Is it worth thousands of dollars to fix an inground pool?

Are you planning on selling this house or staying for awhile? If you bought it to fix up and sell and might be somewhere else next year, I'd skip the pool. If your plan is to live here and stay for several years, I think I'd go with what was going to make me love living there, especially if the pool was one of the reasons you bought the house. If you aren't going to resell for a long time, I think what you want in a house in more important than what some future buyer might want in their home.

A pool will not add value to the property. It's an insurance cost increase, can be expensive to maintain and a possible danger, especially for those with kids. That being said, I would flipping love to have a pool and despit the cost, tue enjoyment that comes from it would make it worth it for me.

Did you buy the house to fix it up and sell for a profit? If yes, leave the pool alone. Did you buy the house to live in and enjoy for an indeterminate number of years? If yes, repair the pool.

I'd worry less about the $5-6K, which isn't a huge amount of money in home improvement terms, and consider how likely it is that you'd use it often enough, over the long term, to make the ongoing maintenance costs and chores feel worthwhile. Is there a decent municipal or private pool nearby that could give you almost as much fun for way less work? Do you love swimming by yourself or very occasionally with friends so much that it will continue to feel great even after the novelty wears off?

What if you filled it with dirt and made it into a garden. Would that even work?

Fix the pool! A friend of ours has a pool. They've only lived in the house with said pool for one summer but I tell you, that one summer was a blast for their children as well as the children of their friends. One night, the grown ups even kicked all the kids out after dark and we ran around the outer of the pool, laughing and carrying on, until we made a whirlpool. We're adults, keep in mind. IT WAS A BLAST. If our friends pool had issues that needed repair, I'd go so far as to offer them money to help with the repairs just because it's been such a fun thing for everyone.

I agree with Admiral Haddock: your reasoning re the pool is actually about adding a pool. What you have now is a huge hole in your back yard. I would be very surprised if the value of your house is the same with that huge hole as it would be with a working pool. Fix it or fill it in.

You've got to do something with it because right now it's probably a health and safety hazard. You know how much it would cost to fix it up and restore it to being a pool. How much would it cost to fill it in properly?

What if you filled it with dirt and made it into a garden. Would that even work? It won't drain properly in the rain if you do this. If you don't want to pay $6k to fix it, you really don't want to pay the court judgement when someone falls into a mud pit in your backyard and drowns.