[famoroso]

There's a Pelican with the tagline... "Your classic car owns you. You own your hot rod."

It's a thing. I've suffered it. In fact, it's a big part of the reason I recently sold my 60k mile, original paint '88 M491 on BaT. It's also the reason I kept my 108k mile, repainted, mildly wife-unfriendly '87 M491 hot rod. On the continuum between purist and hot rodder, I fall slightly to the right of centrer. On the one end, some cars should be 100% preserved / restored, On the opposite end, some cars, especially rough cars or basket cases, should be hot rodded to their owner's delight. I'd argue that most cars fall somewhere in the middle. So, I say "you do you" and mod away. It's your money.

I just acquired an '89 coupe. 133k miles. Powertrain is solid with a relatively recent top end. The cosmetics are rough. It needs a bare metal respray and most of the interior redone. For the most part, I subscribe to the "First, do no harm." theory. Keep your mods to 100% reversible items and although you may not end up with your perfect vision, you'll guard against "what were you thinking" type regrets down the road. You'll also save some money. Potentially A LOT of money.

I'd love to do a sunroof delete during my respray, bur it will add at least $7k to the cost. That puts me over my body & paint budget, so no can do.

I agree with the advice of developing a master plan by living with the car for awhile and truly understanding what you want and what you don't want based on your use case. Then again, this isn't your first air-cooled 911 rodeo, so you can move more quickly through that process than a noob.