I'm sure everyone has seen the "Uh oh, Better get Maaco" commercial where they go on and on about how good their paint job is and at such a low cost. I first decided to paint my car after I saw a stock hite CRX in a parking lot one day from the road. I only saw the rear end but just the way that black tint on the rear hatch accented the white around it made me think about how much I didn't like "Y-49" Barbados Yellow as my car. I decided I need a change and to end the "Short Bus" cracks about my ride. But the whole idea of a quality paint job for under 800 dollars made me a little 'iffy'. First thing I did was go down to the nearest Maaco and had my car estimated. It wasn't the best first impression for me because the lot going into the factory was little motto-cross course. I thought, "That's a good way to get people to need body work". The man there was very helpful and gave me a quick estimate on my car: 189 dollars to repaint it Mustang Yellow in their lowest quality paint. I wanted white but they said it would be 75 dollars to paint each door jam, the hatch, and the hood. I went home and did a little research online. What I saw mostly was complaints about how the paint would peel and fade after only a few weeks. However when I looked closer at these reports they were all from the same Maaco in Salem, Massachusetts. I didn't know at the time that each Maaco was franchised by Maaco Corporate, so that individual people owned each factory. After talking to my brother, a mechanic at a local garage, he suggested I should prep the car myself and it would turn out a lot better.

So then it hit me: If I paint the door jams myself, I won't have to spend 00 dollars extra to change the color of my car and I could get the supreme paint. How many shades of white could there be? Well.. a lot.. But they all looked the same as soon as they dry. I went to Advanced Auto Parts (Numerous times) to get the supplies I needed. 6 Cans of primer, 2 industrial cans of white spray paint, 5 import color Honda Polar White. That along with sand paper came out to be around 30-40 dollars. That sure as hell beat 75 dollars per section. I took my corner lights out and my taillights and pulled my dad's boat out of the garage, wheeled mine in, and got started taping sections down. First, I found out that my car was so old and there was so much grease and oil on EVERYTHING that masking tape would just not stick. I used duct tape, against the advice of my brother who said it would react with the paint. Using a bit of creativity and trash bags, I covered my seats and the plastic parts of the car I did not wish to paint. The man at the first Maaco I went too told me to not worry about getting paint actually on my car if I did anything of the work myself, and that he would just sand it down. It took me about 3 days, working on it about an hour or two a day just to get everything taped down and covered. Next, I had to sand it. Finding that sanding was a little more tiresome that I originally thought, I only did the sections that I would really see and omitted things like under the door. For those I just brushed across them once or twice to get any excess grime off. Then, primer. One section at a time I primed the 4 areas I planned to paint myself. Here's the trick to primer and paint: DONT HOLD DOWN THE BUTTON. Push it. Release. Push it. Release.
Just do that over and over again while moving it across a small area at a time and it'll slowly coat. It takes a lot longer but it doesn't drip. Once it was dry, I did the same thing with the paint. For the inside of the hood I used those industrial cans of spray paint since they held a lot more and I wasn't too concerned with that area shining. I pulled off the tape, replaced the rubber stripping around the doors. And decided I did a damn good job. Now I had to get my car painted. My brother called me that day and told me that the Maaco in the neighboring county did a lot better job and I should tow my car to them. (I needed to tow since I didn't want to put my taillights back in and Maaco does not remove everything). So not all Maaco's did the same job huh? I wanted to know more, so I called around. Every single Maaco in the city. There were five. Are the prices the same? How long have you been in business? Do you have a website? Questions like that. I eventually went with my brother's decision, thought having never been to that factory since it was so far away, and towed my car there. When I pulled up, it looked like the factory on the Maaco website. The high-tech looking building, not that junkyard like my first trip.
I was worried but that sight set my fears to rest. They had a garage open and you could see one of the cars being painted, it just happened to be white. I also felt comfort knowing there was a very modern fence there with security cameras at each pole to cage in the cars that would be painted. This man was even more helpful then the first Maaco. 300 for the supreme. 50 to flex-prime my molding and side skirts, 35 to change the color and for supplies, paint, etc. 385. Now you're talking. I left off my car and went home. 2 days later they called and said it was ready, but I was out. When I got home they were closed, but I couldn't wait. I made the 20-mile drive to the factory even to just see my car through the fence. They had it set out (I would have preferred it being inside, but it turned out it didn't matter) but it was too dark to see anything and I couldn't get close. The way the moon reflected it though, it looked great. The next day I had my friend drive me out there with my lights. I put all my lights back in and put the strip back around my sunroof (Which is a bitch, If you're not willing to spend about an hour hurting your fingers with a screwdriver, leave it in and clean the excess paint off it if they over spray). The car looked amazing. It was that really bright gloss that only came from a new paint job or a new car. It was soft too. Real smooth. It wasn't perfect, I'll admit. I've found two drips in inconspicuous places and a few little.. I don't know, backward nicks I guess but other then that it's amazing. My mom said, "That car was made to be white" after she saw it. I've never enjoyed my rex more then I do now. Nothing makes it stand out more then a new paint job, and I highly recommend painting the moldings and side mirrors and what not. Maaco has very high quality paint. The drop in charge comes from their speedy prep work. If you prime the car yourself, they won't give you a warranty, but if you take all the lights out and everything you don't want over spray on, go around and find the BEST Maaco in your area, you really can get a good paint job for under one grand.