Fifteen points compared side by side: evidential value, who pays, what is included. And the cases where a repair estimate is enough.
In short: A repair estimate is a repair quotation from a workshop. A damage appraisal report additionally documents diminished value, replacement value, salvage value and the repair and downtime periods, and it supports settlement under § 249 (2) sentence 1 BGB (German civil code). For very small losses a repair estimate is enough; there is no uniform nationwide value threshold for this.
Both documents put a figure on what a repair should cost — but they answer different questions. The repair estimate answers: what does this workshop charge for this repair? It is a costed quotation for a job the workshop would like to carry out itself. The damage appraisal report answers: what damage has the vehicle sustained, and what sum of money is required to make it good?
The difference shows in the content. A repair estimate normally ends with a total made up of labour units, parts and paintwork. A damage appraisal report additionally contains the items needed to settle the claim, which a workshop does not determine at all: the market-based diminished value, the replacement value, the salvage value, the expected repair duration and the time needed to obtain a replacement vehicle. Without those figures, several heads of claim simply cannot be quantified.
Then there is the position of the author. The workshop is your future contractual partner for the repair and has a commercial interest of its own in the job. The appraiser is instructed to establish and assess the condition, not to repair it. The case law builds on that independence when it makes the appraiser's findings the basis of settlement.
| Feature | Repair estimate | Damage appraisal report |
|---|---|---|
| Who produces it | The repair shop that wants to carry out the work | An automotive appraiser with no interest of their own in the repair |
| Who chooses | You choose the workshop | On a liability claim, free choice of appraiser; the other party's insurer cannot dictate one to you |
| Who bears the cost | Often free of charge, or for a fee credited against the repair order; recoverable as a head of loss only so far as actually incurred and necessary | On a not-at-fault liability claim, part of the recoverable loss under § 249 (2) sentence 1 BGB, so far as the appraisal was necessary and appropriate |
| Evidential value in court | A party's submission on the level of repair costs; covers only that one item | Substantiated submission on every head of loss and the customary basis for the court's assessment under § 287 ZPO; does not replace a court-ordered expert report |
| Repair costs | Included | Included |
| Market-based diminished value | Not included | Included; since BGH, judgments of 16 July 2024 – VI ZR 205/23 and VI ZR 188/22, to be calculated from the net sale price |
| Replacement value | Not included | Included; the price of an equivalent replacement vehicle on the regional market before the accident |
| Salvage value | Not included | Included; usually on the basis of at least three offers from the regional market |
| Repair duration | At most as a non-binding indication of dates from the workshop | Stated as calculated working days |
| Period of loss of use | Not included | Included; downtime and vehicle group under the Sanden/Danner/Küppersbusch table |
| Total loss assessment | Not possible, because replacement value and salvage value are missing | Possible, including examination of the 130 percent limit |
| Photo documentation and course of events | As a rule not covered | Regularly included, as are details of prior damage and plausibility |
| Effort to produce | Low; often costed as the vehicle is booked in | Higher; inspection, calculation, and determination of value and salvage value with a market survey |
| What it is sufficient for | Small, unambiguous body damage with no diminished value and no downtime | Full settlement of every item, notional settlement, total loss, contested liability |
| What it is not sufficient for | Diminished value, loss of use, total loss, separating prior damage, preserving evidence | It is no substitute for legal advice and does not bind the court |
After a not-at-fault accident, the cost of the appraisal report is among the financial losses recoverable under § 249 (2) sentence 1 BGB, so far as obtaining it was necessary and appropriate in order to pursue the claim. The yardstick is the view of a sensible, economically minded injured party at the time of instruction. The Federal Court of Justice held this in its judgment of 30 November 2004 – VI ZR 365/03 and again in its judgment of 22 July 2014 – VI ZR 357/13.
You do not have to survey the market for the cheapest appraiser, and the other party's liability insurer cannot dictate an appraiser to you — there is no contract between you and it from which a right to give instructions could follow. What it may do is dispute the level of the fee and the necessity in the individual case. The BVSK fee survey is recognised as a basis for assessment under § 287 ZPO.
In practice the workshop's repair estimate is often produced free of charge, or for a fee that the workshop credits when the repair order is placed. Where a fee actually arises, it is recoverable on the same basis as other heads of loss: so far as it was necessary.
Case law: BGH, judgment of 12 March 2024 – VI ZR 280/22. The principles on the repair shop risk apply to the appraiser risk as well: from the moment the instruction is given and the vehicle handed over, the injured party's ability to know and to influence matters is limited.
This is the real decision point — and there is no nationwide figure. The Federal Court of Justice has used the concept of minor damage but has not fixed a euro limit. It requires the necessity to be examined case by case. The numbers circulating in guides come from the lower courts and the commentary literature, not from a ruling of the Federal Court of Justice.
The local, regional and higher regional courts set the threshold very differently. The range runs from about € 600 to about € 1,000, and it depends noticeably on which court would have local jurisdiction.
| Court | Case number and date | Threshold applied |
|---|---|---|
| AG Ratzeburg | 17 C 95/21, judgment of 20 Dec 2021 | € 600.00 |
| AG Braunschweig | 120 C 1071/21, judgment of 12 Jan 2022 | € 700.00 |
| AG Pforzheim | 3 C 739/24, judgment of 1 Oct 2024 | € 700.00 |
| LG Freiburg | 3 S 145/16, judgment of 24 Nov 2016 | € 750.00 |
| OLG München | 10 U 579/15, judgment of 26 Feb 2016 | € 750.00 |
| AG Siegburg | 121 C 96/23, judgment of 28 Dec 2023 | around € 800.00 |
| AG Lübeck | 29 C 1246/21, judgment of 27 Oct 2021 | € 811.21 |
| AG Rostock | 43 C 1/17, judgment of 25 Apr 2017 | € 822.42 (incl. VAT) |
| AG Passau | 15 C 872/22, judgment of 11 Apr 2023 | € 993.00 |
| AG Oberndorf a. N. | 10 C 121/23, judgment of 26 Aug 2023 | € 1,000.00 (net) |
| AG Oberndorf a. N. | 10 C 250/22, judgment of 22 Mar 2023 | around € 1,000.00 |
| OLG Hamm | I-7 U 45/21, judgment of 28 Jun 2022 | € 1,018.43 (incl. VAT) |
Careful: These figures are individual decisions, not a formula. Anyone wanting to know the threshold in advance faces a circular problem: whether the loss falls below it is only known once it has been quantified. Where components are visibly destroyed, panels are distorted, or damage to load-bearing parts is suspected, the minor-damage threshold is in practice never an issue.
There is a discernible tendency in the more recent lower-court decisions to read the minor-damage threshold narrowly and to award appraisal costs even where the damage looks modest from the outside; see for example AG Bad Neustadt a. d. Saale, judgment of 28 May 2026 – 1 C 21/26. All that can safely be taken from it is a direction, not a new figure.
There are situations in which an appraisal is not necessary and its cost is therefore not reimbursed either. The repair estimate is then the correct route on the merits — not the second best.
That applies first of all to genuinely small losses: a scratched bumper cover, a broken door mirror, a dented trim frame, in each case with no load-bearing parts involved. Where no loss of value is to be expected because the market does not notice damage of that kind once it has been properly repaired, and where the vehicle is not off the road during the work or is off it so briefly that it does not weigh, the appraisal simply lacks the items that would justify it.
It applies further to a comprehensive claim. There it is not § 249 BGB that governs but the insurance contract with its general terms of motor insurance. The comprehensive insurer may as a rule instruct an appraiser of its own or refer you to a named one. If you instruct one on your own initiative, you generally bear the cost. Where the size of the loss is disputed, the terms usually provide for an appraisal procedure under § 84 VVG. The precise scope depends on the wording of your contract; there is no uniform nationwide rule.
And it applies to damage to your own vehicle with no other party involved — reversing into your own garage, for instance. Here there is nobody against whom a claim could be brought; a repair estimate is enough to decide whether and where to repair.
Conversely, there are items that cannot be pursued at all without an appraisal, because the figures they are calculated from do not appear in a repair estimate.
Market-based diminished value is a head of loss in its own right under § 251 (1) BGB, owed alongside the repair costs — including on a notional settlement. It has to be estimated, and the Federal Court of Justice requires an appraiser's estimate under § 287 ZPO rather than a mere formula. Since the judgments of 16 July 2024 – VI ZR 205/23 and VI ZR 188/22 it must be calculated from the net sale price.
Whether there is an economic total loss at all can only be answered once the replacement value and the salvage value are known. The same goes for the 130 percent limit: repair costs plus diminished value may not exceed 130 percent of the replacement value, otherwise only the replacement cost is reimbursed. With the salvage value there is the added point that the regional market governs and you may not be referred to online salvage exchanges — which presupposes that somebody has actually surveyed the regional market.
Loss of use, finally, requires two figures: the vehicle group under the Sanden/Danner/Küppersbusch table, which sorts some 38,000 models into eleven groups from A to L, and the length of the downtime, that is the calculated repair or replacement period. Daily rates run, depending on the group, roughly between € 23 and € 175; the current year's edition of the table governs. Vehicles over five years old are usually moved down one group, those over ten years old two groups.
If you want the sum paid out instead of having the repair done, the appraisal is the sole basis of your claim. In its judgment of 28 January 2025 – VI ZR 300/24 the Federal Court of Justice made clear that what matters is the objectively necessary amount according to the appraisal, not the expenditure actually incurred. A repair estimate, which is expressly a quotation for a particular piece of work, does not carry that role in the same way.
The same applies to prior damage: where the vehicle was already damaged in the area concerned, the separation has to be documented, otherwise the whole amount is liable to be disputed. And where liability is unresolved or contested, preserving evidence through photo documentation and a plausibility check of the damage is often more important than the calculation itself.
The term is not defined in law, and the case law on necessity under § 249 (2) sentence 1 BGB does not recognise it as a category of its own. In practice it denotes an appraisal of reduced scope, offered for losses at the borderline of the minor-damage threshold. Whether its cost is recoverable does not depend on the title of the document but on whether obtaining the appraisal was necessary and appropriate at the time of instruction, and on whether the result supports the items you want to claim. Rely on the content, therefore, not on the label.
On 16 January 2024 the Federal Court of Justice handed down five decisions on the repair shop risk on a single day: VI ZR 38/22, VI ZR 239/22, VI ZR 253/22, VI ZR 266/22 and VI ZR 51/23. The core: the party who caused the damage bears the risk of inflated or unperformed workshop work, so far as this was not recognisable to the injured party. The Federal Court of Justice expressly held that the injured party does not have to obtain an appraisal before instructing the workshop.
In fairness that belongs in any weighing-up. It does not mean an appraisal is superfluous — it means you do not need one in order to be allowed to have the vehicle repaired at all. The reasons for an appraisal lie elsewhere: in the items a repair invoice does not capture, and in preserving evidence.
Careful: Where the repair invoice has not yet been paid, you may rely on the repair shop risk but can then only demand payment to the workshop. That legal position cannot be assigned under § 399 BGB — which has considerable consequences for workshops' assignment models.
For a very small loss with no diminished value and no appreciable downtime, it is. As soon as diminished value, loss of use, a possible total loss or a notional settlement are in play, the repair estimate lacks the necessary figures. It contains neither a replacement value nor a salvage value nor a calculated downtime.
There is no uniform nationwide limit. The Federal Court of Justice has laid down no euro threshold but requires the necessity to be examined case by case. The lower courts set the minor-damage threshold at between about € 600 and about € 1,000, in some cases higher. Which figure applies depends on the court with local jurisdiction.
Many workshops produce it free of charge or credit a fee when the repair order is placed. Where a fee actually arises, after a not-at-fault accident it is recoverable on the same basis as other heads of loss, that is under § 249 (2) sentence 1 BGB, so far as it was necessary.
A notional settlement rests on the objectively necessary amount shown by an appraisal; the Federal Court of Justice confirmed this in its judgment of 28 January 2025 – VI ZR 300/24. A repair estimate is a quotation for a particular piece of work and, moreover, covers neither diminished value nor downtime.
No. There is no contractual relationship between you and the other party's liability insurer from which a right to give instructions could follow; the claim is a statutory claim in damages. You may instruct a qualified appraiser of your own choosing. What the insurer may dispute is the level of the fee and the necessity in the individual case.
No. In the five decisions of 16 January 2024 – VI ZR 38/22, VI ZR 239/22, VI ZR 253/22, VI ZR 266/22 and VI ZR 51/23 the Federal Court of Justice expressly held that the injured party need not obtain an appraisal before instructing the workshop. For diminished value and loss of use you will still need one.
No. On a comprehensive claim there is an insurance contract, and the general terms of motor insurance apply instead of § 249 BGB. The insurer may as a rule instruct an appraiser of its own. Where the size of the loss is disputed, the terms usually provide for an appraisal procedure under § 84 VVG.
This article reflects the position as at 3 August 2026 and is no substitute for legal advice in an individual case. Written by PKW Gutachter Service GmbH, automotive appraisal firm, Neu Wulmstorf, Germany.
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