For example
Mario has a black car (vsr1.com see cars for sale) that is at his shop and that he is quite familiar with. The advantage to you is that you know what you're starting with and hence the time and effort to create exactly what you want is more deterministic.
I always hear people say, "buy the best you can." The problem is, most of us do not have the ability to look past a really nice paint job. You can't see how well the sheet metal was restored, or if it was properly cleaned or if the inner cavities were treated with a self etching catalyzed primer, etc. If you talk to reputable restorers, you'd be amazed at the percentage of really gorgeous/restored cars the encounter that end up needing to be redone because they were just really thick lipstick on a pretty ugly pig.
I just saw a gorgeous, fully restored CSL. Except, there was a whole list of things that weren't correct on it ... some of which require repainting to fix.
My personal belief is that it's better to buy the best "starter car" you can, and have someone trustworthy do a full on restoration for you.
Can you occasionally find a very well restored car that's selling for less than it would cost to duplicate? Of course, as long as there's full documentation of what was done, the restoration shop is one of the few good ones, and that shop is willing to tell you the full and unadulterated truth about the restoration. Again, you're likely better of taking to the owners of these shops because they know where all their best restorations reside.
John
