Can Dents Affect My Car’s Resale Value?

Car dings and dents can happen to even the safest of drivers. From the market lot to long drives in inclimate weather, forces out of our control can send a shopping trolley or piece of rock flying and mint a fresh ding or dent, not only affecting the look of the vehicle but the value as well. Your car may be running well and the motor could be pristine, but if it has noticeable body damage, there is a probability the value of the car will suffer worse over time.

From private buyers to dealerships, your resale price may drop if your vehicle features extensive dings and dents. This article will go into more depth about how dents can affect your car’s resale value and how you can get the best value out of your car once it’s time to sell. 

How Dents Can Affect Value

Size of the Dent

The size of the dent will roughly determine how much it will cost to repair it. Larger dents require more work and metal manipulation, hence, they will cost more to repair than a singular or smaller dent. Most dent repair shops have specialised equipment to estimate damage and determine what machinery or equipment they will need to fix the dent. 

How Deep Dent Impact Is

While the size of a dent does matter, the depth of the dent is what can cause real damage to your car and ultimately, to your wallet. Depth can also show if the dent has caused damage to the paint and if there has been any contact between other parts of the car. 

Depth also helps indicate if the dent is from natural causes or human error, such as hail or a fast ball to the side of the car. As long as your paint has not been compromised, you can go to your local paintless dent removal shop to remove the dent, often for far less than if you went to a traditional body shop. 

If paint has been taken off, however, you will have to find a body shop that specialises in traditional dent repair and paintwork, which will likely cost you far more in repairs.    

Where The Dent is Located

Location of the dent is a huge factor on how much you can expect to pay in repairs. When you get your dents assessed, don’t be surprised if a dent on the roof is more expensive than an easy to remove side panel. Likewise, dents that affect more than one panel are likely to complicate repairs and incur higher repair costs.

How Many Dents There Are

Quite obviously, if you have a car riddled with dents, you will want to get these taken care of before resale. While you may be able to get away with one or two dents without taking a major hit to resale value, a car with a plethora of dents will definitely tank the value of the vehicle when you are trying to sell it. 

What to Do If You Have Dents

Paintless dent repair is your best bet when it comes to expertise and value. Paintless dent repair, also known as paintless dent removal, is a technique of removing dents from the body of a car without sanding, filling, or otherwise disturbing the paint and body panel. Paintless dent repair can fix a wide range of damage as long as the car’s paint surface is still intact. Paintless dent repair can be used on both aluminium and steel panels as well.

If your dents have gone past the paint, you will need to take your car to a body shop that specialises in fixing dents with the paint missing. This will be more expensive and timely to fix, as we mentioned earlier. 

If you have an older car, weigh the cost of repairs vs. how much you’ll get from your resale without fixing it before you make your decision. You can always fix the more superficial ones with paintless dent repair and leave the bigger ones for the new owner to save yourself some money if need be. 

How to Maximise Your Car’s Resale Value

You’ve seen how dents can affect your car’s resale value, so here are some additional tips keeping that resale value nice and high. 

1. Clean and detail the car.
2. Fix minor repairs needed before you sell.
3. Keep the car’s mileage as low as possible.
4. Refresh the interior as best you can before selling.
5. Replace all necessary parts (bulbs, glass, etc)

Up Your Resale Value with Caversham Coachworks

At Caversham Coachworks, our mission is to provide top quality car repairs and dent removal services. Our technicians have the skills and tools to get your vehicle looking new again, no matter if you’re dealing with a minor or major dents. We offer exceptional service and use the most modern, safe techniques to repair your vehicle.

Call us today or complete our convenient online free estimator tool and see why we are the leading independent vehicle repair centre in Berkshire and Central Oxfordshire.