There are a lot of reasons why you should plan the restoration of your car before you dive in head first, one of the biggest reasons that I can suggest to you is, so your car will get restored the way that you want it to, any good restoration shop should be glad to help you with this part, if they want your business, this is one way to determine what shop that you'd like to take your car to for the restoration work, go to a few shops and compare their plans to see what one fits the idea that you have for your car the best.

Now remember that because I say a plan, this does not mean that the shop will estimate a price on the restoration work to be done on your car, a plan is merely a lay out of how that work will be done on your car, and this should give you peace of mind during the restoration work, restoration shops do not give estimates for a very good reason, they have no idea what they'll have to repair on your car during the restoration process, until they begin the work on your car.

If your main goal is to save money, then maybe now is not the time to restore your car, my experiences restoring cars tell me that usually the cars that we restore are not in great shape, usually there is a lot of rust, dents, and general bad body work to repair, not to mention electrical, mechanical, and interior work to be done on your car, and this is why I say, do yourself a favor, and go to a few shops and put a road map of how the restoration process will be done on your car.

A plane should include an idea of what needs to be done on your car, and how it will get done, a plan should include you telling the shop what you want the car to be when it's done, such as a show car, a driver, or a custom car, you have got to realize that there are a lot of differences between the type of work, a driver may not need to be 100% perfect, you don't need to replace every littles and make the car 100% factory again, where on the other hand, if you want a show winning car, every last nut and bolt will have to be as close to perfect as it can, and this of course makes the process of the work change.

Ask the shops a lot of questions, and be sure to look at some of the cars that they have restored in the past years, tell the shop exactly what you want to use this car for, because in most cases, a show car is not your daily driver, you don't want dents and scratches in your show car, well not if you aim to win any shows with it, your daily driver will get door dings, dents, and scratches as a natural part of your every day driving of the car, it does not matter if you take extra care to see that this doesn't happen, it will happen.

The restoration shop that you choose should treat your car as if it were there own, treat it an you with respect, but remember this is a two way road, if you offend the shop and it's workers, the shop will offend you, so if you ask respect of the shop that's doing the work on your car, then give respect to them, and remember that if speed and fast work is what you want on your car, this does cost more money, as the shop has to take people off of other jobs and put them on your car, and the shop labor rate is a per person thing, if there are three people working on your car and the labor rate is $75.00 per hour, you will pay that amount for each person working on your car, and yes it is fair.

So I say do yourself a favor, and plan your restoration down to the finest detail, know exactly what you plan on using your car for, know how much money you want to spend, and know that most shop's don't have the space to store your car, unless their working on it, a shop makes it's living by using the space it has to a maximum advantage, and it does this by havening every space that a car sits in making money every day, a well organized shop will know how much it needs to make from each space to stay in business, and they will not short change themselves in any way.
ZL1 Corvette Registry Classic Car Restoration