufacturers choose to develop and manufacture electric vehicles for the automotive market. It’s the future of the automotive world. Companies like Tesla produce exclusively all-electric vehicles, while companies like Porsche, Volkswagen, Honda, and Ford are slowly transitioning to a fully electric lineup. As the landscape changes into this new era in automotive manufacturing, so does the repair process of these vehicles. While the techniques remain virtually unchanged, processes and procedures evolve to help ascertain the safety and security of our technicians. We have gone the extra mile at Texarkana PDR to maintain our technicians’ safety and your electric vehicle during the PDR process. Dents happen in all kinds of vehicles, and we are prepared to fix them in your Hybrid or Electric Vehicle. We have obtained our Electric Vehicle Power Down Certification. With this certification, we can safely power down your electric vehicle so that PDR can be performed on it without risk of damage or injury.
Electric Vehicles have a battery core in addition to power cables that run throughout the vehicle. It’s imperative to understand where these cables are located and where they connect. During the PDR process, we use a variety of sharp metal tools to repair dents from the underside of your vehicle’s body panels, and failure to possess the knowledge of where these cables are located can result in the injury (or an untimely death) of the technician and damage to your vehicle. If a careless, non-certified technician were to puncture one of these cables, they run the risk of frying themselves and that, my friends, is not good. We can safely power down your electric vehicle at Texarkana PDR, making it virtually harmless for the PDR technician to work on. Once the PDR process is complete, we can power up the vehicle safely as per the manufacturer’s specifications and instructions, and the car is all ready to go!
If you have an electric vehicle that needs paintless dent repair, you must take it to a shop with the correct certification for the job; of course, you can always bring it to us at Texarkana PDR. We would love to earn your business.
If you have questions about EV’s (electric vehicles), door dings, dents, or damage to your vehicle, please reach out to us at the shop. We would love to help clear anything up and understand how you want to proceed with your car’s repair. We are here to make your repair easy, seamless, and we are here to help. We want to get you back on the road with a car restored to its factory condition. Please give us a call or stop by the shop to estimate the damage. We want to explain the dent removal process to make things seamless and easy and get you back on the road and cruising. Call Us Today at 903-280-8190 or fill out our contact form here!
Trusting your vehicle to a shop that has the right certification is extremely important for the technicians’ safety and that of your vehicle.
So your car has hail damage. First, we are so sorry, and we empathize with what pain this process can be.
We are here to fix it, get you back on the road with your car feeling like it NEVER HAPPENED. Let us teach you how we find out how much damage is on your vehicle and how we price this process out.
There is no arbitrary dollar number because we legitimately count dent, every one of them, and then put them into a matrix.
Let’s break it down.
You come in and sign some paperwork so we can look at your car legally. It gives us permission to assess it and give you a proper assessment.
We bring it back, and we need it for a few hours. We put specialized lights on the car that make it possible to see every dent on your vehicle. (Pro-tip, ask to come back and look at a car with the light, you will be SHOCKED to see what we see.)
We count each dent by the panel and size of the dents. We use coins as our size guide. So, there are 15 quarter-sized dents on the right front fender. This is how the insurance has dictated that we write up a vehicle, making it pretty seamless.
After we look at every panel, we calculate the R&I. This is when it will remove and install different parts to access dents and replace any damaged parts in the storm.
We total everything up, every panel of dents counted, the work to get to the dents, any parts needing to be replaced, cost of the scans of the cars’ computers, for your safety and ours, and we send this estimate off to your insurance for approval. After it is approved, we get your car back to its pre-storm condition.
A warning. If a hail company promises you the moon, free iPads, money back, and the idea of repair, and this deal seems too good to be true, it usually is. We believe in honest work for fair pay and get the best techs to fix your damage. Dent Repair Technicians are trained for years, and the BEST ones can make those dents disappear where the human eye can no longer see them.
If you have questions about the hail damage process, door dings, dents, or damage to your vehicle, please reach out to us at the shop. We would love to help clear anything up and understand how you want to proceed with your car’s repair. We are here to make your repair easy, seamless, and we are here to help. We want to get you back on the road with a car restored to its factory condition. Please give us a call or stop by the shop to estimate the damage. We want to explain the dent removal process to make things seamless and easy and get you back on the road and cruising. Call Us Today at 903-280-8190 or fill out our contact form here!
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