There is no way I would let my wife use this vehicle unless a real Collision Center assured me that they could put it back properly . Any time a vehicle reaches Salvage point I don’t want it , period.
And that’s your choice and I wouldn’t even think of talking you out of it. But it’s not mine and in my view the owner of this car should know the options.
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Mr. West , the owner of this vehicle did not even know if he took a settlement and kept the vehicle it would have a Salvage title .
There is a lot of skill involved in body work. If he is skilled, it will look like new, except maybe for the paint, if he does not repaint the entire car. It’s unlikely he would have the facility to do a modern paint job.
OK, let’s talk door anatomy and metal properties. (I’m really just trying to avoid cleaning the garage. Either too hot or too cold.) A door is just a stamped sheet metal inner frame (thin) and an outer thin sheet metal cover welded or glued together. The strength comes from all the bends and putting it all together. There really isn’t much to them and really doesn’t offer much crash protection. Just like your hollow core doors in your house, it is only cardboard egg carton type filler with thin plywood glued on each side. Not much there but put together is reasonably sound. Doesn’t take much to break through one though. For safety, because doors collapsed so easily (I have some experience there too), they started putting heavier beams inside the door. You can see where the bottom of the beam is from the small crease at the upper part of the door, under the handle. So the safety beam is still intact and undisturbed. The sheet metal outside shell and some of the inner shell is disturbed though. So really not much of an issue whether left alone or pounded back in shape.
Now when a piece of metal is bent, and then bent again, it becomes “work hardened”. Stiffer and more brittle. This would be a problem for a crush zone absorbing a crash, but doors and the dog leg are not crush zones. You don’t want the side to crumple, but to stay intact in a crash to protect the occupants. So by reworking the door and the associated dog leg, the metal will actually become stiffer than before and really offer more resistance in a crash.
Bottom line, no safety problem in fixing the car to make it look better. Or as I see it from my little world in the little town by the lake after having a few doors apart. Change my mind as they say.
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Due respect, but I’m going to guess you’re not a financial planner. That OP is bothering to ask this question rather than just running out to buy themselves a new Mercedes suggests that money is not unlimited for them.
Your suggestion would have the OP spend the insurance payout to borrow a car, which means at the end of the borrowing period, OP has neither the money nor a car, and now they have to go spend more money to get another car. That’s, honestly, not a smart financial move.
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With a wee one in college, that is an understatement for most. The good news is that it usually doesn’t last forever. At some point they are out of school and finances return to normal. 
Couldn’t help it.
Twenty years later the kids are gone, if you’re lucky. In the meantime, saving for college and retirement and paying the mortgage can eat up anyone’s wages.
Well, yes, that’s true. But I never expected much else. You get old enough, you take care of yourself, if you are lucky you find another person to partner with and maybe reproduce, they you and your partner find ways to support yourselves and your kids and you build a life. It costs money. Sometimes you drive a banged up, sad looking car because that’s what you do.
That’s for **** sure! The down payment together with the three years of monthly payments probably come to just under $7k. Then there’s the required full-coverage insurance, which will add another $30-40 per month compared to good insurance on a beater (by which I mean liability with decent policy limits, uninsured/underinsured motorist, and medical payments to pay toward your own injuries in an accident). That’s a lot of money to sink into something which disappears at the end of 3 years!
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That is all well and good until you get into an accident that is someone eles fault, got rear ended, my trailblazer not bad, other car totalled, $1400 estimate, then the other insurance company I had to deal with as I had no collision dropped the repair down to $700 using used parts. I think I may have gotten lucky on our lease. $31k original car price, 3 years at $300 a month ($10,800), bought it out at $17,988. Looked at Rav4 xle awd with less than 20k miles 21 to 25k,
It’s all theoretical, until you actually get in a crash, geez. I’m assuming you’re not suggesting that the OP actually go crash-test this car (again)? That argument is like saying ‘I don’t need a seatbelt because I’ll just be sure not to run into anyone’.
One basic fact, with that damage. If another crash happens in the same general area…never mind the crumple zones, metallurgy, or all of the “theoretical” stuff that you really should pay attention to from a safety standpoint. You’ve moved the exterior of the car closer to the passenger compartment…where there used to be metal, there’s now just air (because the metal has already been dented in). Whatever car is crashing into you now has an extra two inches to travel at 50 mph before anything starts slowing it down. Doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out that there’s a safety issue here.
I found a semi-retired auto body man who repaired the car for me for $2200. It’s not showroom perfect, but he said the vehicle is safe and everything works. Some photos of the repair and the finished car below.
I am impressed. It’s as close to “showroom perfect” as any other 10-year old used car on the road. (Yes, I know it’s even older than that.) What a great car! I hope you get many more years of use out of it.
The car looks decent again, and I figure it will be a win if the repair holds up for at least three years.
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Congratulations on a happy ending. I wish your daughter well.
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That is a good looking repair
I’m glad you went that route
Far better choice, versus junking it and buying a totally unknown car, which probably would have been hiding all sorts of evils and was probably maintained very poorly
I’ll go a little off-topic
This is a perfect example of why body shop work is expensive . . . and just imagine what it would have cost if this had been completely above board, so to speak . . . you’re paying for considerable man-hours of labor and hard-earned expertise.
By the way, can I assume the door was repaired and partially repainted, versus being replaced?
The person I used has hard-earned expertise, too. He is nearly 70 years old, spend his entire career as an autobody man, and owned his own six bay auto body business. He retired but does small jobs out of his home garage to keep his hand in the business. He replaced the door with a used one, which is what the autobody shop had included in their quote.
You are correct, an autobody shop would have restored the car to factory appearance, and that was reflected in their quote. That was not worth it to me, because the other 3/4 of the car is showing its age (no rust, though). I asked the person I used to ensure the car be safe to operate and that it look good, but perfection was not my goal. He delivered what I requested.
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To my inexperienced eye he went above and beyond what you asked. You’re fortunate to know such a guy. Dad had an uncle who was a mechanic and knowing him was a huge boon.
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Looks pretty darn good to me . . .
I suspect people who have never seen the car before could walk right up to it and never realize that there had been an accident
That car should easily last several more years
How did you find this guy, anyways . . . ?!
Word of mouth?
Or did you know him before he semi-retired?
You should tell your neighbors and friends what a good job he did 
Since the car now has a salvage title, does that affect getting it registered?