I never repair, just break down and remake. You save gold, and get skill ups, and the new armor will be the same level.
But that does not make much sense if the armor you wear comes with some sort of charm or bonuses. The next you will not come with this bonus. I have a set that gives me +7% experience in exploration. Always fix it. However, other parts of the armor I made it myself.
The difficulty in finding gold makes the players build their own armor, but realized that there are not many types of armor to do.
The only thing that is changing is the lvl, but the look of them is the same.