To give you a clue about what these cars can hide, I paid £150 for a mk2 Spitfire that had cost the previous owner £5000 3 years earlier.
It was a temple to bodgery. Floor pans were made out of road signs cut to size and stuck down with silicon sealant.
Engine (Mk4) was utterly shagged, knocking noise would have been defeaning if it hadn't had a very noisy exhaust system. Pissed oil of every possible place.
You could hear the spokes in the Wire wheels "pinging" as you turned corners.
I managed to get an MOT on it and shortly after it ripped the rear trailing arms out of the box section. Very exciting handling but it got me home.
Did have a mint chassis under it mind, which is now under a Mk1 GT6.
Looked cracking in the photos she showed me from when they bought it.