^^^^ Familiar story for sure.....
My boss had a wrecked unit, all the local shops that *would* touch it estimated at least $15k in repairs with no promises. Only 25% of it's value but a big chunk of cash just the same.
After over a month he couldn't take it any more and asked me to make some contacts and see if we could get and old employee to take a look.
Well "Bob" stops over, looks at the damage, makes about a page of notes then goes to visit the owner. After some negociating, Bob offers to "fix" it for $5k, we buy all the parts and clear the shop for him as a FAVOR to us. We agree and he shows up Saturday to beging the repairs.
Um, Monday morning it's completely repaired and parked outside painted and all. The owner was MAJOR P!SSED!!!!! $5k for only two days work! Not even, I think "Bob" actually had it finnished in about 10 hours.
After all the cr@p jobs Bob did for us over the preceeding years, and considering we were going to have to total the unit w/o his help, everyone got off good.