How much should it cost to paint a door?

[Silver99SE]

I know this question gets asked plenty, and I have scanned through every thread in The Body Shop here and haven't found an answer. My drivers side door has some surface rust along the bottom and a couple spots on the top. I took it to a local frame and body shop and the guys said that it looked like it had a new door skin put on and it didn't get painted good enough. So I asked him to give me a quote on painting the door, which would involve sanding out the rust spots, painting and clear coat. The estimate was $470. Does that sound right? I'm going to get estimates from a few other shops next week. A couple friends said it sounded a bit high to them, but they don't know much about body work just like me. What do you think?

[Silver99SE]

*bump*

[Peyman]

for a decent job...i think 300 would be fair

[Silver99SE]

Ya that's what I was kinda thinking. I want it done right of course, but $500? Seemed a bit steep to me also.

[JoeyK]

There's no way to acurately guess this kind of thing. We don't know what the door looks like at all (condition of rust, any dents, what paint type it'll be, etc.) Some things sound high to people when they don't have a clue as to what all goes into a job. Like when I was getting estimates to have my mothers house reshingled, sounded high to me, but I'm no carpenter. I didn't have a clue as to what all went into the job. I shopped around & found that the 1st estimate I recieved was actually reasonable. What you really need to do is what you said. Get other estimates from local bodyshops. That's your only way of knowing what the average in your area is. What one shop in Calif. would charge for the same job might sound high to someone in, let's say Boise Idaho.
Everyone that even thinks of asking that ... "How much should this cost" when it comes to a body estimate is really just wasteing thier time typing. Really, Not trying to be rude, just stateing the facts. I see so many people ask the same thing about costs & I can guess as good as anyone on the forum about the cost but you know what? It's still just a guess & nothing more. See my point?:)

[Silver99SE]

Ya I see what you're saying. I'm gonna get some estimates tomorrow and then go from there. I might even consider taking the door off and stripping it down first and try to save some there. Any ideas on how hard that is to do? I have power everything.