It is all a question of money when you get down to your final decision.

Six K may be ok and even a bargain if the car was particularly nasty to begin with...

My 'road pig' began in pretty nasty shape.  Yet all the body shops in the area of West Chester PA wanted $4200 to completely renovate the body.

I ended up buying a new front bumper cover, new hood, body side moldings, rear valance etc and did it myself.    

When I trotted the 'rebodied' road pig around to the shops they all came in with estimates of about $1800 for final sanding, prep and paint - and that was using fairly expensive paint. 

My cost of the parts was about $600.   So there was a nice tidy saving of about $1800 in my pocket, rather than the body shop.

One thing that I have noticed is that depending on the market you live in, there can be quite a difference in similar body and paint jobs. 

When I was down in Texas there were shops that could accomplish miracles with wrecks and the full cost of a complete reno was about $1800 total.  And surprisingly the quality of the work was beyond reproach.

When I relocated back to Canada, I did some price shopping to see what the situation was like here.  Everyone came in at roughly $2400 CANADIAN.( which is roughly $1725 US Dollars ).   

But than I heard that one of my friends had just taken his car up to Montreal, which is located in the province of Quebec, roughly 2 hours drive from herre.   His car was in an almost identical condition to mine.   The price he was quoted and eventually paid was $1200 ( CDN ). or roughly $860 US$.

So the one beauty or mystery of bodyshops is that you can have quite a spread of prices for identical levels of work and quality.  But you can also have identical pricing for quite different levels of quality of work.

In the end you have satisfy yourself that the work being performed by the body shop you eventually choose is going to give you a good return on your investment with them.

The last thought that struck me, as I tallied up the monies you were noting this venture was going to cost you... is a question of return on investment.    Now if you are Bill Gates, you can afford to throw caution to the wind and toss money into your car like a drunken sailor on shore leave.   He doesn't have to weigh the cost of the project against what the car will be ultimately worth when the task is finished.   Like Captain Picard on Star Trek, he just says "make it so' and it is done.

But for the average Joe, you have to take a serious look at 'why does this particular car deserve a massive investment'.     The reason I weigh this issue is this - if you look at the total cost you may end up ploughing into your road warrior, you may find that it might be wiser to have invested that big bag of money in a mint condition low mileage McLaren.    The kind of money you are already quoting would land you with a pretty decent McLaren.

That is a factor that should nag you, in the back of your mind.   Is your investment in this particular McLaren worth it when you compare the level of vehicle that you could have purchased with the same bag of cash ?

As for my 'road pig' - I simply wanted to have a car to restore.   That is where I have gotten my kicks with this little car and so far the money invested in it is way below your overall estimate for your car.   At ths point I could not buy a McLaren of 'like mechanical and physical fitness' anywhere for the money that I have invested so far in to this restoration.   At that point I figure I am ahead of the game.   But if I sudden saw my bills pushing the overall restoration of my car into the $10, $12 or $15 bracket - than I will start questioning myself as to why I didn't just buy a low miler to begin with.

Ah... sorry if I rambled... but hopefully it stimulates some conversation on the question of how much money to throw into a restoration and whether the 'break even' point should play a role in that decision

Marq