My buddy bought a 1989 Ford Mustang 5.0 LX GT with a slipping automatic transmission, A/C and nothing else for $500. Rebuilt auto, stall, tires, heads, intake, decent FI cam, headers, exhaust, 4.10 gears and a Procharger got him into the 10's for less than $10,000 on the stock lower end. We did almost all of the work ourselves and I'm not saying it can't be done but that's hard to beat, the ROI for that car has been fantastic, and he drives it to work...