Honda Car Forum

I have a 1997 Honda Civic that is in like-new condition. It only has 25k miles on it, so you can only imagine that the rest is in incredible condition. Minus a couple of scratches, the exterior is in excellent condition. I'm curious of the average cost to paint it black, as white shows so much dirt, too many scratches... and I want to fix the car up a bit so it doesn't look it's actual age- white bores me!

Paint jobs cost quite a bit. If you are changing from whit to black then you are wanting to paint door jambs engine bay trunk, the works. Otherwise it would look dumb everytime you opened the door. I just had a car painted and I didnt even get the door jambs etc painted cause the new color was from black to dark grey so it wasnt really an issue. I got a SOMKING deal at $1400 and I did alot of the work myself. The door jambs and such is where the real work comes in and where the price shoots up. It will be easily be $3500 plus for a decent job.

It would honestly be better and cheaper to sell it and buy one in a different colour. Here in the UK, you can get a "dust over" which is where they simply mask up the windows and doors for about £500, but it looks crap everytime you open the bonnet or doors.A proper full respray needs everyhting to bestripped out the car and redone, here in the UK you;re looking at about £2000.Just so you know, black (and other dark colours) shows the dirt even worse than white does, if you dont want the dirt to show, the best colour is bright red, followed by other bold colours such as french blue or grass green.If you're really bored with white, it's be cheaper and easier to have the paint corrected by a bodyshop and then have a tinted laquer applied over the top. Tinted laquers show the highlights on your cars surface, and white is the easiest colour to apply them over. If you have a blue tint made, your car will appear white but have subtle blue colouring round any curves and dips in the bodywork, which shift as you walk round it.it's not as extreme as the chameleon paints you see and I think is much nicer as its not as garish.

don't do it , if you think white was hard to keep clean you will " drive yourself crazy " with black , plus the body panels must be PERFECT , white can hide a multitude of sins , the first car i did bodywork on had to be painted white , your cherry Honda may look all ripply in black and body prep is $$$$ , do like the others say , buy a black one .

Yep, buy a black one. It's faster and easier...and if you don't do the jambs, under the hood, etc. you'll regret it every time you get in/out of the car. Black shows every spec of dirt.Silver blue isn't too bad.A quality paint job is in the $3500 range as even the nicest car needs decent prep work and that's usually $50-$75 hr. so it adds up fast. Then there are materials. I have a show car and I paid $1500 for two stage paint (materials only) and another $7,000 to get the bodywork and paint done (on a very straight car). Granted. it is a nearly flawless, award-winning mirror-like finish that has been cut and buffed to death. It shocked me too...but the more you pay the better you get.Cars that win best of show for paint at car shows often have $10-$20K paint jobs. Get top dollar from your nice white one and buy a black one for less knowing you are going to do things to customize it.