The cost of a paint job.

[CrazyBoutRacin]

I have an old Corvette I painted 30+ years ago myself in my garage and it still looks great. Cost me very little compared to today. But I’ve been hearing these reports of $20k, 30k paint jobs today that just sound insane. Then I stumbled across this Vette on BaT with an invoice for body repairs and paint @ $40,000 plus.

1967 Chevrolet Corvette Coupe 427 4-Speed

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I couldn’t help but post this on Corvette Forum which sparked a bunch of responses including one from a guy who’s friend had a bill for $72,000 for body and paint on a 63 split window, and another in CA who was only getting quotes in the $40k to $50k range.

I’ve painted two of the cars I own and these prices just sound unreal. I have a couple of friends who are using custom paint shops here in AR for their restorations and they are generally spending about $12k to $17k which is still a chunk. Definitely makes one double think about taking on a project unless you know a guy or can do it yourself.

The last two cars I had painted (going down to bare metal) were around $25k. My ‘65 Coronet is the cheapest one I’ve had done in a while. It’s going to be a regular driver, so I cut some corners here and there, but it was in really good shape generally. It’ll come in around $13 or 14k. Here’s a before pic.