Actually, it’s totally worth paying for this if you can totally mock him in public for a long time to come. Things like how poor he must be. And how sad it is that he treats his minivan like an expensive car. I bet someone like this guy would go crazy if you kept on him for this.

old # 7 and a used sock. Twenty minutes or less later, it will look good as new.

I think the important thing here is what kind of hell hole do you live in that requires the garage door to be shut at all times or you'll get your stuff stolen.

Maybe something about him trying to pick up single moms in his flawless minivan. Whatever it takes to get under his skin.

Probably one that would require a police escort to get to the punkin patch.

I wouldn't ask for it to be fixed, but I'd be annoyed someone closed a garage door on my car. If I was in wife's spot I would just pay to have it buffed out, probably wouldn't be that much and would negate any bad feelings.

The kind of hell hole populated with soccer moms fueled by anxiety, perfectionism, and chardonnay.

And the kind where it is embarrassing to drive around in a raggedy-ass minivan.

This is true. How does this even happen? Oh wait a preschooler party outing...nm. My brain would be a bit fuzzy also.

The correct answer, as always, is to pay the guy, and never associate with him again.

Even before I saw the "scratches", I was thinking "LOL @ ever getting insurance involved for something like this".

This.

I work at a body shop. I could be wrong, but in those pictures I can't see any dents in the tail gate. The light scratches on the tail gate may buff out, which a buddy at a body shop would do for free in about 3 minutes. The deeper scratch on the right side of the handle needs paint. The cheapest solution would be a stick of touch-up paint; the car dealer can look up the paint code from your VIN and sell you one for about $10-20. It won't look perfect, but it will look OK from more than 3 feet away and it will keep the gate from rusting (the handle is probably plastic).

If they want the tailgate and handle painted by a professional, you're looking at $300+ for: detrim lift gate, blend within panel, then trim out lift gate. FWIW, even with the best painters, it's hit-or-miss how well the new paint job will match the rest of the car; silvers and grays are especially tough to match the existing tone exactly.

If the owner insists on a professional paint job and you don't know anyone who works at/owns a body shop, your cheapest move would be to find someone who is/knows a criminal and give them $200 to steal the car.

Awesome! I like it.

wow, yeah I'm sorry I would tell them to straight **** off, and then stop associating with them. Having people that would take their 1.5 year old van in for a repair on something that massively minor is a big leak.

Like I can't imagine that their van isnt already covered with stuff that minor. Do these people never drive it?

Paying to have it stolen and chopped is next level.

Hey, I am updating you all as I find out **** here, so my initial reaction was assuming that it was a brand spanking new van--not a year and a half old--and that the scratches were worse than the pictures.

More details: I have never met either the wife or husband. My wife has a **** ton of friends in the area, but this one is not a close one. I guess my 4yo is friends with their kid at school. The mom volunteered to drive a carpool to the god damned pumpkin patch field trip and they met at her house.

As far as the hell hole we live in, it's called ****ing USA#1. My wife is in the habit of always putting down the garage door because once 6 years ago and 2 houses ago we left it open overnight and some **** heads stole our ****ty ass 20-year-old bikes.

The story up to now is the wife was pretty agitated because I guess they are anal freaks about their stupid lolvan, or she just knows her husband is one. She told Mrs. Truant that she would talk to her husband and see what he wants to do. Then she texted the pictures to my wife today and told her that he wants to take it to get it repaired and would let us know what they say.

There are still some unknowns here. Will the shop buff it out with rubbing compound, or recommend that over a full gate repaint? Will the couple have the ****ing nerve to try to present us with a ridic bill? Will they suggest we pay the whole thing? Will it be enough to get insurance involved? Does the husband even lift? Based on the trajectory, I am assuming the worst here, that they are insufferable nits and that I will be making a cost-benefit analysis of pushing back depending on the price and how these mother****ers fit into my wife's social structure.

Lastly, yes I can afford to pay $1k without it ****ing up my life, but that is because I don't spend money on nice things very often or give a **** about the paint job on my cars and stuff.

don't have it chopped. Have it stolen and dumped where it will be found but the criminal sprays wd-40 everyone on the inside to hide the prints and smokes about 10 packs of cigarettes in it. Then the insurance wont total it, and i can't imagine that these pricks could tolerate driving around in a van that someone else had stolen and that stinks like cigarette smoke and wd-40. So will cost them money because theyll have to sell the POS for less than value and get a brand new one. Hopefully they are upside down on it too.

Alobar,

They'd still want the scratches fixed before they sold it though.


Johnny,

You're getting taken for a ride. In your shoes I'd agree to just pay for it and be done with them but there's no way I'd pay anything over $100. Any body shop that wants to repaint the whole gate is shady as hell. In fact paying anything over $50 seems like you're getting taken. I mean more taken than being expected to pay a penny.

Probably the most important factor, in the end, will be that my wife is embarrassed for making a mistake and feels ****ty for scratching their van, and by how much it upset them. I don't give a **** about these people, especially if they do turn out to be unreasonable, but I love my wife a lot and will choose the path that causes her the least stress, which will not likely be going to war.

ETA: there is a point where paying an exorbitant amount will be more stressful than fighting back, though.

With all the new info I am moving into the "accidents happen" camp and letting him deal with his own stuff.

If the estimate comes out very low ($200 or less), I might consider being the good guy and picking it up. More than that, I'm probably not going to be very agreeable and will just tell him that his wife should have closed the tailgate since she obviously knew it was in harm's way if the garage door got closed by anyone making an attempt to protect everyone's property and toddlers.

None of this is wrong.

JT,

0% chance this guy lifts.

I'd be more annoyed that someone decided to close my garage door for no reason than I would be with the scratches on the car.

Why would you be annoyed at someone closing your garage door? You've also got a bunch of preschoolers running around, it's probably a decent precaution to take.

I came in to say this.

Rexx,

Because why the **** are you closing someone's garage door? If the person who lives there wanted it closed, they would have closed it themself or asked someone to close it. Pretty presumptuous to just close it without asking.

As far as toddlers go, were there even any in the garage when this happened?

Either way, the mini vans people seen like insufferable douche bags who deserve any additional pain that Johnny can manage to inflict upon them.