Keep it or sell it?

So about 4 months ago I was hit the night before my wedding. The truck was taken to a Caliber Collision Center and I was told the damage was over $10k. So they replaced the rear side of the cab, roof, and bed side. The paint was never right and they repainted 4x. After getting it back I noticed that the front fender had been removed, painted, and reinstalled with a badge for a 13+. I got a second opinion and the second body shop began fixing what Caliber messed up. It had to be repainted again. The paint didn't match. There was no insulation in the cab corner or roof, the fender was not aligned, the rear window was torn up, the tiny that they had to replace due to scratching it did not match, and several other things .So at this point the truck has had $16k worth of work done to it to get it back to normal. From what I have seen it is now flawless. I have had the old painted gone over to match the new and everything is aligned and the truck looks great. I should be picking it up today. Now after all of that, would you keep or sell?

Without taking a lose I would get rid of it.

How's the frame? Was it all body damage or how much mechanical damage? To me if your happy with everything now and it was minimal mechanical damage, i keep her if there was a bunch of mechanical damage fixed. I would think about getting rid of it body shops normally give lifetime warranty's with there work and caliber isnt a local ma and pa shop that's going to close down. If in 5-6 years your clear starts peeling you get it repainted for free or any other issues fixed.

How does it drive would be my question, since after being hit this hard it most likely won't feel the same. Get a diminished value amount and move on.

My biggest fear would be "dog tracking", after I got rear ended (as stated above) the truck never felt right again. I swear my truck tracks, but I've been told she goes straight down the road. If the truck feels good and looks good to you then I wouldn't sweat it, but if you have any doubt then part ways now, I speak from experience, I should've parted ways with my truck when I was rear ended.

SilverStreak88 said:

If the truck feels good and looks good to you then I wouldn't sweat it

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This.

14hemiexpress said:

How's the frame? Was it all body damage or how much mechanical damage? To me if your happy with everything now and it was minimal mechanical damage, i keep her if there was a bunch of mechanical damage fixed. I would think about getting rid of it body shops normally give lifetime warranty's with there work and caliber isnt a local ma and pa shop that's going to close down. If in 5-6 years your clear starts peeling you get it repainted for free or any other issues fixed.

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Calibers work was less than satisfactory and I had them pay another shop to fix their mistakes. So unfortunately no lifetime warranty from them.

I bought a truck from a shady dealer in CT that i didn't know was shady at the time. They told me the truck was a dealer demo that's why it had 2500 miles on it. I bought it then had my first kid so I was going to trade it in for a crew as it was only the quad cab. The new dealer said you know this had an accident right? I got that punched in the gut feeling. I swear ever since they told me that I started having little issues that kept getting worse. The point of this long thing is to say get rid of it before it starts getting bad.

There was zero mechanical damage other than a park brake cable. Everything was body damage. According to them no frame damage whatsoever but it was hit hard enough to damage the high strength steel cab structure which worries me. I always felt that the cab was twisted but they could not verify that. It looks fantastic and I'll know today how it drives but knowing what has happened it'll never be the same. Also no ground to stand on as far as diminished value goes since it was an uninsured motorist and in Texas if your insured for uninsured motorist you will get it fixed but your insurance is not required to pay for loss of value.

2014greatwhite said:

I bought a truck from a shady dealer in CT that i didn't know was shady at the time. They told me the truck was a dealer demo that's why it had 2500 miles on it. I bought it then had my first kid so I was going to trade it in for a crew as it was only the quad cab. The new dealer said you know this had an accident right? I got that punched in the gut feeling. I swear ever since they told me that I started having little issues that kept getting worse. The point of this long thing is to say get rid of it before it starts getting bad.

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That's kind of what I was thinking. The problem is that I'm going to lose big on this truck. I have 14 payments left til payoff but I won't get anything for diminished value and I know it won't be worth much after this.

from a financial standpoint your resale/trade in value took a big nose dive. i would live with it unless it drives horribly.

If someone would have thrown me out the several times I'be been ****** up enough to need body work, I would have never seen the last thirty years. If it is tracking straight, keep it. It is a nice truck, be happy drive it into the ground.

Silverbullet said:

That's kind of what I was thinking. The problem is that I'm going to lose big on this truck. I have 14 payments left til payoff but I won't get anything for diminished value and I know it won't be worth much after this.

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If you are concerned drive it until payoff then trade it in. This way you won't have negative equity and the fact that yes it was in an accident, but only had body damage (no frame damage) shouldn't hurt you in trade-in.

Last year I had a guy in the lane to my right that was puling a utility trailer try to move into my lane without looking and the trailer fender hit the back of the drivers door and part of passenger door. Body shop did a good job and mechanically fine so I don't think twice about it.

It all comes down to how it drives. I agree. I won't know if it truly bothers me until I drive it. But thanks for all the input!

Burla said:

It is a nice truck, be happy drive it into the ground.

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That's what I always say

If it was me and my truck i would get rid of .


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The DodgeFather said:

If it was me and my truck i would get rid of .


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I probably would too. That was a lot of damage, and looks like a hard hit. Seems unlikely to me there wasn't frame damage of some sort. But I suppose if it drives straight and true, then it could be ok.

I would lose my mind if I got hit by an uninsured motorist (read uninsured f*****g a*****e, et al....). It's not a big enough crime for people to not have insurance, and should be jail time to give more incentive to keep people on it. I was fortunate that the only accident I was in, the other driver admitted fault (yes even in a no fault state it does matter) to the responding police, and we both had the same insurance company, so everything else on my end was extremely simple, besides having to wait for my truck...

I guess having to pay for other people's problems and mistakes in general is my issue...

Good luck with your truck OP. It really is a sweet vehicle, and it'd be a shame if it has issues.

ExpressRules said:

If you are concerned drive it until payoff then trade it in. This way you won't have negative equity and the fact that yes it was in an accident, but only had body damage (no frame damage) shouldn't hurt you in trade-in.

Last year I had a guy in the lane to my right that was puling a utility trailer try to move into my lane without looking and the trailer fender hit the back of the drivers door and part of passenger door. Body shop did a good job and mechanically fine so I don't think twice about it.

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its going to cost him at least 20% of the value on trade. the car fax will show MVA, not what was repaired.